SOUTH DAKOTA STRAIGHT TALK

Doug Lund at Keloland.com has a nostalgic post When It Was A Game about baseball in the 1950s. Lund was a Dodger fan as was I.

As we approach pathetic Barry Bonds donning the Home Run Crown it is a fitting time to think about when the National Pastime was a game.

Not all about money and some rich men doping up for athletic success. Ironically for Lund, television played a big part in the money chase.

In Fort Worth we had our beloved Double AA Texas League team, Fort Worth Cats. The Cats were a farm team for the Dodgers and thus Brooklyn had many fans in Fort Worth.

During Spring Training in 1958, just before the regular season began, the Dodgers came to town to play an exhibition game against the World Champion Milwaukee Braves. 1958 was also the year that the Dodgers became the Los Angeles Dodgers and moved from historic Ebbets Field to Chavez Ravine.

Miraculously as an eleven year old I convinced my Dad to get tickets and let me stay out of school to see my first Major League ball game. Game day was a sunny spring Texas day, about 75 degrees – just perfect for a boy with his Dad.

On that eventful day, the Starting pitchers were Don Newcombe for the Dodgers and Lew Burdette for the Braves. Burdette had been the MVP of the 57 series. Burdette won 3 games in that Series! Newcombe also had a Major League resume being the only ball player to have won the Rookie of the Year, Most Valuable Player and Cy Young Award, a record he still holds.

Also on hand were other notables, Eddie Mathews, Hank Aaron, Duke Snider, Gil Hodges, Warren Spahn, Don Drysdale, Sandy Koufax and one of my childhood favorites, Pee Wee Reese. Upon retirement Reese went on to join Dizzy Dean in the broadcaster’s booth for the Game of the Week.

By the time that Pee Wee joined the broadcast, they weren’t letting Dean get drunk on the air. Dizzy the great St. Louis Cardinals pitcher was the leader of the Cardinal’s Gas House Gang during the 1930s.

The Braves beat our Dodgers that day at La Grave Field. The highlight of the game was when Eddie Matthews took a big cut and inadvertently, the bat flew out of his hands and out toward the pitcher’s mound and Don Newcombe. Newcombe who is a hulk of a man and seems at least 6 feet 6 inches and perhaps 250 pounds, picked up the bat (which looked like a toothpick when he held it in one hand, and walked to home plate in a menacing fashion and handed it to the errant Matthews.  (Matthews was not a small man and had a pretty good set of pipes - but at that moment he was looking up at Newcombe and saying thank you Sir.),

For my two cents worth, when Bonds surpasses Hammerin Hank it won’t count. Hank Aaron out swung the Babe fair and square - no extra help.

Thanks Doug for reminding me at this very appropriate time of a great day at the park.

                       Ole Diz