Evening star., 1950-04-01
Fine Hurting, Hitting
In Minneapolis Game
Support Contention
By Burton Howkins
Stor SfaH Correspendanf

ORLANDO. Fla, April L.
Bucky Harris, who inherited an
eighth-place baseball club, has con-
tended since the first few days he
was introduced to it that the Mats
would make representative
showing if equipped with passable
pitching. AS a prophet he may
rank in the first 10.
Washington admittedly is woe
fully thin in pitching, and Harris
recognizes the fact, but given
even fair hurting the Mats might
be rugged. That was illustrated
yesterday when Washington
spanked Minneapolis, 60, on the
combined one-hit pitching of Joe
Haynes and Buzz Dozier.
The Mats were to receive the
acid test today when they dis
patched Mickey Harris against
the Cincinnati Reds, hottest team
in the Grapefruit League, with IL
victories in II games.
Hitting Pleases Harris.
Harris is pleased with the hit
ting of his club. despite past per-
formances, which might indicate
the Mats are betting over their
heads. For instance. he las Eddie
Robinson hitting AL pace, and
among other outstanding hitters
are AL Kozar, 800; Gil Coan, 1888;
Clyde Vollmer, .316; Irv Noren,
.304, and Sam Mele, .306.
Normally. that sort of batting
order would represent at least a
first-division threat, but Harris
has been shackled with poor pitch
ing. Not until yesterday did he
receive a big batch of encourage
ment.
Haynes effort, following an i'm
pressive four-inning job against
the Boston Red Sox in which he
yielded one unearned run in four
innings. was particularly hearten-
ing. Joe yesterday permitted one
scratch hit in six innings and was
succeeded by Dozier, who allowed
no hits in three innings.
Between them they retired "a
batters in order. issued only one
walk and, in general, gave Bucky
a pleasant day of it in swapping
a four-gam losing streak.
Robinson remains the Mats
story. In addition to his fantastic
average. he has thumped across
Il runs and has demonstrated he
may be headed for the top season
OF his career. They're getting him
out occasionally. but usually on
line drives.
Big Day for Robbie.
In the first inning yesterday
Robinson singled in Noren, who
had tripled. In the sixth inning,
when the Mats clustered four
runs off Adrian Zabala, Robinson
launched the attack with a single
and scored on Mele's triple. Fol-
lowing those blows were a single
by AL Evans. Mickey Grasso's
pinch-double and singles by Eddie
Yost and Sam Dente. The Mats
added a run in the eighth when
the Millers committed two errors
Any time we get pitching we
can be tough" declares Harris. Il
don't say We could win the pen
nant with better pitching, but
we'd let any club know it had been
IN ball game. From what I've
seen, we'll hit enough to get by"
NAT NOTES.-The Mats said
Zabala. who jumped to the Mex
lean League several years ago.
showed them more stuff than any
pitcher they've seen this spring
Sid Hudson had one set of
x-rays made which showed no
damage to his right shoulder. but
he wants another set made
My shoulder feels all right now, !"
says Sid, but my back is both
ering me-"
The hit cleaned off Haynes
could have been called an error
with no stretch of the imagina-
ton. for Kozar's throw on 'Bama
RoWells slow roller pulled Robin
son on nrst base The next
Minneapolis player to reach base
was John Kroft, who walked with
two out in the ninth.
MIENEAp0T rS