Nervous Yankee

When brisk, brash Larry MacPhail took over the New York Yankees last winter, newshawks asked: "How will McCarthy feel?" Last week Joe McCarthy felt sick.

Chubby, jut-jawed Joe McCarthy's 14-year record with the Yankees is a manager's daydream. "Just let me worry about the club" is one of his favorite remarks, and he has worried his well-heeled, star-studded club to eight American League pennants, seven world championships. This year, although they have stayed within shooting distance of the league-leading Detroit Tigers, the Yankees have generally looked like also-rans.

Larry MacPhail, who is also a worrier, found it hard to take. Finally, as everyone felt sure he would, he emerged from his lowering cloud of silence and publicly castigated the Yankees. Along with some dark threats about overpaid players, he charged: "It is one thing to be beaten and quite another to be outhustled. . . . We must have more life, more pepper. . . ."

Back to Buffalo. No such criticism had ever come from the front office during the serene reign of Manager McCarthy (ex-Boss Ed Barrow never strayed that near the base paths). Shortly, gregarious Joe McCarthy found himself suffering from "a nervous condition." After steering clear of the stadium for a few days, he offered his resignation.

Hastily absolving McCarthy of all blame for the Yankees' failures, MacPhail refused to accept the resignation. He suggested instead that Joe go home for a rest. The 58-year-old manager, who has suffered from a gall bladder ailment and who could certainly afford to retire if he felt like it (total earnings with the Yankees: some $500,000), shuffled off to Buffalo to think things out.*

Although both the manager and his boss denied any disagreement about how baseball should be played, many dopesters thought differently. Mindful that big-league baseball is bush-league by prewar standards, McCarthy had strongly defended his men: "I say the players are giving everything they have. You can't expect them to develop a lot of skills . . . which are not in their physical make-up."

On to Chicago. But Larry MacPhail, who excludes the word "impossible" from his bulging vocabulary, had already decided to shake up his slumping club. Last week, neatly finessing waiver difficulties, he sold high-paid ($17,500 a year) Pitcher Hank Borowy (won 10, lost 5) to the National League-leading Chicago Cubs./-

Borowy, who promptly won his first start for the Cubs, might well nail down the pennant for them. In return MacPhail said that the Yankees would get unnamed players worth $100,000, or their cash equivalent. He added: "This is the first step in the general plan [for rebuilding] that Manager McCarthy and I have agreed upon. . . ."

*Guessing that McCarthy might be through, New York sportswriters began nominating possible successors: Yankee Coach Art Fletcher (unlikely), Manager Leo Durocher, of the Dodgers (possible) and ex-Yankee Lieut. Bill Dickey, now managing two crackerjack Navy teams touring the Pacific (popular). Babe Ruth nominated himself.

/-This week brought managerial news from the National League too: a nine-game losing streak catapulted Manager Bob Coleman of the seventh-place Boston Braves out of office, gave Coach Del Bissonette his chance.

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