The Atlanta Constitution from Atlanta, Georgia • 31

Ttvs Atlanta Journal WEEKEND TT Atlanta Constitution August 20, 1983. 5-C Teraefe tempest baffles Chief I Vc a9 A i that smoke bomb stuck right between the tepee pole and the canvas, and it started the canvas on fire." Beverages from the cups of nearby fans didn't help very much. "It wasn't totaled," the Chief said, it definitely needed to be renovated." Levi Walker used to be a character only for Atlanta to view. Now, through Turner's Super-station and Joe Torre's wins, his following is national. Re-cently indoctrinated Braves fans would probably not believe Walker when he tells of playing before a crowd of 333 in 1974.

"I love what I do," he said, ''I would love to be able to do it until I'm 90." By then, Walker, who gets (50 per game, might have to alter his act At 41, his sprint to the left-field corner, done after a dance around the pitcher's mound, is not what it used to be. "I think I've lost a step," Noc-A-Homa "Time ii catching up with me, but that doesn't mean I don't think I can still do it" Walker got the job in 1969, having grown weary of life as an insurance salesman, warehouse worker or plumber. He argued that the fans "deserved a real Indian." The Braves rewarded his persistence and hired one. According to Walker, he's "1516ths Ottawa and Chippewa, l16th French." Undaunted by criticism from Indian leaders in the Wounded Knee era, he has expanded the position and grown proud of his role. The Braves like to call, him their "goodwill ambassador." They added "Princess Win-A-Lotta" this season, but Noc-A-i Homa is still the show.

Years back he added fire-eating for "July 4th, Opening Night, crucial games, stuff like that" No danger from the kerosene, he said, "as long as you keep away from the flame." Makes sense. So would returning the tepee. For now, Noc-A-Homa's still smiling, but powers are not to be ignored. A 1980 rain dance in Huntsville, Ala. brought showers out of a blue sky.

The gentleman in the business suit stopped dead in his steps in the hallway at Turner Broadcasting. Forget about stock tips. The heck with rising interest rates. Who cares if we can't get in touch with Ted? This is important. "Hey, Chief! Yoo gonna do something for us?" he pleaded.

'1 don't know," said the man in Indian clothing. "Whatever happens win happen." "Chief, you've gotta get us out of this. Deja vu, you know?" The Chief shook his head and grinned as the exasperated fellow departed. 1 "Deja vu, huh?" be said. "Yeah, right, an old Indian term." Chief Noc-A-Homa, who pays taxes under the name of Levi Walker, Forest Park, had stopped by the CNN studios.

Friday morning for an interview. The Chief, as you may know, has been a hot item lately. "Ooooooh, Chief Noc-A-Homa," said the secretary, dispensing a lengthy hug. "You're one of my favorite people." "Hi, Chief," said another lady. "You dont remember me, but Friday night you sat in front of me.

You gave me an autograph. I lost it I feel terrible. Could you give me another one? And also one for my friend?" For the second straight year, as you probably know, there's A Great Tepee Controversy. Or, as one man called it A Tempest In a Tepee. With Noc-A-Homa 's home in storage, the Braves are 4-23.

The populace is confused and upset But is anybody thinking about the poor old chief? They not only told him that the 22-foot tepee must be removed, they made him remove it "What got me was that when they said to take it down, I had just set it up before that game be-; cause the wind had blown it over," Walker said. "So I didn't think anything about it when they said to take it down again after the game." But it has stayed down, once again, to enable 250 seats to be sold in left field. It would have to come down were the Braves to win the National League West the league controls playoff seating but since the tepee was dismantled before the Dodgers series, the Braves' luck has changed suddenly and remarkably. Although Walker speaks about "negative" attitudes making this worse than is rationally probable, he allows that "The 'Spirit' is probably in there. Look what's happening." What's happening to Levi Walker is that people only seem to notice him when weird things transpire with his rather weird job.

As a matter of fact, this really isn't the worst calamity involving his tepee. In 1969, for example, his rookie year, the wigwam burned up. "There were four things that should have told me something was going to happen," he said. "The Braves were in first place, Phil Niekro was pitching against Bob Gibson; we had traded Joe Torre for Orlando Cepeda; and it was one of the shorter baseball games I ever seen." In the fifth inning the Braves were a run down to the Cardinals. Somebody had just dumped the Chiefs trash can and he was straightening up in the tepee.

With Ralph Garr on first Clete Boyer homered. Noc-A-Homa hit the doorbell button on his tepee, which then automatically triggered a smoke bomb. "I was hollering at Lou Brock in the outfield," Noc-A-Homa said, "Clete's running around the bases and I heard this loud I looked up and saw '5 ine spirit he said, "must have been wit! A. BRIDGES JR.Statt Chief INoc-A-Homa unnoticed unless tepee down me." MWtm presents Centurion Torre shuffles batting lineup SOFTWARE t9fS2 TUnDnnr.UBDrn mm 1 Wj, k-A4 books MAGAZINES ACCESSORIES FEATURING GRAPHICS' BUSINESS NOME EDUCATIONAL SOFTWARE I SPECIAL OFFER- mm, niiir--' pim new mibhwq io 4t iwi mmtmm mtwmtu of a tew wA-icta. We'wi added tee ealimiwe el driwi prettioieM.

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26th There seemed to be a team-wide effort to be exceptionally loose going into Friday's game. To further loosen things up, several players' caps were stolen before the game so that many worked out bare-headed until new caps were brought in from the hotel Torre theorized that the theft was an outside job, "Especially since memorabilia is such a big-money field now. It's gotten to the point that someone might be sitting in the stands at a game wearing Reggie Jackson's uniform, and it won't even be noticed." But could the theft have been some sort of inside prank, to further shake things up? Torre answered very tongue-in-cheek: "This might be our Pascual Perez (getting lost on 1-285) of 1983. I suspect that the combination of the lost hats and the tepee will straighten us out." home run, in the top of the first. Dale Murphy hit cleanup, an off-and-on spot for him all season, and Gaudell Washington, who normally bats second or third, was moved to fifth.

Rafael Ramirez was moved to sixth from his usual second slot. "I told him it wasn't a demotion," Torre said, "that I just wanted to give him an opportunity to drive in some runs, because he's been making good contact lately." Biff Pocoroba again caught in place of Bruce Benedict, who has a slightly twisted neck, and batted seventh. And Randy Johnson played third and batted eighth. NOTES Benedict is expected to catch Saturday when the Braves send Craig McMurtry (12-8) against Chicago's Steve Trout (9-10) in NBC-TV's backup game of the week. ByEdHinton Sielt Writer CHICAGO Atlanta Braves manager Joe Torre Friday came up with his most massive hitting lineup scramble so far this season, "just to do something different" to try to break the team out of its hitting and scoring doldrums.

For Friday afternoon's game against the Chicago Cubs, Brett Butler remained in the leadoff spot and pitcher Phil Niekro hit ninth, but virtually every slot in between was such a surprise that when pitcher Ken Dayley looked at the posted lineup in the clubhouse, he said. "Who are these guys Oh! That's us!" Glenn Hubbard, who usually bats seventh, batted second. Rookie Gerald Perry hit third "just to give him some pitches to hit," according to Torre and responded immediately, with his first major-league 3362-B CHAMBLEE-TUCKER RD. NORTH HILLS SHOPPING CENTER 455-3417 Get the paper, -find get creative. With new recipe ideas in your Journal-Constitution Food Guide.

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$20.99 enocft abeorptlon built mto eul- the game, "the kid to get some good pitches to work with. He should with those other guys behind him." After Niekro relinquished a three-run homer to Jay Johnstone in the Cubs' seventh, Torre called upon Steve Bedrosian; the bard-throwing reliever got the last two outs of the inning and earnestly worked through the eighth and the ninth to pick up his 17th save. And what appeared to be a ho-hum move veteran first baseman Mike Jorgensen replacing Perry in the bottom of the eighth turned out to help save the game. Jorgensen gloved Bill Buckner's tough-hop bouncer leading off the inning, staving off what could have been a big inning. ole.lnKi-.

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They know what to do." The 22-year old Perry, by far the looser of the Braves' two recent Richmond grads (the other being Brad Komminsk) drove a first-inning pitch thrown by Cubs' starter Chuck Rainey (12-10) into the left-center-field bleachers. Although one run traditionally has little enduring value in this park, it gave the struggling team a subliminal booster shot. It broke, first of all, a 29-inning string in which Atlanta had sandwiched a two-run scoring effort between. shutouts. Moreover, it permitted the Braves a rare early-inning lead, thus alleviating a lot of the pressure that has been dictating their offensive strategy recently.

"It doesn't matter to me whether we score first or the other team scores first," said Niekro. "Either way, I'm going to pitch the same kind of ballgame. But what getting the lead does do for us is give the hitters so many more options to work with. Being ahead, they can use the bunt more, and hit-and-run." The Braves, holding a 1-0 lead, did exactly that in the third, when Brett Butler led off with a single. With Butler1 running on the next pitch, Glenn Hubbard, starting after two full days of rest deftly placed the ball to the tkrkM S000 $000 mi ATLANTA Butter It Huoord to Perry lb Jorgntn lb Murphy ci WMnin rl RRmri ll Pocorob BJhmn 3b PNiekro Seoroin CHICAGO brkb) It 0 MH4 4 13 1 Bowi 3 113 Bucknr lb 9 0 Cey 3b 10 10 Durham 5 0 0 Morelnd rl 4 0 10 JOevi, 4 0 0 0 Sndbro lb 3 110 Rainey 3 0 0 Wood A 10 10 Sort Jotmtln Ph Cemobel Bottev pit 37 $11 TeteU Jr.

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That hit-and-run play was typical of how effortless Torre's job looked on Friday. Everything he implemented seemed to work: from the slumping Hubbard's installation as his No. 2 hitter (the second-baseman responded with a single, a double, a home run and a bases-loaded walk in the eighth that put the game away at 5-3) to his somewhat bold choice of Perry as No. 3 and Claudell Washington as No. 5.

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The Braves and Dodgers were among at least 10 big-league clubs negotiating with the Rangers for Honeycutt this week. The deal with the Dodgers was made about an hour after Braves assistant general manager Pat Nugent arrived in Arlington, Texas. Braves' officials Friday night refused to discuss their efforts to obtain Honeycutt. But they obviously would have preferred that he go anywhere except to the Dodgers, the Braves' closest pursuers in the National League West. "We obviously knew he was going somewhere," Braves general manager John Mullen said.

"To say we're disappointed he went to the Dodgers why should I say that? The Dodgers have got him. He's now their property." "Well, the Dodgers got pitching help, and they lost pitching help in Stewart," said Braves manager Joe Torre. As far as the effect on the race, I couldn't tell, until it's over." Asked if he feels the pitching rich Dodgers might have made the trade for Honeycutt mostly to keep the Braves from getting him, Torre said, "You're going to have to do your own conjecturing about that" The Braves ultimately failed to get Honeycutt because of their unwillingness to give up Dayley, who is 3-3 with a 4.23 earned-run average this season. Reportedly, Braves owner Ted Turner, at the recommendation of minor-league pitching instructor Johnny Sain, nixed the Dayley deal. But the Braves, surprisingly, had not ruled out the possibility of sending Butler, their starting left fielder, to the Rangers with Behenna or Fisher.

It was learned that the Rangers Friday afternoon informed the Braves they would like to make that deal if the Dodgers' swap was not completed by midnight Sunday. A few hours later, Honeycutt was a Dodger. The Braves, therefore, never had to make a final decision on whether they'd trade a member of their starting lineup at such a late point in the season. It is believed that, at most, they would have wanted Butler to be specified as a player-to-be-named-later and not delivered to the Rangers until the end of the season. The addition of Honeycutt further strengthens the Dcdgers' area, their starting pitching.

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