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Show A 1.ceJi .1 IT MUST be understood in advance that it is the minor leagues and , the colleges that make the major ma-jor leagues what they are. And you can include the sand lots, who furnish fur-nish their full supply of stars. The big leagues stand and wait. But, it is the case of Lou Novikoff, recently turned back by the Chicago Chi-cago Cubs, that proves again the5"" ' 1 number of brilliant ' minor league stars ( j who can shine in their own domain, I j J but are only dim s 1 candlelights In ' the v wind when they v" J move into faster 1 company. I, J? : j Lou Novikoff is no - " outstanding excep- Lou Novikoff tion. He is merely one of many. For example, I recall from my earlier years the case of Three-Finger Jack Hulseman of Shreveport, who could hit .380 In the Southern league, lead that circuit more than once, and yet finished around .190 in the majors. And Hulseman was a great hitter but only in the minors. A Hav nr twn neo I had a fan session with Lt. Bill Dickey, late of the Yankees, and Duster Mails, one of the best pitchers of his day 20 some odd years ago. "I could name yon 30," the Duster said. "Do you recall Paul Strand? Paul hit over .400 with Salt Lake. What a hitter. Paul was a .400 minor league hitter. But a .200 big league hitter. "I'll give you another. Do you remember re-member Ike Boone, the Alabama football and baseball star? There was a great football and baseball player. Ike came to the Missions on the west coast in a tough league with a bad right arm. He really had only one arm he could use. A Flop in Big Time "But in his first 27 games that season, Ike batted .410. He was terrific. ter-rific. We all said that with two good arms he'd hit .500. He was big, game, strong, a natural athlete and a natural hitter. But in the big leagues with at least one or two clubs he was a steady .240 hitter. "And there was Smeed Jolley with the Red Sox 6 feet 3235 pounds, one of the greatest minor . league hitters I ever saw. He had ' everything. In the big leagues he hit maybe .200. "There was Bevo LeBourveau of the Phillies and Giants temnc m the minors but a flop in the big time. I could name you 20 great minor league hitters who couldn't hit the size of their hats in the majors. And this includes the great Russian Rus-sian Novikoff who can hit everything every-thing in the minors and nothing in the majors." "One trouble with the minors," Dickey said, "Is this the pitchers pitch-ers or the catchers often fail- to discover dis-cover the batters' weakness. We'll take Lou Novikoff. He can murder a certam type of pitch. He can't even foul a fast one inside. But don't ever give him a fast one outside. He'll murder it. At least that's what I hear. All I know is that after being be-ing with the Yankees in the American Ameri-can league so many years, I know just about what every fellow likes to swing at and also what he DOESN'T like to swing at. And what a difference that makes." (As a side remark, I'd like to add that Bill Dickey knew more about American league hitters than any catcher in the history of baseball. He knew everything they liked and everything they didn't like). Greatest Hitter "There was one exception. His name is Ted Williams of the Red Sox. "There is the greatest hitter I ever saw," Dickey went on. He'd never swing at a ball two inches off the plate. Williams could wait for a fast ball or. a fast curve until it was almost in my glove. Then if he liked it he'd even hook it to left. "Ted had the swiftest reactions I've ever seen. He could make up his mind what to do in at least a tenth of a second. I tried to cross him every way I knew, but I never could. I'll say that Ted Williams Wil-liams is the greatest hitter I ever saw in baseball, and I know how good Babe Ruth, Lou Gehrig and Joe Di Macgio were. But Williams was something out of this world. If we hadn't run into this war I believe be-lieve Williams would have finished as the greatest hitler of all time." It might be added here that Lt. Bill Dickey, the Arkansas quail shot, never makes any wild statements. state-ments. He only calls them as he sees them. Nothing else counts with him. Most Thrilling Fight When it comes to the most thrilling thrill-ing prize fiRht, I always pick the Dempsey - Firpo volcanic eruption that lasted only a trifle more than four minutes. Where Dempsey was hammered to the floor or at least tr. his knees with Firpo's first right-hand right-hand where Dempsey kept Firpt. on the floor most of the round-where round-where Firpo hammered Dempsey through the ropes where everything happened in such a hurry that n one could follow the swiftly shifting scenario of raw action. |