[Jiggs McGee]

August 29, 1938

RESURGENCE IN TORONTO

What a difference this season has been in Toronto. A few short years ago there were worries the club would head south, literally not just figuratively like it has in the standings, with all kinds of talk of moving with Cincinnati being the most likely destination. The club was terrible, lacked any star power and Dominion Stadium regularly challenged for the league lead in empty seats but all that has changed as a fairly new General Manager, a new owner and a pair of superstar talents have made the Wolves a team to fear in the Continental Association. Club revenue, while still not among the league leaders, are at least middle of the pack and attendance will quite possibly double last seasons total when the final pitch is thrown for the season. The club will cross the 700,000 mark in their next game and could very shortly break the franchise record of 767,167 set in 1927, which was the last season they finished in the first division. Too think only 216,000 entered Dominion Stadium just 4 seasons ago, a number that is believed to be the lowest single season total for any FABL venue this century.

On the field the club is riding high with a 7 game winning streak pushing their winning percentage to .595 and they are within 5 and a half games of front-running Brooklyn. Assuming they can maintain this pace the Wolves will end up with their best record since 1911 - which was the last time they won the Continental Association pennant. They won just 72 games last season and with a full month to go this time around have already equaled that victory total. The turnaround can primarily be attributed to a gutsy move they made over the winter in dealing several pitchers to St Louis in order to acquire Frank McCormick (.413,14,77). The 28 year old has often been described the last couple of seasons as the best player never to win a Whitney Award but after a pair of second place finishes and a third place finish in Fed balloting the last few years that seems assured to change as McCormick looks to be a lock to win the Whitney in his first season in the CA.

McCormick also signed a 3 year extension with the Wolves recently that will pay him a little over $80,000 over the next three seasons, giving him modest raises on the $25,000 he will collect this year. The Wolves also inked a 4 year extension this week with their other superstar as 25 year old Joe Hancock (19-6, 3.01) will see his salary rise from $15,000 this year to $20k over each of the next four years. Like McCormick with the Whitney, Hancock appears to be the front-runner for the other CA achievement, the Allen Award for the top pitcher.

The Wolves still have a lot of work ahead of them and are running out of time if they want to prevent Brooklyn from becoming the first team since the 1928-30 Philadelphia Sailors to claim three straight pennants, but even if the Wolves fall short in that regard this season has been an amazing resurgence for a club that has not really been relevant in over 25 years.

QUICK HITS

• Congratulations to New York Gothams icon Bud Jameson (.310,6,66) for scoring his 1,000 career run this week. Thanks to injuries and age the 34 year old is not the player he once was but with 1,817 career hits, a .329 lifetime batting average and now 1,001 runs scored (all in a Gotham uniform) he is on the back nine of a tremendous career and has enjoyed a nice resurgence this season.
• Brooklyn's Del Lyons took a loss in Toronto but rebounded with a save against the Cougars - his single season record tying 26th. The mark was originally established by Bill Mendine in 1922 when he had 26 saves and appeared in a record 99 games. Lyons, who has a won-lost record of 7-7 this season, will not catch Mendine for the games played record. The 33 year old 9th year King has seen action in 'just' 54 contests thus far.
• The Detroit Dynamos slide out of first place in the Federal Association has coincided with Sal Pestilli's (.305,32,93) struggles at the dish in August. The 22 year old two-time all-star slashed .271/.313/.458 this month with only 3 homers and 14 rbi's. He went 8,8,9 in homers for May, June and July.
• Pestilli's August power outage seemingly has sealed the deal on Chicago Chiefs catcher Tom Bird (.379,18,86) winning the Whitney Award in the fed. Bird is leading the league in batting average, on-base percentage and slugging percentage. So with it almost a certainty that Bird and Frank McCormick will be the Whitney Award winners this one has to wonder what the St Louis Pioneers offense could have looked like had they held on to both of these players. McCormick, of course, was dealt over the winter for some very good pitching while Bird was still a rookie in 1934 when the Pioneers moved him to Montreal for Heinie Zimmer (.262,5,39) and Al Tucker (.333,10,82), both of whom have worked out well in St Louis.
• Tucker actually has a 24 game hitting streak on the go, which ties Jim Beard of Washington's mark for the longest of the season in FABL.
• Out of the scuttlebutt from last weeks ill-conceived Dynamos-Stars deal involving Bill Barrett is word that the Dynamos made a real run at the trade deadline to try and acquire Deuce Barrell from Baltimore. Barrell, who was the first overall pick of the 1935 draft, made his big league debut just before the deadline losing a 6-4 decision to Toronto. Detroit reportedly offered a large package of players, prospects and picks for the 21 year old. A package that is said to have include some of the likes of Leon Drake, Frank LeMieux, Ed Stewart and Elmer Nolde. The deal never happened and to be honest it would be hard to see Baltimore being willing to part with Barrell unless they were getting Sal Pestilli back or a package including Red Johnson. The Dynamos eventually moved on to the Sailors and landed a veteran arm instead by acquiring William Jones. In the short-term a Barrell deal would likely have ended the Dynamos pennant hopes with the amount of offense they would have parted with so if Detroit does actually come back and win the Federal crown perhaps they have Baltimore to thank for it.
• Former 2nd overall pick Chick Stout has rebounded nicely after missing all of '37 with an arm injury (would have been nice if he was the closer in the WCS instead of Lou Ellertson in that ill-fated game 2 loss that tipped the Series in Brooklyn's favor) Stout's been healthy all year, appearing in 35 games with 43.2 IP, 14 saves and a 2.89 ERA. Very big things were expected from Stout when the Rainier College product beat out Tom Barrell for first team All-American honours in 1929. Stout would never develop into the top of the rotation arm that Barrell, who was drafted one slot ahead of him, became but the 30 year has fashioned a decent career pitching almost exclusively in relief for the Miners.
• Bob Walls(4-0, 3.09) has been lights out since being acquired at the deadline by the Toronto Wolves. Rookies Jim Morrison (8-8, 5.37) and George Garrison (3-3, 5.36) each got their W-L records back to even during the 7 game winning streak, now if they could both work on their respective control issues. For both players the WHIPs are being severely inflated due to free passes given up to opposing hitters. Is it a case of a tighter strike zone for rookie pitchers as manager Hank Lietzke has been heard yelling from the dugout steps? Wolves are in closed door discussions regarding September call-ups but almost assuredly an arm(s) will be added to the 'pen.
• Brooks Meeks of Cleveland has an interesting streak going. Each of the previous three seasons he finished with exactly 27 doubles. He needs 6 more this season to keep the meaningless but statistically speaking rare streak alive.
• Tough break for Cleveland prospect Johnny Slaney. The 22 year old was cruising along at AAA Cincinnati with a 12-3 record and a 3.01 era and was all set to be recalled by the Foresters when the rosters expand next week. However the top 100 prospect who was originally a 1934 Pittsburgh fourth round pick, blew out his arm last week and will be sidelined at least a calendar year. Slaney did make 3 starts for Cleveland earlier in the summer.
• Brooklyn's Tom Barrell continues to struggle as the 3-time Allen Award winner took another loss this week to drop his record to 10-11 on the year. The only losing season of his career came in 1933 when he was 13-16 but he had control problems that season. This year he has pitched well, in fact leads the Kings starters in FIP and WAR but just has had some bad luck.
• Dave Haight Does It Again! The former 13th round pick, acquired in the offseason by the New York Gothams as part of the Johnny McDowell deal with the Chicago Cougars, has won his second POW award. Haight, who made the jump from AA in the Cougars system to a starting job with New York is hitting .325/.385/.504 with 29 D, 11 T, 5 HR and 62 RBI on the season. Last week he was 11-21 with 4 doubles, a triple and a homer. Haight has become a mainstay in RF for the Gothams after spending the first month of the season sharing time in the outfield. Haight should be considered among the league's top rookies along with the more heralded Red Johnson in Detroit and his own teammates, Ernie Perez and Bill Dalton.
• The upcoming Gothams schedule over the next two weeks does include a lot of Detroit and Chicago, but the Gothams have so far avoided the second half collapse that sent last year's squad to a team record 100 losses. Now 23-22 since the All-Star break the team is just 3 wins shy of last year's total. While some prognosticators wondered if the team could win 50 this season, they are now shooting for 60 and beyond. This attempt may be hurt by the news that rookie starter Nate Spear is done for the season with forearm tightness. The 22 year old was 8-11 with a 4.32 era in his first full season in New York.
• It was a 2-4 week for the New York Stars under interim GM Tom Davis. Davis did recently promote top 50 prospect Joe Angevine from AAA and the 23 year old responded by going 3-for-8 in his first two big league games with his first hit being a double off of the Sailors Walt Wells. The rookie in the Stars lineup everyone wants to see is Bill Barrett, but it was a rough week for the 18 year old who went just 4-for-23 but did hit 3 doubles in 6 games last week. Barrett is batting .200 with 3 homers in 13 big leagues, which is the exact same number of games the teen played in the minors so regardless of the press clippings, and there have been many already, the Stars need to be patient with their young star.
• Just some random updates from the Kings farm system courtesy of the Brooklyn Daily Eagle: Remember Dan Rogers? The 1934 1st rounder who started #51 on the prospect list and then plunged. Well he is hitting .297 with 14 homers at AAA Rochester and has a slim chance of being a September call-up next week. Still only ranked #261 by OSA but my SD likes his chances and much better than flirting with #500 like he was a season ago. Fellow outfielder Jim Alarie (.292,0,11) is adjusting nicely to his first taste of AAA. Alarie was one of the players who came from Chicago in the Bill May deal.
  Jack Goff (5-11, 5.04 at AAA) had a great spring for us and if he was righthanded the 22 year old might have started the season in Brooklyn. Got off to a bad start in Rochester and never recovered which has Kings questioning his long-term role in the organization.
  Hank Mittan (6-1, 2.47) is settling in at the AA level after AAA seemed too much for the 23 year old to start the season. His future if he makes it to Brooklyn is likely in the pen as, while he has a great slider and a decent fastball, his third pitch is practically non-existent. Mittan was a 1932 9th round pick of Pittsburgh we traded for after picking him in the Rule 5 last December. It took 42 games (17 in Memphis and 25 with Knoxville) but Chuck Adams - #10 on the prospect pipeline - finally hit his first homer at the AA level. The expectation is the 21 year old will need another year in the minors before he can challenge for the 1B job in Brooklyn.
  It's a bad season all around for Class A Springfield but at list our other big slugging 1B is showing signs of progress. 20 year old Tiny Tim Hopkins struggled early but has raised his average to .252 with 7 homers for the Hustlers.
  James Slocum, Manager Powell Slocum's step-son, is hitting .300 through his first 34 games of pro ball at Class C Marshalltown. Slocum was the Kings 4th round pick in June. 7th rounder Dick Farmer (6-3, 2.58) is looking very good as an 18 year old for the Maples as is our fourth round pick from a year ago in catcher George Jones. The 19 year old is hitting .349 and will certainly move up a level, perhaps two, next spring. The Maples, with a half game lead are the only team in our organization with a solid shot at winning a pennant. Unfortunately 3rd round pick Bobby Boone is one of the few disappointments in the early going. The 19 year old his batting just .179 through 49 games.

The Week That Was
Current events from the week ending 08/28/1938

• The British government gave France "unmistakable assurance" of support if a a conflict resulted and if France were called upon to fulfill treaty obligations to the Czechs.
• London also called upon Germany to avoid violence in Czechoslovakia as doing so might precipitate a general war in which Britain would have to join. Russia, Yugoslavia and Romania reply they will also observe defense pledge to Prague and will join Britain and France if Germany takes action.
• The American pilot of a Chinese airliner tells a harrowing tale of how Japanese war planes forced him to land before shooting 14 Chinese passengers from the flight.
• Japan and the US are at odds following the attempted bombing of an American gunboat in China waters. The gunboat was showered with water but not damaged by the explosions after Japan was said to have refused permission for the gunboat to enter a river towards Shanghai that is under Japanese control.
• The racketeering trial of New York politician James J. Hines continues. Hines charged for complicity in a numbers game and for protection of now deceased gangster Dutch Schultz and his gang.