Kid Comes Back (14 page)

“No, Spike, you got me wrong, honest to goodness, you got me wrong.”

“I know what time the boys get to bed, Lester. You’ve been half ruined, what between the girls and the sportswriters. Now, at last, you find yourself up against a tough proposition. It isn’t so easy. You fall into a slump, you get jittery, and when I ask you to play first you blow up and talk of going back to Milwaukee. Yah! Look, Lester...”

He leaned over and put out his cigarette. His face was close to the big chap in the easy chair who shuffled the bat nervously between his knees.

“Look, Lester, remember the run Roy Tucker scored for us when we beat Wingate in that extra-inning game at home, remember? He risked everything for that one run. He had no idea would his leg stand up when he struck out for home plate that time. He didn’t know would he ruin himself for good, and he didn’t care, either. We had to have that run. O.K., he went out and got it for us. That’s the way we play on this ballclub.” He rose and went toward the door.

“Unless you do the same thing, unless you quit chasing round with the girls, there’s no spot open here. You can get your ticket to Milwaukee from the secretary tomorrow morning. Go out there at first or go home. Make up your mind. Good night, Lester.”

“Er... er... good night, Spike.”

C
ASEY SAUNTERED INTO
the dugout late the next day. It was just before game time, but he had been delayed in reaching the park. He sat kidding with the boys, his favorite pastime; for he had discovered that jokes and laughter were often more productive of copy than serious discussions about pitchers’ arms and the technical side of baseball. That afternoon he was giving it back and forth with Raz Nugent, the sportswriter and the ballplayer furnishing entertainment to the entire bench.

“No use talking, Raz, you ain’t what you used to be!”

“Nope. Well, who is?” rejoined the big pitcher philosophically.

“Yes, sir, if it wasn’t for that salary whip of yours, Razzle, you’d be back in overalls on your farm down in South Carolina.”

“Yeah, maybe.” The ballplayer was never at a loss for a retort. “And if it wasn’t for that-there typewriter of yours, you wouldn’t be a baseball writer, you’d be driving a truck at thirty bucks a week.”

The whole bench laughed. Casey didn’t particularly enjoy the laughter. “I’m not a baseball writer, you ham,” he reminded Razzle. “I’m a sports columnist. I do a daily column; write football and other sports. If you could read, Raz, you’d understand the difference.”

The big hurler picked up his glove, winked at Roy sitting opposite him on the dugout step, and rose with dignity. He climbed from under the roof, stepped out on the field, a look of acute distaste upon his face. Taking a ball, he spit copiously into his glove and walked away, yanking down his cap. Then he half turned to the bench again, and called back over one shoulder: “A football writer, hey! A football writer is a baseball writer with a vest on.”

Laughter rocked the bench. “Isn’t that guy something!”

“Can’t get ahead of old Raz.”

“They don’t make ’em like him any more!”

“They sure don’t, these kids coming along haven’t any personality.”

“I remember when he first joined the club. He blew into our hotel in Florida before the war; ’twas a Sunday, and in those days you couldn’t play baseball down there on Sundays. Raz now, he rolled into the lobby” — Fat Stuff pulled off his cap and ruffled his thick black hair with his fingers — “wearing a sweater and an old, dirty pair of pants. So naturally someone asked him was he going to play golf that afternoon.

“Raz, he sets down his battered tin suitcase with the bat strapped to one side, and says, solemn-like: ‘Golf! Mister, you got me wrong; I’m Raz Nugent, the ballplayer.’”

“Yep, and that’s what he’s been ever since,” chimed in Charlie Draper. “Dave Leonard was managing the club that season, and when he sees Raz in the lobby, he takes him to his room and says, sort of explaining, ‘Nugent, mebbe you better put on a shirt to come to the dining room tonight.’ Raz, he just looked at Dave. ‘Shirt! You mean one of them things they wear a tie with? I didn’t never have one of them things on.’”

“Yeah, and now look at him. Every time he steps outside of his room he looks like Mr. Esquire with a new suit on and three hundred bucks of clothes over his shoulders.”

CLANG-CLANG-CLANG.
The bell stung the bench into activity, the boys getting ready for battle, while Casey rose to make the long climb up to the press box, pausing en route for a quick luncheon of coffee and a couple of hot dogs. He did not actually reach his colleagues above until the first half of the inning was over, and the Brooks were about to take the field. Wedging into an empty space in the long line of sportswriters, he uncorked his typewriter, struck a match to light a cigarette, and then hesitated as the Dodgers ran onto the diamond.

He sat there staring down, the unlit cigarette drooping from his lips. The match burned down in one upraised hand. “For Pete’s sake! There’s Roy Tucker back in center again. They’ve benched Lester... no... suffering polecats! Lester Young on first! Is that Young on first there? Hey, Mike, hey, Sam, why didn’ya tell me?”

A chorus of angry cries rose along the press box, and the clattering of a dozen typewriters slowed down for a few seconds. Their replies had a trace of annoyance in them.

“He never told
us.
We never knew no more’n you did until they went out to practice before the game.” As one man, the entire press box then turned back to their machines and the clattering telegraph keys at their side. This was news. The Dodgers’ line-up was being revamped with the end of the season only a month distant.

Next morning Casey’s column dealt at length with the team, now precariously sitting with a half a game lead in the National League.

“It wasn’t so much that they won the last game of the series with the Cubs at Wrigley Field yesterday, or the way they won it, as the fact that Spike Russell finally seems to have his team in hand for the down-to-the-wire sprint in the pennant race. The fundamentals of a ballclub are through the middle: catcher, pitcher, shortstop and center fielder. He has them all. Yesterday Roy Tucker went back to his old spot in the middle garden, which is bad news for enemy hitters. Yesterday in Chicago Roy played as if his leg had never bothered him at all.

“Handling two difficult singles with dispatch and holding the runners each time to one base, the Kid from Tomkinsville snared two fly balls in his region, and made a really fine professional catch off one. This was hit by Cy Ashwell, a ball that forced Swanson and Roth over; but Tuck raced in and gloved it smoothly. In the 8th he got hold of a high inside pitch at the platter, and laced it to right for a smart single that scored the winning run. Roy always likes to bat in a crucial spot of this kind; he bears down a little extra. He’s a ballplayer’s ballplayer, and will be a tonic for the Bums in the tough days ahead.

“Spike Russell made other changes and apparently to the good. He gave Frank Havens his unconditional release, for the former Montreal Royal hasn’t been shaping up any too well in the big time, and the coaches consider he isn’t yet ready for the majors. Spike placed Lester Young on first. The big chap played the base mostly by ear yesterday; but he was in there trying every minute, and saved the ballgame in the ninth when he jumped into the air to snare Shiell’s throw, a catch only possible because of his height and his quick, long reach. It was the play of the afternoon.

“At the dish, he powdered the ball cleanly and met it squarely each time he came to bat. Unfortunately his rifled shots were going straight at the opposing fielders until the ninth, when he backed Milton Arnstein up against the barrier in deep left with a stinger that missed being a home run by a very few feet. When these blows start falling into open territory, as they will some day, the rest of the league better watch out. Meanwhile, after a few more practice sessions, Lester may become a useful first sacker and plug up the hole in the infield which has been worrying Spike and his coaches all season.

“Last night the Bums left for Pittsburgh by air, where they tackle the Pirates in a four-game series at Forbes Field beginning this afternoon. They are still squeezing that slender lead of half a game, with the Cards, Cubs and Giants all within three games or less of the leaders. Sunday’s double-headers can mean lots of changes in the standing. The race is a double-jointed doosey.”

G
UESSING IS ALL
part of the business, yet rarely, if ever, had Casey been so exact in his prophecies. That Sunday’s double-header caused many shake-ups in the club standing. The Cards and the Cubs, playing second-division teams, each won a couple. The Giants took two also, the nightcap in 14 innings, while the Dodgers dropped two to the Pirates, and found themselves traveling home in fourth place, the lowest berth they had occupied since early May. Late that afternoon the Cards were perched precariously atop the league, a game ahead of the Cubs. Only a few percentage points separated the four first-division teams.

Spike Russell was worried now. There had been plenty of times during the season when the team looked bad, when they’d slump so it seemed they never would shake it off, and then bang! They’d slash into some league-leading pitcher or smash into one of those do-or-die affairs to maintain their slender lead. Tossing in his compartment on the train that night, he lay awake as Altoona and Tyrone and Harrisburg flashed past in the dark, realizing that this was a turning point for the club, replaying the season, game by game, thinking of the close ones they’d lost by a single run, by that one bobble in the field, by that ball striking on the wrong side of the foul line.

We can’t go on like this, we really can’t. We never failed to win the game we needed to stay on top until this afternoon. Well, the boys’ll either come back as they’ve invariably done, or else slump into the second division, and fast. Tucker, he’s my man out there; he’s a manager’s ballplayer. And Lester begins to look at home on first. But the pitchers! Well, it’s anyone’s race now. The thing is wide open.

Ordinarily Monday was an open date for all clubs, but the Dodgers had to play a postponed game at the Polo Grounds the next afternoon, to be followed by a series of four at Ebbets Field against New York. The brain trust talked things over as they dressed in the manager’s room of the clubhouse the next day, concentrating on the game ahead. They all knew if this one was lost, their chances of getting back into first place again were none too good. Charlie Draper made the remark they all had in their minds:

“What we need is a stopper—some pitcher, someone who can go in there and stop any opponent, some big guy who can be counted on to take the crucial game in a series. That’s if we’re gonna stay up there with ’em. Raz Nugent is tired; he’s worn down. Jerry’s too young to be depended on in the clutch. Mike has that bum shoulder. Eddie? Sure, but you can’t pitch him every day in the week like you’ve been doing lately. He’s tired, too.”

“With Jerry being in and out, and Doc giving Mike injections for his torn back muscle every time he pitches... and Raz no use, as you say, I don’t see your stopper on this staff.”

“I see him!” Old Fat Stuff spoke and they listened. “Why not shoot a wire to Montreal, Spike?”

“Montreal?”

“You mean Bonesey?”

“He’s undependable. Always behind the hitters.”

“He won 14 and 4 up there, and they’re on top. Can’t do that and be behind the hitters. Maybe he’s learned his lesson.”

“Aw, MacManus doesn’t like Bonesey; never did.”

“Yeah? Jack wants to win the pennant, doesn’t he?”

“Besides, you’re the manager. We need him bad; what say, Charlie?”

“Why, I think you got something, Fat Stuff. If that kid behaves, he can win from five to seven games for us between now and the end. That would just about mean the old flag.”

“Right,” said Spike. “I’ll wire for him this afternoon and tell Jack I did it. Bones might even catch the night plane and go in against this southpaw of theirs tomorrow. All right, Charlie, get the gang together.”

It was a quiet meeting and short that afternoon. The boys were sober, worried and anxious like their chief, as they sat round facing him in the cool clubhouse. Roy noticed the circles under the eyes of the manager, the taut expression about his mouth, knew he had slept little the previous night. And no wonder. When your team falls off the ladder after being up there all season, it’s not easy to keep cool and unruffled.

“Fellas, there’s nothing to go over in those two games against Pittsburgh yesterday. That big lefty sure pitched ball the first game, and as for the second, well, what is there to say about a 9–0 beating? They just clubbed us to death, that’s all. Every team runs into that sort of thing at times and bounces right back the next day. Forget it. We’ve always snapped back and we will this time. We’re not first any more; what of it? The strain is on the team that has to watch the scoreboard; that’ll be the Cards now. Let them try it for a change.

“But no use kidding ourselves, either this is our series or we’re through. We must win to stay in there. Playing the Giants on their home grounds is always tough; but we’ve had the edge on ’em here all season. Don’t forget, fellas, that Jameson and Tonelli hit to either field. Last time we pitched to Jameson, he hit to left, center, and right on three consecutive trips to the plate. Lester, play that ball, move so you’ll get a good hop, charge it, don’t ever let it play you the way you did once yesterday.

“Now this man Jackson, he has a good change of pace and likes to use it. Don’t let him fool you. Guess that’s about all. Here’s the line-up for today: Swanny, right. Russell, short. Lester, first. Tuck, center. Roth in left. Shiells, third. Bob on second, and Jocko catching. And Fat Stuff on the mound. All right then, guys, le’s go get ’em.”

There was a scraping of chairs and benches. Then they left the cool room smelling of arnica and the Doc’s liniments, and tramped into the sunlight outside, down the long steps to the field. The stands, nearly full already, greeted them with a roar, for it was going to be almost a full house even on Monday.