Hog Heaven
From 7-2-14
My last story involved playing "baseball" with a knife, & it has broken open a flood of memories.
When I was a little boy, baseball was the only game we knew. I always loved to ride the Exposition Mills' company truck that carried the baseball players to their games. I noticed all the big players chewed tobacco, so one day I sneaked a big chunk of my dad's Brown Mule & headed to the ball field. I had that big wad in my mouth, & I felt like a "big leaguer". The first ground ball hit toward me took a bad hop & hit me right between the eyes, causing me to swallow my Brown Mule, & I saw more colors than I ever knew existed!--NEVER, EVER any more tobacco for me!!
When someone asked me what I was going to do with my life, the answer was always--"Play Ball!" They always said, " you can't do that your whole life!"-- but I'm getting close to proving them wrong! If an old man gets out & flies a kite by himself, everyone thinks he's crazy! But, if he has a young boy with him everyone will say, "isn't that old man nice to help that youngster learn to fly a kite!" At Avondale High School I played on state championship teams in baseball (pictured here), football, & a state runner-up in basketball! Obviously, I had a passion for sports! My senior year in HS, several pro baseball teams made offers to me, but the best offer came from the Atlanta Crackers. The offered to pay me a bonus more than any other team & gave me an additional offer that would be illegal in h.s. today. After my h.s. baseball practice each day, I would go to Ponce de Leon Park & work out in pre-game warm-ups with the Atlanta Crackers. This was big stuff--I was in "hog heaven"! I remember the day when future Philadelphia Phillies manager, Gene Mauch, got mad at his team, hit the wall with his fist--breaking his hand & having to wear a cast for the rest of the season. This was in 1953, & some of those guys moved on as the new team, the Milwaukee Braves, later to become the Atlanta Braves. My mom made a wise decision in urging me to go to college, rather than accepting a pro baseball offer! I turned down a UGA football scholarship, thinking a baseball-basketball scholarship would keep my offers open for a pro baseball career. Today, any time I pass the old Sears building on Ponce de Leon Ave. in Atlanta, my mind begins to wander. The only thing left of the baseball field is the magnolia tree. My senior year in high school, I played in the North-South all star game, & our teams were quartered at the old Henry Grady Hotel. At our pre-game meal, most of the guys were nervous, and gave me their food. The ball I hit under the magnolia tree for a triple, would have been a homerun if I had not eaten all those steaks! Our next post we will feature 17 years coaching baseball at Newton Co. H.S., & how 2great undefeated H.S. pitchers, Stanley Edwards & Doug Bledsoe, were State Runners-up. (It still hurts--they deserved to be State Champions!)
