Monday, August 28, 1950

              W  L  PCT GB
Tacoma ..... 83 49 .629 —
Yakima ..... 84 51 .622 ½
Tri-City ... 72 61 .541 11½
Wenatchee .. 70 64 .522 14
Victoria ... 59 77 .434 25
Vancouver .. 55 76 .419 26½
Spokane .... 55 77 .417 27
Salem ...... 55 78 .414 27½

VANCOUVER, [Erwin M. Swangard, Province, Aug. 29]—Among the more reasonably happy people in Vancouver Monday night was George Nicholas, the handsome righthander of the Vancouver Capilanos of the Western International Baseball League.
George is actually considered one of the league’s best pitchers yet by scoring a 6-3 victory over the Victoria Athletics Nicholas’ win-defeat count for the season reached an even 15-15.
That, of course, doesn’t look a bit impressive but it actually is when one considers that Nicholas lost nine games by one-run margins. Of the nine three were 1-0. In addition he lost another three games by shutouts.
NEEDS BACKING
Or, as Manager Bill Brenner put it when Nick recently lost 1-0 on a three-hitter to Victoria, “When are we going to give Nick some runs?”
Well, Monday night the Caps did give Nicholas a working margin all the way and George went along fairly smoothly. He got into a couple of minor jams but bore down to erase all but two threats. Lou Novikoff homered with one aboard in the fifth and Nicholas got into another in the seventh when Nick lost control temporarily with two out to walk the “Mad Russian” and Gene Thompson, and then yielded a single to Jim Moore.
Meanwhile the Caps managed some potent run-getting of their own. With one away in the first, Ray Tran and Reg Clarkson made first on successive errors to shortstop Bill Dunn. Ray scored on a double steal and Reg came home when burly Jim Keating belted one of Ronnie Smith’s Sunday pitches over the left-field fence.
BOTH FENCES
Caps followed it up with some long distance hitting in the sixth. Charlie Mead homered over the right field fence with one away and just to show that they weren’t playing favorites, Len Tran followed him to the plate and homered over the left field fence. Another insurance run came in the seventh which Jim Robinson opened with his third successive single and scored on Ray Tran’s infield single, a fielder’s choice and Dick Sinovic’s long fly ball to centre field.
Tonight, it’s Victoria again and lanky Sandy Robertson will make his third try for victory No. 13. The two teams meet Wednesday at Cap Stadium and then transfer their struggle to keep out of the league basement to Victoria for the rest of the week.
Caps, of course, are definitely out of the running for any honors. Yet, ironically, they can very well decide the league championship. Tacoma Tigers and Yakima Bears, engaged in a bitter struggle for the title, will play four games each here next week. Caps thus can make or break either.
Victoria ........ 000 020 100—3-13-2
Vancouver ... 300 002 10x—6-11-1
Smith and Ronning; Nicholas and Brenner.

Marriage And a New Job Lure Robinson From Caps
[Vancouver Daily Province, Aug. 29, 1950]
November theme song: “The Bells are Ringing . . . for Jim and His Gal . . .”
Right in tune will be Capilano third-baseman James Robinson and Vancouver’s Miss Dianne Addington. They render a chorus of ‘I Do’s’ shortly and then head blithely for a life of happy-ever-after.
Jim will hie his lovely brunette bride swiftly off to the hinterlands of Washington State—where, at Adna High School, he will take up his new post as teacher of history and English and coach the prep baseball and basketball teams.
The newly-assigned job nets the Cap infielder $3800 per annum, and as the school term runs from May 28 to September, he will be free to play in any pro ball in the summer months. Robinson has a masters degree, and is a native Tacoma.


ONLY GAME SCHEDULED

TACOMA, Aug. 29-Glen (Jeep) Stetter, stocky Spokane outfielder seems destined to become the first Western International league batsman to wear the loop hitting crown twice.
With only two weeks remaining in the season, the Indians outfielder held a 14-point bulge over his nearest competitor, figures released today by the league office here disclosed. Stetter won his first title back in 1946 when he clubbed the ball at a .366 clip for Wenatchee, and this season he is bettering that through games of Sunday, August 27.
Dick Greco, the Tacoma bridegroom, continued in the runnerup slot with .357, one. point off his pace of last week, while Bill McCawley, Yakima outfielder, trailed in third place with .343.
Greco, however, continued his mastery in the two other important divisions of the hit chase. His home run production was upped by on to 31 for the top mark while Gene Thompson, Victoria outfielder, was next with 23.
The big Tacoma right fielder also stretched his lead in the runs batted in department, knocking seven mates across the plate during the week to raise his total of 138 for the season. Jim Warner of the Tri-City was second with 112, while Jim Westlake, Yakima third baseman was third with 111.
Averages of top 20 hitters who have appeared in 85 or more games thrugh Sunday, Aug 27th.
                     AB  H  RBI  Ave
Stetter, Spokane .. 429 159  95 .371
Greco, Tacoma ..... 498 178 138 .357
McCawley, Yakima .. 338 116  67 .343
Rossi, Spokane .... 449 150  99 .334
Thompson, Vic. .... 497 163  99 .328
Clarkson, Van. .... 520 169  69 .325
Warner, Tri-City .. 491 159 112 .324
Vanni, Spokane .... 413 132  58 .320
Quinn, Tacoma ..... 518 163 101 .315
Gifford, Tacoma ... 460 145  64 .315
Hjelmaa, Wen. ..... 475 149  71 .314
Ragni, Wen. ....... 255  80  46 .313
Cheso, Yakima ..... 461 144  93 .312
Cameron, T-C ...... 373 116  74 .311
Zuvella, Yak. ..... 270  84  56 .311
Fracchia, Wen. .... 477 147  83 .308
Mohr, Spokane ..... 401 123  41 .307
Bryant, T-C ....... 483 146  82 .302
Sinovic, Van ...... 398 120  75 .302
A. Spaeter, T-C ... 557 167 400 .300

Monday, August 7, 1950

              W  L Pct. GB
Yakima ..... 71 44 .617 —
Tacoma ..... 64 46 .582 4½
Wenatchee .. 64 50 .561 6½
Tri-City ... 61 52 .540 9
Victoria ... 50 65 .435 21
Vancouver .. 48 63 .432 21
Salem ...... 47 64 .423 22
Spokane .... 45 66 .403 24

TACOMA, August 7—Tacoma got only five hits off Yakima's Bill Bradford but bunched two of them for the only run of the game as the Tigers defeated the Bears 1-0 tonight in a Western International League encounter.
Wimpy Quinn's single and Jose Bache's were good for a lone tally in the second frame.
Bob Kerrigan gave up only eight blows from the Tacoma mound in twirling his 17th win against six setbacks. The contest was a makeup of an early season rain-out. It cut Yakima's lead to 4 1/2 games over the runner-up Tigers.
Yakima ...... 000 000 000—0-8-2
Tacoma ..... 010 000 00x—1-5-0
Bradford and Tiesiera; Kerrigan and Sheets.

VANCOUVER, [Erwin M. Swangard, Vancouver Province, August 8]—Some weeks ago, when right-hander Sandy Robertson of the Vancouver Capilanos was in the early stages of his Western International Baseball League record-tying victory streak, he told me:
”It’s just a matter of staying in there and trying. Sooner or later, our fellows will start hitting and win the ball game.”
That’s just about the story of his Monday night with over the Salem Senators before a tense crowd of 3200 at Cap Stadium.
SPECIAL WIN
But there were two exceptions:
It just wasn’t another win for lanky Sandy but it was his twelfth straight this season, without defeat or relief, and tied the WIL record set in 1948 when Frank Nelson, now with the Pacific Coast League Oakland Acorns, was with Spokane Indians.
It was Sandy himself who did a lot of the “sooner and later” hitting and thus capturing a ball game which for a time appeared in jeopardy.
In fact Sandy, the engineer-pitcher, was in considerable trouble in the first inning when the Senators got to him for three singles and a walk to move into a 2-0 lead.
It would have been 3-0 but Bob Cherry, Salem centre-fielder, raced for home from third base a little too early after catcher Bill Beard skied to Jim Keating in deep right field. He was called out at third.
TO THE RESCUE
The two-punch combination of Dick Sinovic and Keating got Sandy one of those runs back in the second. Dick opened with a double and Jim brought him home with a single.
But two innings later came the weirdest play seen at Cap Stadium for many a moon. Cherry belted a ball out of the park at least 10 feet foul of the left field line. Cherry followed the flight of the ball as he moved to first and then returned to pick up his bat. Umpire Dutch Bergman suddenly motioned fair ball and the rhubarb was on. The off-shot, of course, was that the run counted and Sandy was behind, 3-1.
This time Sinovic and Mead combined to get one back in the Cap fourth inning. Dick singled and Charlie doubled. In between, Keating popped to second baseman Gene Gaviglio. Catcher Bill Heisner struck out and then luck came to Sandy’s aid. Gaviglio fumbled Bob McLean’s easy grounder. Mead scored on a wild pitch. Sandy doubled to send Bob to third, Reg Clarkson singled, scoring McLean.
MEAD’S HOMER
That was all Sandy needed. Caps scored, of course, another six runs but even without them Sandy was the boss man although he did contribute another two-run single in the sixth. Charlie Mead got himself an honest homer in the seventh with one aboard.
That homer send starting pitcher Bill Osborn to te showers and brought in Caps’ old team mate Bob Costello. Bob gave up one more unearned run.
Tonight caps and Senators go again and big Bob Bruenner, who pitched himself a victory over Wenatchee last week, will be on the mound for the Brenner men.
Salem ............. 200 100 000— 3- 7-3
Vancouver ....... 010 302 31x—10-13 2
Osborn, Costello (7) and Beard Robertson and Heisner.

VICTORIA, B. C., Aug. 7—The Victoria Athletics slugged and walked to 17-10 victory over the Tri-City Braves in the first game of their Western International league series here last night.
The A's jumped on Tri-City starter Gene Roenspie for five runs in the first and Dick Faber, who took the hill at the start of the second gave up the same number before he was relieved bv Nick Pesut. Pesut went the rest of the route giving up seven runs.
In losing their initial game of the series the Braves contributed five errors to help Victoria to their victory. The errors permitted four of the A's runs to cross the plate.
Roenspie got the thumb from plate umpire Jerry Mathieu when the hurler disputed one of Mathieu's calls. Faber who came in to relieve had trouble finding the plate walking four and hitting one of the six men to face him. Before Pesut could retire the bases-loaded A's, five runs had been added to their total.
Merle Frick for Tri City and Gene Thompson for Victoria hit three-run homers, Frick, playing in left field, belted his in the four-run fifth inning. It was the best inning for the Braves who were fighting from behind all night.
Pesut took the hitting honors for the visitors with three for four times, including a double and accounted for two of the runs that were batted in. Al Spaeter and Jim Warner each had a .500 average at, the plate It was a totally different lineup than Tri-City had used all season that was presented here last night. Two pitchers, Frick and Joe Nicholas held down outfield posts, while their regular starting catcher worked nearly all the game on the mound.
After racking up 10 runs in the first two innings the A's came hack in the third for two more and added a big four in the fourth as they romped on the visitors. Although the Braves outhit the winners, walks and boots by their infieldeis and outfielders figured heavily in the scoring The two teams continue their sencs tonight and finish off their meetings for the 1950 season on Wednesday.
Tri-City ....... 001 240 021—10-15-5
Victoria ...... 522 401 00x—17-13-1
Roenspie, Faber (2), Pesut (2) and McKeegan; Propst, Brkich (9) and Ronning.

ONLY GAMES SCHEDULED

'Caps Player Is Named As Coach
CHEHALIS, Wash., August 6—James Robinson, baseball player with the Vancouver Capilanos in the Western International League, is Adna high school's new athletic coach, Edwin L. Bolton, superintendent of the Adna district west of Chehalis, has announced.
Robinson will succeed Robert Eastman, who will devote full time to his duties as grade school principal. He graduated from Seattle University in April and attended Gonzaga University from 1939 to 1941. Previously he attended Bellarmine high in Tacoma. Robinson played professional baseball in 1942 and from 1947 to the present time.

TACOMA, Aug. 8—Glen Stetter, stubby Spokane swatsmith, unlumbered on Yakima and Tri-City pitching for 17 hits in 32 times at bat last week and raised his Western International league-leading willow average a cool 15 points to .369, it was revealed in figures released today from the office of Robert B. Abel, president of the circuit.
Four of Stetter's blows were home runs, giving him a season's total of 12, and he batted in 13 runs for an aggregate of 83 for the campaign.
The diminutive Spokane outfielder was still considerably behind Tacoma's Dick Greco in the latter two departments, however, since the slugging Tiger Gardener had a fair week himself, belting five homers and driving in 16 tallies for totals of 27 and 114, respectively.
Greco had a 14 for 29 weeks at the plate and hoisted his batting mark nine points to .359.
Although he lagged considerably behind the leaders percentage-wise, Tri City's Jim Warner exactly duplicated Stetter's rampage by collecting four homers and 13 other assorted blows in 32 times at bat. Warner batted in 15 runs for a total of 91, just one shy of the runner up in that department, Jim Westlake of Yakima. Reno Cheso of Yakima was fourth win 90.
Joo Rossi of Spokane clouted two homers to regain the runner up spot in the four-master derby with 18, one more than Victoria's Gene Thompson, while Warner was next in line with 15.
                    AB  H  RBI  AVE
Stetter, Spok. ... 371 137  83 .369
Greco, Tac. ...... 418 150 114 .359
Tornay, Yak. ..... 211  75  36 .356
McCawley, Yak. ... 268  95  52 .354
Vanni, Spok. ..... 350 117  47 .334
Rossi, Spok. ..... 377 124  78 .329
G. Thompson, Vic.. 426 139  88 .326
Warner, T-C. ..... 405 130  91 .321
Cheso, Yak. ...... 417 134  90 .321
Zuvella, Yak. .... 257  82  50 .319
Gifford, Tac. .... 381 121  49 .318
Clarkson, Van. ... 437 138  53 .316
Hjelmaa, Van. .... 393 124  61 .316
Sinovic, Van. .... 323 102  66 .316
Hack, Vic. ....... 169  53  22 .314
Matoh, Spok. ..... 423 132  70 .312