| Show SPORT LIGHT yanks ready to win by GRANTLAND RICE into the palms and P PEERING pines the casey stengel of 1950 is an entirely different person from the casey stengel of 1949 A year ago at this time we found a bewildered baffled uncertain yankee manager who admitted that he knew few answers to any questions involving his bia team this Is now a new casey the sun is brighter t the h e palms are greener the b birds f ads grantland rice itice sing sweeter songs and even the pelicans look more intelligent for casays 1950 answer is bring em along red sox and all the rest the yankees will be set and ready we are far bertei off than we were re a year ago casey sal said id how do you figure that one out I 1 asked you added a single lingle player 1 I figure it this way casey said joe dimaggio DIMagg lo reports in the best condition in many years I 1 never saw henrich enrich II or look better joe rage page Is all set in addition to allie reynolds vie vic kaschl tommy cyme byrne ed lopat and others we have bob porterfield and frank shea two of our 1949 wounded back in harness with their bandages removed both expect to be ready in my opinion casey continued reynolds is going to be a leading star this year I 1 mean a great pitcher he could also be a relief pitcher close to page the big fellow is a fine allaround all around athlete he was a backfield star at oklahoma or one of those oklahoma colleges will be among the best again and I 1 have an idea tommy byrne will soon find where that plate is planted and when he does look out hes got amazing stuff heres another thing weve found out we could suffer over 60 wounds and still win weve discovered we could have most of our team on crutches and at still wl win did you know that tha t ui dl maggio II Ill enrich and berra three of our top hitters were only in 19 or maybe it was n 17 games kamas together all season we are bound to have better breaks than we drew last year lightning cant hit the same spot SO 60 times in a season this means we ive should have our best men in action far ar oftener than we had them a year ago that could make a big difference the 1950 casey may have a few cw inner twinges but outwardly he fairly exudes confidence iles hes the only manager I 1 know of who Is willing to admit ad mil openly that he expects to win the yankee bench at that moment an ancient look ing pelican lighted tor for a few minutes not so far away 1 I only wish I 1 was halt half as smart as that bird looks to be casey said no one could be that smart in the course of punching the bag I 1 asked casey what he thought was the strongest feature of the yankees last year easy he said it was our bench we always had a good man ready for any gap no other team had a bench that matched ours outside of first base we had coleman rizzuto brown and johnson ready for our infield outside ot of dimaggio DiMagg ici and henrich we had bauer woodling mapes and lindell for any va vacant cant spot in our outfield the bench was ready to give us anything we needed all al good men too it makes a big difference what sort of reserves you have we had good ones all the time bauer mapes wo woodling d brown etc anything hap happened to berra there was silvera in 58 games batting our pitching anything happened to reynolds there was waa page anything happened to kaschl there was page anything happened to byrne or lopat or sanford there was page 1 I guess our weakest spot casey finally said our pitchers had to be relieved too often no one pitcher should be yanked out of the bull pen 60 or more times in a season almost halt half our games too many weve got to do something about that kaschl bad that way but I 1 think find reynolds and byrne will need less help porterfield is sure he Is OX 0 K and that his arm ligament has healed shea says he feels fine with all his soreness gone you cant ask a pitcher to show you everything the first day of the spring season all in all casey concluded we have no alibis and no excuses tor for what happens I 1 think well be better than we were a year ago dont forget to mention those two words yankee spirit what won for us a year ago I 1 think it can win again it will be a much tougher league this time |
