The Waterbury Democrat., 1931-03-13

In fact, MT Mack almost gIared when he spoke, and a glare on the patiently polite face of MT Mack Is about as common as sunstroke in Siberia.
 We. had been discussing the Ath- letics' chances to win third straight world championship. and though Connie Mack still retains ideals that he cherished as a youth something like half a century ago he Is toiling under no delusions as to the difficulty of the job that lies just ahead.
 Carefully, almost painfully. he had gone oyer the roster of his team with me, conducting as careful an inventory of his baseball assets as la Scotch grocer who has misplaced can of beans. 1t was when he reached the subject of pitchers that
 MT Mack grew emotional. "Just Too Bad. We had been talking of luck ana injuries and offhand I asked him if he thought the Athletics could go any place without Grove or Earn shaw, except perhaps to a good
 movie.
 If something should happen to Grove or Earnshaw? Well, that would be just too bad!' MT Mack is not man who goes
 around blindfolded. He is aware
 that he has only six pitchers who can be depended upon as regulars,
 He wants three more. As a result, every other person you meet in Fort Myers this spring would probably admit under pres
 sure that he was pitcher. Tho stY ro01vlos.o Grove, Walberg, Rommel, Shores and Mahaffey, and it has been gen. erally admitted that three or four of
 these pitchers are pretty regular at
 that. In his canvass for three more, Connie is giving every likely pros-
 pect from Opp, Ala, to Pilger, Neb, Q careful once-over. There are 19 lhurlers in camp, some of whose
 names are not even known, and
 there are more on the way. Noticing the size of the squad, which seemed unusually large for the Athletics, I asked MT Mack if
 he happened to be going in for ex-
 perimenting in big way this year. Not much experimenting" was
 his reply, except for the pitchers.
 At few positions, our men had
 bad years last year. Haas and Mill Ter did not do as well as I think they will this year. But as whole my infielders and outfielders look good to me.
 "With Todt, Williams. McNair and Higgins, we have a pretty good re- serve infield. Bob Johnson and Jim
 Moore are god outfield substitutes.
 One of the other recruits may show
 promise. Palmisano from Portland. and Heving, who came from the Red Sox with Todt. can help Cochrane
 out with the catching. There will not be much experi-
 menting. except for pitchers" We talked over few of the great
 pitchers of other years. Would MT
 Mack liketo have Chief Bender or
 Rube Waddell, in his prime. this year?
 MT Mack agreed sadly that he would.
 But his conclusion carried a.note of optimism based upon baseball experience of 19 years ago. His Best. "I didn't think they could beat my ball team of 1912" he said. ''It seemed to me the best team I ever
 saw. We had won the world cham pionship in 1910 and 1911 and I
 looked forward to 1912 with whole lot of confidence.
 "But they beat that team. Jake StahPs Boston team won the pen nant and the series that year.
 "The very next year we won the world championship again. despite the fact that I had lost Jack Coombs, one of my best pitchers" "Oh, well, maybe pitchers are not so important, after all.' said. But his quick reply was: "Oh, yes, they are!"