Sneakin’ Sam Snead Had a Plan

If you had a swing like Sam Snead’s, what else would you need? Turns out, Snead himself was looking for every edge he could get.

“I was like Ted Williams studying a pitcher,” Snead told Bill Livingston of the Cleveland Plain Sam Snead

Dealer. “I had a file on everybody on the tour. Byron Nelson, Cary Middlecoff, Jimmy Demaret . . . they could put their shoes in front of their locker and I could tell who each pair belonged to.

“I knew their mannerisms by heart. It was like a checkers game. You waited to watch them change their mannerisms, because that’s how you saw the nervousness.

“That’s how I won the PGA in 1942. I was playing Jim Turnesa in the finals, and on the 16th hole his mannerisms changed. He gave a couple of extra waggles before hitting. Next thing you know, I had him two-down with two to play.”

Add Snead: He once made this confession: “The only things I fear on a golf course are lightning--and Ben Hogan.”

Said Nancy Lieberman when asked what the feminist movement has to say about her venture into men’s basketball in the United States Basketball League: “My only movement is ball movement. If I don’t get the ball up the floor then I sit next to Henry.”

That’s Henry Bibby. He’s the coach of the Springfield Fame.

Trivia Time: Who is the only member of both the Baseball Hall of Fame and the Pro Football Hall of Fame? (Answer below.)

What-a-difference-a-team-makes dept.: In eight decisions with the Chicago White Sox, Tom Seaver never was given more than three runs. In his first start for the Boston Red Sox, he was given four runs--in the first inning.

Add Seaver: Boston fans are hoping his addition will insure a pennant, but it didn’t work out that way in Cincinnati in 1977.

When Seaver came to the Reds from the New York Mets in June, the rest of the league was ready to throw in the towel, but the Reds, who were coming off two straight pennant-winning seasons, wound up second to the Dodgers.

Norman Chad of the Washington Post, on World Cup fans in Mexico: “The English fans easily rated as the most obnoxious and most intoxicated. The men seldom wore shirts in the hot afternoon sun at stadiums, which created an incredible glare from their whiter-than-white beer bellies.”

From the Denver Post: “The Washington Bullets are sending 7-7 Manute Bol to physical trainer Mickey Shillstone in mid-July for eight weeks of workouts that Shillstone guarantees will add 25 to 35 pounds of muscle and 12 to 16 inches of vertical jumping ability to the league’s tallest, skinniest player. How confident is Shillstone, who gets most of the credit for bulking up Michael Spinks from a light-heavyweight to a heavyweight? Unless Bol gains 25 pounds and adds 12 inches to his vertical leaping ability, the Bullets don’t have to pay Shillstone.”

Al Davis of the Raiders, in a speech at the Associated Press Sports Editors convention, summing up his dislike for the way Pete Rozelle runs the National Football League: “I just don’t want the philosophy to continue to be, ‘How does it look?’ rather than, ‘Is it right’?”

Trivia Answer: Cal Hubbard. He was an All-Pro tackle for the New York Giants and Green Bay Packers from 1927 to 1936 and an American League umpire from 1936 to 1951. He then became the supervisor of umpires.

Note: He lived until age 77 and once said, “If I’d known I was going to grow this old, I’d have taken better care of myself.”

Quotebook

Don Sutton, told to hang in there by Tom Lasorda when he was pitching for the Dodgers: “I’ve got to. I can’t sing or dance, and we’ve already got a pitching coach.”