State

May 30, 1936 THE STAT' Page Nine SPORTS GOSSIP BY JAKE W A I) E SPORTS EDITOR OK llll < llllil.OITE OBSERVER MANY native sons of North Carolina have sen led the heights in professional base- hull. In addition, scores of young fellows who had their minor league season¬ ing in North Carolina towns but who happened, by the accident of birth, to hail from other states, have made good in the big leagues. Also, there have been many young¬ sters going direct From the cam puses of North Carolina colleges to the majors, there to achieve national base¬ ball celebrity. Needless to say, North Caro¬ lina baseball fans religiously fol¬ low the fortunes of these young men. Their daily literature are those little plots of agate type in the newspapers, the major league box scores. It is their pleasant vanity to be able to say, "I knew him when — .” Among the North Carolina fresh¬ men in the big leagues Ibis year is a youngster named Л. K. (Buddy) Lewis, who was horn and reared in (iastonin. Nineteen years old. he is the youngest regular in the major leagues. He plays third base for Washington. The 1936 season is young and some¬ times the kids ••«•rack wide open" unexpectedly, but so far Huddy Lewis has shared honors with doe DiMaggio, a Pacific! coast boy with the Yankees, as i he most spectacular and sensat ionnl rookie of the year. Kept on the bench during the first two games of the season. Lewis was then inserted in the Washington line¬ up and has been there ever since. In every department be lias rung the bell. The latest batting averages show Lewis has been hitting for a percentage of .365. A day rare¬ ly passes that he does not come through, and usually he registers hits in clusters. Last Saturday he hit safely four times. On the next day lie hit safely four times out of six, and his collec¬ tion included a triple and a home run. He drove in four runs that day. It had been feared that he might be weak against left handed pitchers. BUDDY LEWIS The above picture shows Buddy when he was one of the star players on the Gastonia baseball team. since he bats from the south side. But some of his best batting has lieen against southpaws. Manager Bucky Harris of the Senators says Buddy is one of the best third basemen he has ever seen in collaborating oil double plays. Altogether his Holding, while not quite so sensational as his batting, has been entirely sat isfnetory. All Gastonia is proud of Buddy Lewis, but the proudest citizen of that town is Brown Wilson, cotton broker. Legionnaire, ardent baseball fan. Brown Wilson pulled Buddy out of a cotton mill, saw him through the Legion baseball ranks, "fathered" him right on up to his present high state. Next proudest must he Roy (Casey) Morris, one time University of North Carolina star athlete, whose early coaehing of Lewis is believed to have had miieh to do with his success. And Wilson. Morris and others who I lave followed Buddy's career know that it was no picnic for him to get his big chance, that for one so young lie has had more than his share of disappointments and setbacks, that lie had to be a good, game boy or he would not Ih- up there where he is now. In 1932 Buddy played second base for the Gastonia Legion Junior team, being shifted to third base the last two games of the season. Casey Mor¬ ris, roach of the team. sense*I that Buddy's natural |>ositlon was third base. In 1933 be played the entire season at third base and was captain of the team, batting in elean-up position. Gastonia went to the eastern finals, losing to Trenton. N. J., at •Spring- Held. Ohio. In that game Buddy hit safely twice out of two attempts. In the regional finals series preceding that in one game Buddy got four for live, including a triple, a double and a single, and ill the other he got three for live. The late Johnny Dobbs, then pres¬ ident of the ( 'harlot tc club of the Pied¬ mont league, was attracted by Lewis but was not bufliciently impressed to give him a contract. Memphis of the Southern associa¬ tion offered him a job but Bill Terry, manager of the New York Giants, persuaded him to sign an agreement to go with the Giants when he de¬ cided to play professional baseball. At the time he was anxious to go to college. Gastonia admirers made arrange ments for Buddy to matriculate at Wake Forest College, ami in 1934 he played on the Wake Forest freshman team. He did not return the next year, means of Htiaueiug being exhausted, but instead went to New York where Terry permitted liini to travel and work out with the Giauts for two weeks. At the end of two weeks Terry turned him down. “Go to the minors,” he told (Continued on pag> twenty-two)