Lewiston .... 3 0 1.000 —
Victoria .... 3 1 .750 ½
Calgary ..... 2 1 .667 1
Tri-City .... 2 1 .667 1
Yakima ...... 3 2 .600 1
Wenatchee ... 2 3 .400 2
Edmonton .... 1 2 .333 2
Salem ....... 1 2 .333 2
Vancouver ... 1 3 .250 2½
Spokane ..... 1 4 .200 3
YAKIMA [Victoria Colonist, April 29]—Victoria Tyees lost their first game of the youthful Western International Baseball League season last night at Yakima and dropped out of the lead they took at home last week with a series sweep against Spokane.
Getting steady pitching from Danny “The Lion” Rios, veteran Mexican knuckleballer, and profiting by Tyee mistakes and inability to hit in the clutches, the Bears made a four-run first inning stand up for a 5-2 victory. Almost 2,800 fans saw the Yakima opener.
The teams continue their series tonight and conclude it tomorrow with the Tyees moving to Tri-City Friday for four games before returning home Monday.
HARD-LUCK START
Making his second start, Bill Wisneski ran into a hard-luck first inning but pitched creditably from there until taken out for a pinch-hitter in the seventh.
Wisneski walked his only two men of the game in the opening frame and hit one batter. This, combined with two bloop singles, a topped ball down the third-base line which refused to roll foul, and a legitimate single to send four Bears across the plate.
The Tyees, who went into the lead in their first turn when manager Cec Garriott hit a run-scoring triple, had their chances but hit into three double plays and had two runners picked off first base to help end what might have been big innings.
FOUL UP CHANCES
Ron Odekirk banged into the first double play in the second after Joe Clardy had lefd off with a single. In the third, Nap Gully, had failed to get a ball out of the infield, tapped into a twin killing by way of the plate with one out an the bases loaded. And, in the fourth, Sam Brusa was doubled at first with a runner aboard and one out.
Clardy was picked off first in the sixth with one out and a teammate on second and Odekirk killed a promising threat when he ventured too far off the bag and fell victim to a toss from the canny Rios. The Tyees had a runner on second and with pinch-hitter Chuck Abernathy and Lu Branham following with singles, might have made it interesting. Don Pries fouled out to end the game but, except for Odekirk’s laxity, Garriott would have had a chance to bat with the tying runs aboard.
On the brighter side, the Tyees reeled off there double plays themselves and Zeb Walker, rookie colored southpaw, came up with two hitless innings of relief pitching.
[Rios homered and doubled in three trips to the plate.]
Victoria ............. 100 000 001— 2 8 1
Yakima ............. 400 001 00x— 5 10 3
Wisneski, Walker (7) and Brusa, Martin (8); Rios and Day.
KENNEWICK, April 28 — The Tri-City Braves fell on the offerings of an old teammate, Joe Orrell, Tuesday night for four runs in the first inning to win a Western International League baseball game from Calgary, 4-2.
Orrell gave up two walks and three singles to allow all the Tri-City runs before he was relieved by Bill Stites.
Calgary ... 000 000 011— 2 8 0
Tri-City ... 400 000 00x— 4 8 0
Orrell, Stites (1), Levenson (7) and Bricker; Tanner, Dobernic (7) and Pesut.
LEWISTON, April 28 — Lewiston was out-hit 5-3 but still won the pitchers' duel between the Broncs' Russ Butler and Wenatchee's Rick Botelho Tuesday night to down the Chiefs 2-1 in their first home game of the Western International League baseball season.
Walks made the difference. Butler fanned nine and yielded six scattered walks. Botelho struck out five and walked nine, bunching two of them together to give the Broncs their winning run in the fourth inning.
Wenatchee ..... 000 000 100— 1 5 4
Lewiston ........ 100 100 00x— 2 3 3
Botelho and Stanford; Butler and Neal.
VANCOUVER [Clancy Loranger, Province, April 29]—Beggars, and a winless ball club, can’t be choosers, so Vancouver Caps don’t care what you say today about the manner in which they won a ball game Tuesday night.
The important thing is that they finally made it into the win column, on their fourth try, in the second game of last night’s doubleheader at Cap Stadium.
They were pretty desperate after Spokane Indians had stretched their losing string to three straight with a 4-2 victory in the seven-inning opener last night. But they were mighty happy—and still giggling—after they’d pushed over the winning run in the ninth for a 4-3 nightcap victory.
The giggling was caused by Van Fletcher, who was not only the Cap’s [sic] first 1953 winning pitcher, but also the man who scored the first winning run. It was how he did it that left ‘em laughing.
NOT THE WORST
Van says he isn’t the worst hitter in baseball—he claims his brother Guy, the old Coast Leaguer, is No. 1—but he’d be a pretty good example if you wanted to show junior what not to do at the plate—and on the bases.
Anyway, Fletcher came up in the ninth with a man on base and none out, and tried to bunt. He had tried it in a spring training game and Manager Harvey Storey offered to send him out a pair of boxing gloves. So last night he bunted, and forced the runner at second.
Then, with Nick Castas at bat, and making like he was going to bunt, Van lit out for second. He so confused Spokane’s catcher, George Triandos, that the latter tossed the ball wide to second and Van got himself a stolen based. Castas then lined a double down the left field line, and Van duck-footed it home with the winner.
HEDGECOCK LOSES
Jim Hedgecock, who lost the first game, didn’t throw hard enough to dent a balloon, which is strange for a fellow who has always fired ‘em good.
With the spell broken, the Caps will be out for No. 2 tonight, with Pete Hernandez back on the firing line at 8:15.
PROVINCE STARS—Spokane rookie Bill Holland, who batted in four runs in the two games with six hits in seven tries, including a home run and two doubles; Harvey Storey, who got his first four hits of the season; and Van Fletcher, base-runner supreme.
(First Game)
Spokane ........... 110 110 0—4 10 0
Vancouver ........ 020 000 0—2 4 0
Palm, Descasle (2) and Sheets; Hedgecock, Gunnarson (5), MacKay (7) and Lundberg.
(Second Game)
Spokane .......... 300 000 000—3 8 1
Vancouver ....... 000 002 101—4 8 2
New, Frank (6), Cordell (7) and Triandos; Guldborg, Fletcher (8) and Lundberg.
SALEM, April 28—The Salem Senators won their first Western International League game of the season Tuesday night when they defeated Edmonton, 2-1.
Connie Perez, who had singled, crossed the plate in the eighth inning on John Conant's wild pitch for the winning run.
Only 305 saw the contest.
Edmonton ... 000 100 000— 1 4 0
Salem ....... 000 000 11x— 2 6 2
Conant and Morgan; Collins and Nelson.
today’s fanfare
The Draft Winds Blow---But Not for Mascaro
By Eric Whitehead
[Vancouver Province, April 29, 1953]
It’s no joke having a two-year chunk carved out of a professionally athlete’s career, whether it be an eager rookie moving up for a veteran star squeezing out the last fat years.
One in the former category is Vancouver Capilanos’ outfielder Frank Mascaro. Couple of years and a bit back, the husky, likeable chap with the rifle arm looked all set to move along and up the ladder.
He was 22, he could move for a big boy, and had just clocked off a sweet .348 batting average with Dewey Soriano’s Yakima Bears.
Give the lad a couple of years, and, well . . . you never can tell!
Only in this cased, Frank could tell all right. Or at least Uncle Sam told him, via one of those polite little draft-board invitations.
So Mascaro resignedly ticked two years off the calendar, had a get acquainted party with his sergeant and was shipped off to Korea to eight months on the front. Ask him if he “saw action,” and he just grins it off and murmurs “yes.” He had four months back in Tokyo, then back up to the front.
He came home this spring, got his first look at his chubby young son and heir, and headed for spring camp of the Sacramento Solons. But Frank was rusty. They sent him back to Class A ball, to Vancouver, to pick up where he left off two years ago.
A couple of lost years for Mascaro—but at least he knows they are behind him. There are thousands who would like it that way.
One in the former category is Vancouver Capilanos’ outfielder Frank Mascaro. Couple of years and a bit back, the husky, likeable chap with the rifle arm looked all set to move along and up the ladder.
He was 22, he could move for a big boy, and had just clocked off a sweet .348 batting average with Dewey Soriano’s Yakima Bears.
Give the lad a couple of years, and, well . . . you never can tell!
Only in this cased, Frank could tell all right. Or at least Uncle Sam told him, via one of those polite little draft-board invitations.
So Mascaro resignedly ticked two years off the calendar, had a get acquainted party with his sergeant and was shipped off to Korea to eight months on the front. Ask him if he “saw action,” and he just grins it off and murmurs “yes.” He had four months back in Tokyo, then back up to the front.
He came home this spring, got his first look at his chubby young son and heir, and headed for spring camp of the Sacramento Solons. But Frank was rusty. They sent him back to Class A ball, to Vancouver, to pick up where he left off two years ago.
A couple of lost years for Mascaro—but at least he knows they are behind him. There are thousands who would like it that way.
