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Show I SPORTLIGH.T Giants Stand Still at Fast Pace Bv GRANTLAND RICE ANY NUMBER of odd turns have happened in baseball this season. sea-son. More than any I recall at the moment. But it seems to me the luck or misfortune of the Giants for well over a month has been a record breaker. Early in June there were 12 games back of the top spot. They were heading downhill in a hurrry. the Vanderbllt team that battled Michigan and Germany Schults. Here was his contribution. "Alabama "Ala-bama was in a battle for the Southern championship. Alabama'? crack forward passer faded back to pass. Auburn's safety man raised back to defend against it. Before the Auburn player turned, far down the field, Alabama's player changed his mind and punted. punt-ed. The Auburn player, thinking it was a pass coming his way, promptly batted the ball down. Alabama covered and scored on the next play. Golf is so packed with odd, weird happenings that picking the oddest is beyond range. I recall a match I played in many years ago in Belleair, Florida. This was at the first tee in a tournament tourna-ment qualifying round. My partner or opponent had been playing extremely ex-tremely well. But on this first hole, he topped his tee shot and the ball struck the steel rail of a track just beyond the first tee. The ball bounded bound-ed 50 yards back of the tee, half stymied by a palm tree. Attempt- i Then in a sudaen reversal for the next 34 days, a I long stretch in the 1 middle of a pen-i pen-i nant race, every-' every-' thing changed. As a starter the entire pitching pitch-ing staff came to life. From Grantland Rice mediocrity, and worse, It became brilliant. Leo Durocher had Insisted as far back as last winter that he had a strong staff. But few of them were pitching good ball. The change was startling. Every pitcher on the squad suddenly looked like a 25- or 30-game winner. Also the team that hadn't been hitting began to hit. Every section of the team began to blend In almost perfect per-fect action. During the next 29 games the Giants won 22 and dropped only seven. This is better than a .750 clip. They might just as well have won 28 and dropped one. It was the fastest clip either le'igue had shown for that length of time. You might ask where any hard luck could be shown in a case of this sort. The answer is that in those 34 days the Giants picked up only one game on the leaders. They began their drive 12 games back of the front. But in all this wild sprinting they had picked up only a solitary game. This left them 11 games out. To Play better than .750 ball for over a month and practically stand still at the same time is one for two or three books. Anything Can Happen It has always struck me that the two games which belong on top in the "Anything can Happen" circuit cir-cuit are football and golf. Certainly anything can happen in any game. In boxing and baseball, in swimming swim-ming and rowing, in track and field and in tennis. Also in basketball basket-ball and bowling. But in football a ball "bounces funny." In golf you have over 400 acres of ground to cover. A day or two ago we were talking with a few football fanatics fa-natics who know their stuff. Pete Dolan, Frank Graham, Marshall Smith and Innis Brown. Innis was captain of ing to hook around tnis tree xne golfer struck it squarely and it bounded at least another 50 yards further back. He was again partly stymied by a palm tree. His aim remained true as the ball struck the palm and bounded some 80 yards farther away. So he was now playing four over 150 yards back of the first tee. Manager's Year As a rule the middle of August or thereabouts is the time you begin be-gin to hear whisperings concerning concern-ing the sad fate of many baseball managers. But 1950 seems to be a different year. I can't recall a season sea-son where so many pilots have turned out as many fine performances. perform-ances. For example, there is a leader known as Eddie Sawyer of the Phillies. With a fast, improving young club, Sawyer was expected to run third and possibly move into second place. As the case stands, even with Curt Simmons, his star left-hander, missing through the stretch, Sawyer, the Phi Betta Kappa, has a first-class chance of winning the pennant. He has been leading the more experienced and highly favored Dodgers through most of the race. This year's leadership lead-ership of the Phils is a dream. Then there's a fellow by the name of Leo Durocher. The Giant mandarin man-darin waded into trouble up to his ears in the earlier days of the race. He brought his team partly out of the rut only to skid and fall back In again. But in place of calling it a year Durocher got his squad going go-ing again. |