MacCool's the Name

Who in the name of Abner Doubleday is Finn MacCool? Perhaps a first baseman Branch Rickey spotted in. Nellies Apron, Ark.? What's his batting average?

When lean, soft-spoken Arthur Daley made an offhand reference to MacCool in his New York Times sports column, readers scurried to the record books. They found Finn's name nowhere, and wrote indignantly to Daley, to say so. Last week, Daley wrote a column about the greatest fielder and base runner of his time.

Finn MacCool was first & foremost a fighter (he killed Aillin, a goblin who was annoying Ireland) but he also took a little exercise for fun. He could outrun a hare or stag, and he could wing a wild duck with the first stone from his sling. He could jump the width of Ireland (115 miles) in three "leps." Finn once licked two hurling teams singlehanded. They ganged up on him (as hurling players still do) but he killed seven and chased the rest away. Next day he found them swimming. They dared him to come in. Finn drowned them all.

MacCool could also hit. To qualify for the Fianna, a band of soldiers in the service of Cormac Mac Art, Ireland's illustrious Third-Century king, he was buried to the knees as a target for nine warriors. With a shield and hazel stick, Finn knocked their spears aside.

Daley once admired Con the Greyhound for giving the wind a head start and then beating it, and Shaun the Bullock, who could hold himself out at arm's length. But Finn was faster than one, stronger and defter than the other. Concluded Daley: "Bad cess to those who doubt him."

This file is automatically generated by a robot program, so reader's discretion is required.