Detroit Free Press from Detroit, Michigan • Page 41

DETROIT FREE TRESS Frid.iy, Aug. 9. '74 1 1 t. am D.mns imro 0 0 IO 'MS 0 0 his ten to 17 Kali tie 5 team Us Resignation By United Press International Baseball fans throughout the country entered ballparks with transistor radios Thursday night to listen to President Nixon's resignation from ofl'ice and in most cases greeted the announcement with short but spirited cheers and applause. At one correspondent said, "It wasn't exactly like somebody hit a home Attendance at the five baseball games was about average and many fans said if they did not already have tickets they would have stayed home to watch the President's speech on television.

Approximately 30,000 fans attending a World Football League game in Jacksonville, heard the President's speech from special speakers. The game between the Hawaihns and Jacksonville Sharks was delayed about 15 minutes until the end of the speech. A correspondent "there described the crowd as "silent, ks if they were graying" while they awaited the speech. When the President announced he will resign, the crowd broke into a long sustained applause." There was a smattering of applause in Kansas City when the announcement was made. There, the fans brought radios with them.

The game was not stopped at all and no announcement was made on the scoreboard. not stil. Hp has a way of making anyone he's with able to relax," says Kaline. "I have a tremendous amount of respect for him. I think he'll make a very good president." SO FAR AS GERALD FORD is concerned, old habits are hard to break, sometimes impossible.

Ford talked about one he picked up as a boy. 'The first thing I do every morning is read the sports page," he said. Then he laughed. "I read it before I do the front page because at least on the sports page you have a 50-50 chance of being right." He was still Vice President when he told me that. Now that he's President, he'll be much busier, but I doubt he'll break his old habit.

Richard Nixon, the man he replaces, also loves sports. But there is at least one big difference between them. The new President was an actual competitor; the old one had a uniform, but spent most of his time on the bench. I'VE WATCHED BOTH FORD and Nixon around professional athlefs. Nixon always seems somewhat in awe of them.

Ford is much more at ease, probably becausee of his football playing background at the University of Michigan and the coaching he did'while at Yle. Richard Nixon is a football buff. Remember him trying Please turn to Page 4D, Col. 5 (Editor's Note: Milton Richman, sports editor and columnist for United Press International, re-cently discussed sports with Gerald R. Ford, the one-time University of Michigan football player now about to become the 38th President of the United States.

Richman tells here of his conversation with the new president.) BY MILTON RICHMAN United Fress International NEW YORK Gerald Ford loves sports. And in one other respect, he's no different from the rest of us. He has a sports hero. Asked on" time if he had any favorite baseball players somebody he liked especially well the Vice President who will be sworn in at noon Friday as the nation's 38th President didn't have to think very long about it. Al Kaline," he responded.

Why him, particularly? "He's a good team man," replied Gerald Ford. Kaline, winding up his 22d season with the Detroit Tigers, has been to Ford's office in Washington several times. Kaline has been there with his wife and with Sen. Robert Gnlfin and always felt completely comfortable, never ill-at-ease, in Ford's company. "He's a down-to-earth type of person, easy to talk to and Geral4 Ford, helping coach' Grand Rapids high school in 1941.

nation Tigers Win, 4-3 Fans Cheer Resig I II jT It Won't. Be Same At Tiger Stadium BY JIM HAWKfNS Free Press Sports Writer The brief announcement made over the public address system that Richard M. Nixon had just resigned the presidency, brought a rousing ovation of approval from the crowd of 12,408 at Tiger Stadium on Thursday night. And, until the bottom of the ninth, that was about the only thing the fans had to cheer about all evening. Then, on the brink of defeat, the Tigers bounced back with three runs to overturn the Cleveland Indians, 4-3.

Two runs down with two outs to go, Gary Sutherland doubled off Tom Buskoy for his third hit of the night and one of'13 the Tigers accumulated altogether. One out later, Ben Oglivie walked. Bill Freehan, who had been stranding runners all night, beat out an infield single. And suddenly, it became obvious that the Tigers were still alive. JIM NETTLES then grounded to Indians first baseman Tom McCraw, who made a good play to prevent the ball Please turn to Page 2D, Col.

4 Coming Through Pines Gary Player peers, ahead, but can barely see the first green for the trees Thursday as he struggles to a 73 in the opening round of the PGA. Three golfers were tied for the lead with 68s. Story on Page 2D. AP Photo "i i 1. Wheels Study S9 ton mumltw er to Sell, Off cotton Tshlvts aed Move Team Oh, it's beautiful to be a newspaperman.

You sit there, as I did at last Sunday's doubleheader, and play it tough and tell tlhe Tigers how they've got to move the veterans out and make room for the kids because, well, that's the way life is and they may as well face up it. Then, suddenly, it is Wednesday night and you are sitting at home, finishing up a day off that was pretty uneventful, and the 11 o'clock news is on and somebody is saying something about Norm Cash and Jim Northrup being cut and your mind starts racing, trying to assimilate it all that they're gone they're really gone and it's never going to be the same at the ballpark again. Sure, I can put it all together now and understand quite logically what happened, just as I felt I was explaining it quite logically on Sunday. But in that first moment when I heard that Cash and Northrup would no longer be with the team, I felt a sense of anger, and outrage, and then in a while, sadness. Do you understand? It is one thing to try to tie a cool and calculating newspaperman and say all the things you feel need to be said, but it is another thing to he just a guy on his day off and abruptly have your world changed.

I guess what I'm trying to say is that I understand why Cash and Northrup had to go but it bothers me to think that things will never be the same again at the ballpark Never again will 1 see these men where 1 have seen them for these last 10 or 15 years Cash sitting to the left of Al Kaline's locker, over in the corner, always with his cap on for some reason, and always holding a bat for another. And Northrup, to the right of Kaline, either with his back to everyone, with his head stuck inside his locker reading his mail, or sprawled out on the carpet in front of his locker with his feet up on a stool and looking up at the ceiling in silence. Pair Tough on Writers I guess I grew up with these two guys, just as I have with so many of the players on the Tigers, and what it is so strange about my feelings is that I have probably had as many problems with these two in trying to do my job as any of the others on the team. Northrup would go wild whenever I wrote something which displeased him and he would either tell me to my face or turn his back to me. Once he didn't talk to me for an entire year.

Once Cash didn't talk to me for two entire seasons. Not one. Two. It was probably very silly but these things happen and they didn't seem very silly at the time. I was on pretty good terms with both of them at the end, especially with Cash.

This is important now only because it shows a little maturity on everyone's side. But I still felt angry when I heard Jim Campbell let them go. You know how I was when they started knocking down some of the old ballparks, Ebbets Field and Shibe Park arjd Crosley Field and Forbes Field, the ballparks of my youth. It brought me a sense of grief that I really don't expect anyone to understand unless you are my age and have a feeling for the game of baseball as it was In the past. I have at home a new book on the last 10 years that the Yankees, Giants and Dodgers all played in New York and I am forever opening it and looking at the scoreboard in Ebbets Field or the short seats in right in the Polo Grounds, so that I sit there and feel this strange sensation of sadness.

Memories of the Stars But now we are talking about people, Northrup with all that gray hair sticking out from under his hat and not looking very neat, and Cash with that silly looking mustache he tried to grow but never quite made it, and in moments like this so much comes rushing back at once, so many thoughts, so many impressions, so many memories that you took for granted at the time but which suddenly become very important to you. When I of Jim Northrup, I think of his bloodshot eyes, the way they were tearing and he could hardly see, and the way he was babbling incoherently in that mad clubhouse scene in St. Louis on the day the Tigers won the World Series in 1968. They had been squirting- champagne at each other the way they do in these moments of madness and Northrup was getting much of the spray for it was his hit, his triple, which flew past the unfortunate Curt Flood, who had misjudged the ball, and opened the gates for the Tigers to pour over the runs and beat the mighty Bob Gibson. And now Northrup was up there on a chair or a table or a and his eyes were red and they were stinging him.

He was squinting through the red haze and trying to tell the world what "it was like to be on the best damn team in the world and to win Jhe World Series because that's what it is really all about and nobody could take it away from him. I remember standing there looking up at him and feeling envy because how many men ever experience the exhilaration ol complete success? I thought, then, how beautiful it must be 30 know are the veiy best in your profession, 2 As for Cash you can talk of that duck-like way he ran or the way he hammered those balls over the rightticld roof or even that twangy Texas way he had of talking. But to me, Norm Cash will always be a guy hitting one into those green seats in right and waddiing around the bases until, nmable to restrain his enthusiasm, applauding himself as he crossed the plate. I don't Know about Tom Veryzer or Fred Holdsworth or even Ron LeFlore but I suspect, some day, Jim Hawkins may be -writing this very same column, even if he doesn't think so now. BY CHARLIE VINCENT Free Press Sports Writer Only five games into their first season, the Detroit Wheels appear on the verge of changing owners and possibly of changing cities.

The Wheels' executive committee, in its regular weekly meeting Friday morning, will consider a proposal by a Charlotte (N.C.) group lo buy the club and move it south. David Pollack, the 60-year-old chairman of the club's executive committee, confirmed Thursday afternoon that "we have been talking to people from Gharlotte, but nothing has been done yet." "I'm sure, though, that their proposal will be discussed at Friday's meeting." Upton Bell, son of former National Football League commissioner Burt Bell, and one-time general manager of the New England Patriots, heads the group trying to purchase the Wheels. Friday's meeting could bring an "ante up or else" threat from the World Football League. The league is reportely ready to take over the Detroit franchise if more capital is not forthcoming immediately and that threat appears to have prompted the attempt to sell the club. THE LEAGUE is reportedly so anxious to make a change that inquiries were made into the possibility of res-Please turn to Page 2D, Col.

1 Lion Strikers i See Forzano 1 BY JACK SAYLOR Free Press Sports Writer Striking Lion players had a nose-to-nose confrontation with ne head coach Rick Forzano on Thursday morning, anU came away blunted and obviously unsatisfied. Some two dozen players, led by player representative Ed Flanagan, stood off to the side of the Cranbrook field. Then as practice ended, they asked Forzano for a meeting. Tne group moved to a meeting room on the campus. A half-hour later, the meeting ended with the striking Viterans, solemn oil face, departing quickly.

Flanagan retused to discuss what went on in the meeting, or indicate what had caused the striking players to show up on the Cranbrook field for the first time. "No comment," he said. "We got everything aired out, that's it." "It's strictly a team thing," said -another veteran. however, admitted the strikers were upset by Please turn to Page 2D, Col. 5 Here's more' help for your back-to-school budget: top quality Carter's briefs and T-shirts at a nicely shaved price.

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