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Show I SPOR TUGH J As Blackie Goes, so Go the Reds By GRANTLAND RICE ' SOME YEARS AGO when the St. Louis Browns were supposed sup-posed to be sinking for the last time out beyond the tow rope Luke Sewell took them over and I won a pennant, it was a war year, but after all the Browns were still the Browns. Now in the . wake of Bucky Walters, a great ballplayer, the same Luke Sewell Sew-ell has the job "I feel great," Blackwell tells you. "I've got back all the weight I lost and my arm trouble is all gone." It would be a big thing for the Reds if this tall workman could only regain two-thirds of what he had three years ago. He is only 27 with many big years ahead. The Red Roundup Lou Klein will add strength to the infield and Ron Northey should help the outfield. Sewell also has high hopes from fiarry Perkowski, the tall left-hander from Syracuse. For a while it began to look as If the Reds were trying to build up an AU-American football foot-ball squad. They first picked Ted Kluszewskl from Bo MC-Millin's MC-Millin's Indiana team a football foot-ball star and then grabbed Lloyd Merriman from Stanford's Stan-ford's backfield. Kluszewskl had a big year last season, batting .309, but Merriman fell to .230, which needs some improvement im-provement this season. . Anyway young Merriman speaks very highly of Stanford's 1950 football foot-ball team which is already listening listen-ing to Rose Bowl whispers. "It isn't an easy matter to dig yourself out of a deep spot in the second division but the Reds are like several other teams trying to look ahead," continued " Sewell. "We've finished in seventh place two years running now and we hope to move up this year. We are stronger than we were a year ago but that seems to be a line several other teams are using. Certainly, Chicago and Pittsburgh will be better bet-ter and they are our closest rivals. Lou Klein will help our infield which is a pretty fair one. We need more punch in . the outfield and like every other club, we could use one or two more starting start-ing pitchers." Blackwell will be the main Red to watch on this outfit. He was still a sick man last year. The next installment of "The Wakefield Story" will soon be written. writ-ten. It can mean a lot to many people, including Casey Stengel and Dick Wakefield. The Wakefield case is a curious one. The 28-year-old, six-feet-four athlete was a big hitter at the University of Michigan,' drawing the first of the famous bonuses. He batted .345 at Beaumont and then .315 and .355 at Detroit. Undoubtedly Undoubt-edly a new star was on the way another Ted Williams. But from .355 in 1944 he dropped to .206. Grantland Rice uf, clncinnati.s Reds out of the quicksands. No one expects Luke Sewell to lift the 1950 Reds into any pennant, pen-nant, but if he can keep them out of last place, he deserves at least one cheer. The Reds are now linked near the bottom bot-tom with the Cubs and Pirates. In a desperate struggle last fall they beat the Cubs by a single game to escape eighth place. "The general opinion seems to be that the Reds will have another hard fight for the cellar with the Cubs," Luke Sewell tells you. "That could happen and there is also a good chance that we can be better than that. For example, just suppose a young fellow by the name of Ewell Blackwell begins winning again. That not only could happen I think it will happen. So does Blackwell who looks better than he has looked in some years. You can see what a difference a 20-game winner would make to our club. We had an 18-game winner in Ken Raffensberger last year and we drew some pretty fair pitching from Herman Wehmeier and a few others. But if Black-well Black-well goes well again it will lift the morale of our entire club." So we turned to the human eucalytus tree, height 6 feet 6 inches, and discovered he was carrying over 200 pounds of solid-looking flesh. Blackwell is the pitcher who shows you the ball four times in his delivery and then hides it four times. As one hostile batter expressed it "Facing him at bat is like having hav-ing a tall tree fall on you. The ball's on top of you before you know it. In addition to which the Fresno Rope has his full share of stuff, when right. In 1947, he won 16 games in a row with the Reds and fanned 193 men. He also pitched in succession a no-hit game and eight innings of another spotless spot-less affair. |