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Show COME earnest and able compiler of (acts and fltfures has estimated there are over 30 million citizens young and old, male and female, who are directly or Indirectly interested In baseball. I believe these figures are on the short side. We have 22 million high school kids for a starter, and most of these follow baseball, base-ball, in one way or another. The range li from 8 to 80 years, and this includes in-cludes those who I Grantland Rice play at the game, see the games, I follow the box scores and the stand- lngs in the daily newspapers or hear ' games over the radio. My estimate f would be 40 million, Including the fanatics and the only mildly inter-' inter-' estcd. This Is only a guess. But that many through newspaper and radio must follow a world series. Many or most of the regulars have their favorite ball players. They may dig back Into the past, or they may pick a few from the modern library. The leading favorite favor-ite In the game's long history has been Babe Ruth. Proof here is simple. Babe has ! gone Into such cities as Philadelphia j and Boston when they were trailing and drawing less than a thousand at home games. But when the Babe came to town they had to call police po-lice reserves to the scene. Next to Ruth we'd have Ty Cobb and after Ty Cobb there would be Honus Wagner. Among those of more recent date, there are four who belong among the rafters of the roof Pepper Martin, Dizzy Dean, Carl Hubbell and Ron Feller. And you can't leave out Hank Greenberg. Pepper Martin, one of the greatest great-est hustlers baseball ever knew, was everybody's favorite, wherever 1 he played. You got the idea that he was willing and ready to break a neck or a leg to get where he was headed for, and you were usually right. The 1946 Favorites Who will carry most of the public pub-lic favor from city to city through 1946? In Boston the leading candidates candi-dates at this spot are Ted Williams and Dave Ferriss. Among the Yankees Yan-kees you will find Bill Dickey, Joe DiMaggio and Joe Gordon with Phil Rlzzuto close up. Stirnwelss will be another. Terry Moore and Marty Marion will lead the Cardinals, Cardi-nals, who have several other candidates. candi-dates. Hank Greenberg and Al New-houser New-houser will head the cast for the j Tiger zoo. For the Giants you'll find I Mel Ott and Johnny Mize In front when the season opens. What about the Dodgers? In this dizzy land of Bumdom they change with startling rapidity from day to day. Dixie Walker has been the civ- Ic nomination, or the peepul's choice for some years. Whether Dixie will retain the affections of the nation's most turbulent and tempestuous baseball crowds remains to be seen. If anything happens to Dixie, or if it happens to be untrue what they say j about Dixie, an early nomination Is Peewee Reese. The Cleveland situation is simple. The Indian's contribution to the favorite fa-vorite class will be one Robert Feller Fel-ler who will lure out the multitudes In fancy numbers at each start. What about the Cubs? Andy Pafko will be one of them and so will Phil Cavarretta and Hank Borowy. The able veteran Stan Hack will also get some votes. At times It is hard to tell just what qualities are needed to make j some ball player the crowd's fa- ! vorite. Hustle is always one of the main points. The populace likes to see the athlete giving all he has. Home-run hitters always have a J strong call. So do strike-out pitchers. pitch-ers. Good people who are there in the clutch or pinch also harvest their share of fanville's affection. The All-Time Best Who have been my ten favorite oal? players? It doesn't matter much, but here they go Babe Ruth, Ty Cobb, Joe Jackson, Trls Speaker, Hans Wagner, Dizzy Dean, Pepper Martin, Rube Waddell, Christy Mathewson, Pete Alexander. Alexan-der. Plus Walter Johnson. Old Barleys Bar-leys pitching motion and the ball you couldn't follow were still something some-thing to look at. Carl Hubbell also : oelongs in this group. So does Bill ; Dickey. Ten isn't enough. As an ! artist, Hal Chase has no equal. Just what favorite crop the new season will give us is in the so-:alled so-:alled laps of the gods. There is Jme enough later on to take this up. Bow and Arroiv Records Every record improves In sport ! nd archery has made a big I idvance since the days of the Sioux ' and the Apaches, the Iroquois and he Mohicans. Their range was j rarely beyond 200 yards. But in 1941 Curtis Hill of Dayton, Ohio, set a pew mark at 614 yards, 6 inches a new record for what is known II "free flight shooting." Hill's rec- I ird for the regular flight shooting, iccording to Frank Menke's book, ' s 517 yards, one foot |