MAY 25, 1942
STARS CONTINUE TO DOMINATE CA, WHILE FED IS AS TIGHT AS ALWAYS
The red-hot New York Stars have lost only 3 ballgames since April 28th. They are 21-3 on the month including a stretch of 12 wins in their last 13 games and now lead the second place Chicago Cougars by 7 games atop the Continental Association standings. Everyone else is behind by double-digits as New York is threatening to end the race by the All-Star break.
It is a much different story in the Federal Association where even the last place Detroit Dynamos are just 9.5 games back and that is only because they are in the midst of a 5 game skid. Only two games separate the top 4 teams and with New York, Philadelphia and even St Louis playing well we might just have six or seven teams still in contention come the end of August.
BLUEGRASS STATE REPEATS AS AIAA NATIONAL CHAMPION
Led by the dynamic duo of pitcher Bob Arman and outfielder Ernie McCoy the Bluegrass State Mustangs claimed their second consecutive AIAA championship in the sport of baseball. The Mustangs went 52-10, the best college single season mark of all-time to claim the crown. Maryland State, which won back to back titles in 1939 and 1940, finished second with a 50-12 record. Rounding out the top five were last year's runner-up Miami in third place followed by Grange College and Columbia Military Academy.
Arman went 7-2 with a 2.14 era despite missing several starts this season. He won the Frank Christian Trophy a year ago as the nation's top player and is a finalist once again this season. The award winner will be announced next week. Despite the fine numbers Arman, who was selected first overall by the Boston Minutemen in January, was nosed out for All-American honours this season but the school will be represented on the first team by McCoy. The Nebraska-born centerfielder was selected second overall by the Montreal Saints in January making the pair the first teammates to go 1-2 in the draft since the St Blane pitching duo of Bobo White and Gus Goulding were taken in 1934. After two years as a second team All-American selection, McCoy was a first team choice this time around after hitting .320 with 6 homers and 31 stolen bases. Four other Mustangs stand a good chance of being drafted in the June portion of the annual FABL selection process. They are senior catcher Chuck Garner (.268,2,38), junior 1B Stan Mish (.289,5,30), junior SS Wally Kuck (.304,4,53) and junior outfielder Wilbur Zimmerman (.267,1,37).
Here are the top twenty teams for 1942
Code:
AIAA FINAL TOP 20 BASEBALL TEAMS
1 Bluegrass State
2 Maryland State
3 Miami State
4 Grange College
5 Columbia Military Academy
6 Bayou State College
7 Eastern Oklahoma
8 College of Waco
9 Charleston Tech
10 Redwood University
11 Rainier College
12 Lane State
13 Carolina Poly
14 Noble Jones College
15 Huntington State
16 Yellowhammer State
17 Darnell State
18 Eastern State
19 North Carolina Tech
20 CC Los Angeles
AIAA ALL-AMERICAN TEAMS ANNOUNCED
Four players who made the first team a year ago held on to their spots led by Davidson University catcher Mark Smith, who won his second consecutive AIAA batting crown. Smith was drafted 6th overall by the Sailors in January. The other repeat first team All-American selections are Miami State first baseman Bucky Sheffer, Second baseman Jack Wilson of North Carolina Tech and shortstop Homer Mills from Weston College.
There were some tough calls among the pitchers as no one player really stood out. In the end the selection committee gave Jerry York (9-4, 2.37) of Noble Jones College the first team berth and Ellery sophomore Jim Carter (8-3, 2.13) the second team spot which meant last year's Christian Trophy winner Bob Arman (7-2, 2.14) of the national champion Bluegrass State Mustangs fell just short.
Here are the members of the 16th annual All-American teams and in the case of juniors their draft status.
Code:
1942 FIRST TEAM
C Mark Smith Jr Davidson University 6th Sailors
1B Bucky Scheffer So Miami State -
2B Jack Wilson Jr North Carolina Tech 17th Cincinnati
SS Homer Mills So Weston College -
3B Frankie Gonnella So Canton State -
OF Nelson Flinn Jr Darnell State 9th Chiefs
OF Ernie McCoy Jr Bluegrass State 2nd Montreal
OF Howie Cooper Fr Lane State -
P Jerry York Jr Noble Jones 8th Toronto
1942 SECOND TEAM
C Bob Newcomer SO Cesar Rodney
1B Jack Blake Jr Grange College eligible
2B Al Wright Jr Mississippi Tech eligible
SS John Morrow So Rainier College
3B Gordon Klein So Huntington State
OF Pete Woodward Jr Cleveland 12th Brooklyn
OF Fred Martin Fr Alabama Baptist
OF Johnny Carlisle Fr Cowpens State
P Jim Carter So Ellery College
TALES FROM THE WOLVES DEN
Toronto welcomes back Larry Vestal from Buffalo hoping he will inject a little energy into the Wolves after another disappointing week. The front office burnt the midnight oil many nights to go through the roster options that Vestal's recall mandated including the the move of Holliday to the Nickels so he could find himself against AAA pitching. The final decision was that Ockie will remain in southern Ontario work with the big league staff to find the key to breakout of his slump. Both he and Vestal will be in and out of the lineup over the upcoming week as Charlie Reed searches for the proper lineup to shake off the malaise that his gripped the Wolves so far in 1942.
The big question in the draft for the Wolves (and probably everyone else) is will their draftees report or enlist? Their top pick in the early stages of the draft, Noble Jones College righthander Jerry York (9-4, 2.37) was named a first team AIAA All-American.
- Percy Sutherland notes that there are 6 batters with a wRC+ of 160 or more, two of them play for Pittsburgh:
Tom Bird, CHI - 211
Leo Mitchell, CHC - 178
Mahlon Strong, PIT - 177
George Cleaves, PIT - 169
Heinie Zimmer, STL - 165
Mule Monier, NYG - 162
Three of the top 5 are catchers; that's pretty crazy.
- George Hampton is making up for lost time after missing all of the '41 season with a fractured elbow and is back with a vengeance for the New York Stars: 16.2 IP, 8 H, 1 ER, 0.90 WHIP, 639 ERA+, 87 FIP- smallish sample yes, but he should get a lot more innings going forward.
- It doesn't mean much compared to starters but Del Lyons has to be the greatest relief pitcher in FABL history. The long-time King has 9 saves already this season and was as important as anyone to Brooklyn's 3 straight pennants. His most recent save was his 150th so he might catch Stan Waters (164) for number one all-time this season. And among players with at least 40 career saves only Hank Harris (1911-20) has a higher successful save percentage than Lyons .789
- Night baseball will be permitted in Dyckman Field but the city of New York has announced that the Brooklyn Kings will not be able to play night games after a test of the floodlight's at Kings County Field can be observed form sea. The Stars park did pass the test thanks to some upgrades down in recent days. Brooklyn had not scheduled any evening contests originally but was considering moving some afternoon games to the evening later in the summer but this decision ends that possibility. Boxing cards are also expected to be affected but no decision was announced in that regard. The city's third FABL club - the New York Gothams - have not scheduled any night games and do not plan on changing things at all this year.
- Bill Barrett spent an off-day last Monday undergoing plenty of poking and prodding as the Navy put him through the paces of a physical examination. "William the Conqueror" passed with flying colors according to Lt. Frank Philbrook, who conducted the exam. Of Barrett the Navy doctor said "He has 20-15 eyesight, which is better than the normal 20-20 required by the Navy, and an unusually high degree of depth perception," which likely accounts for his amazing ability to judge the flight of a baseball.
- Pete Papenfus is now stationed at a base without a ball team, but it doesn't appear his arm will get rusty as Peter the Heater has been seeing regular action with a number of different Navy teams, including Saturday when he will pitch for a team comprised mainly of former college players based in Quonset Point, Rhode Island. His opposition in that game will be Dixie Lee's Fort Devens Army outfit as the meet at Boston's Cunningham Field in a preliminary to the Minutemen-Miners relief benefit game.
- T.R. Goins is very happy with what he is seeing out of his Great Lakes baseball team. The former FABL great, now a lieutenant in the United States Navy, was more than pleased with a 4-1 victory by his charges over Detroit City College on the weekend. Wins over Cuyahoga College, Ohio Poly and Queen City gave them a very successful week against college opposition, with their lone loss coming to Lincoln College and only due to a superbly pitched game by Presidents sophomore righthander Bill Holloway.
- Dan Brady, who lost his first base job with the Keystones many years ago to Rankin Kellogg, is now 45 and a key man at the big Willow Run bomber plant near Detroit.
- When Bill Ashby, Sacramento third sacker, was filling out a questionnaire sent by the Great Western League publicity department, he came to a question about the hardest things in baseball. Red wrote, "To hit left and right hand pitchers."
- Biggest laugh of a midweek series at Kings County was a request number Gladys Gooding, organist, played for a customer just as the umpires appeared: "Three Blind Mice"...If looks could kill she'd have been a corpse the way the three arbitrators were glaring at her from home plate - but she was quite innocent.
- If the head of the Navy's new aviation physical training program has his way all college sports will remain active. Lt. Commander Tom Hamilton says the last thing universities and colleges should be doing at this time is cutting their athletic programs because of the war. "It's exactly what we don't want them to do," said Hamilton. "For some of them it is just a convenient out because they think they might lose money but I can't say too forcibly that it is absolutely essential to the armed services that competitive sports continue in the schools, despite financial losses; that kids must be brought up in competitive athletics. One problem we face right now- our having to add five months to our training period in order to whip our boys into top physical shape- never would have arisen if there had been more hard competitive sports in the last 20 years."
- You can add Brooklyn State to the list of colleges that will permit freshman to play varsity sports at the university next September. A shortage of players made it especially necessary for the football Bears. In addition, athletic directors of schools from the Southern Border Association also have voted to allow freshman on their football teams.
- Reports say that Maryland State has now seen 30 of it's 33 member football squad are now wearing a different type of uniform. The Bengals likely can benefit from a fresh crop, as last year's group went 1-8.
- Attention Axis stumblebums! The St. Patrick's University golf team has adopted that classic way of expressing it's opinion about you. The Shamrocks use balls with the pictures of Hirohito and Mussolini painted on them and for the tough matches daub Hitler's puss on the spheres. They say the fancy art work adds 20 yards to each drive.
The Week That Was
Current events from the week ending 5/24/1942
- A Russian army estimated at 1 million men stormed through blazing villages on the approaches to Khartov after annihilating suicide squads of German parachutists and infantry reserves rushed into battle aboard trailers drawn by Nazi tanks.
- Field Marshall Von Bock, German commander on the Kharkov front, was reported to have sent a message to Adolf Hitler critical of the Fuehrer's new war powers and saying that a general offensive against Russia is "an utter impossibility."
- With Germany having it's hands full on the Eastern Front, Prime Minister Churchill informed the House of Commons that Great Britain is amassing strength and intends to "make a carefully planned attack on the continent of Europe."
- A new contingent of Canadian forces has arrived in England with no issues crossing the Atlantic while reports also indicate the United States is increasing it's military forces in Northern Ireland.
- Mexico, enraged by the ruthless sinking of it's merchant ships, began the formalities of declaring war on the Axis this week with step one being to confiscate Axis property in the nation.
- The United States and Panama signed an agreement formally permitting U.S. forces to take over important defense areas to protect the Panama Canal.