Uncle Eddie's Secrets

I was lucky enough to grow up within walking distance of Forbes Field. I was also lucky enough to have an uncle who was the head groundskeeper at the Oakland ballyard. Eddie Dunn never allowed me to sneak into Pirates games without a ticket, but I always suspected that it was not an accident that the iron gate which was part of the left field wall was never quite pulled all the way down. There was always a gap of a few inches so that kids who didn't have a buck to sit in the bleachers could at least lie on their bellies and watch the game through the gap between the gate and ground. The Los Angeles Dodgers of the 1960s were a team built around speed and pitching. The usual scenario was for speedsters Maury Wills and Willie Davis to get on base, steal second and third and with Don Drysdale or Sandy Koufax on the mound, that was often all the run support needed. But Uncle Eddie had an answer. When the Dodgers came to town, the grounds crew spent an inordinate amount of time around first base, making sure there was plenty of loose dirt and sand so that the Dodgers couldn't get a good “jump.” He had another treatment for the Chicago Cubs. With shortstop Ernie Banks slowing down, the grounds crew made sure that the grass in front of shortstop was always cut nice and short. The result was ground balls skipped through the infield a little too fast for a shortstop who had lost a step to flag down. And when Pittsburgh shortstop Dick Groat neared the end of his career, the grass in front of the shortstop area amazingly grew, slowing down groundballs that Groat may have otherwise had trouble corraling. Then there was Mattie Alou. I think Alou actually won the batting title one year. Alou perfected chopping down on the ball so it would rebound 30 feet in the air, giving him enough time to reach first before the ball came down. Legendary Pirates broadcaster Bob Prince called it the “alabaster blast.” Alou had Eddie Dunn to thank for the fact that the dirt in front of home plate was always packed as hard as a sidewalk, giving extra height to his “blasts.” Then there was the 1960 World Series. The stage for Bill Mazeroski's home run was set by a late-inning Pirate rally which was prolonged by a grounder that appeared to be a routine doubleplay. But the grounder took an inexplicable bad hop, hit Yankee shortstop Tony Kubek in the throat and the Bucs were in business. A stray pebble was always blamed or credited, depending on who you were rooting for, for the bad hop which victimized the Yankees. Everytime I watch the replay, I wonder. How did Uncle Eddie know where to put that pebble?