DON NEWCOMBE

Newk was - and is - a tough old buzzard. Like The Barber, and Drysdale and Bob Gibson, Newk felt the plate was his, period. That man with that little stick in his hand had his nerve even daring to come up to the plate and face him, a big (6' 4", 225 Ibs) modern black man who took no stuff from anyone. Now off the field, Newk had a friendly face, liked to play cards and practice jokes, but on the field he was as serious as a heart attack. And although Jackie Robinson came first and took the first wave of racism alone, Newk followed only two years later and endured his share of hell.

On the surface, he responded well. He was the NL Rookie of the Year for 1949, with a dazzling 17-8 record that included 5 shutouts, 19 complete games and 149 strikeouts (2nd, by two, to Warren Spahn). He made the first of three consecutive All Star games. Bing, bang, boom, 17-8, 19-11, 20-9, in his first three years. However, he dropped the game the Dodgers needed to force a playoff with the Whiz Kid Phillies in 195O, the first of many such incidents that won him a reputation for choking in the clutch. The next year, in the playoffs with the Giants, it was he who left the mound with two men on, setting the stage for Bobby Thomson.

In 1952, Newk changed uniforms and served in the army until mid-1954. He came back mid season and went 9-8. He returned to form in '55 with a 20-5 record and in '56 had his finest season, winning the Cy Young and MVP awards, going 27-1 with 18 complete games, 4 shutouts, a low .221 opponents average (NL best) and a neat 3.06 ERA. While he was losing a little of the steam off his heater, his control was improving, yielding a mere 33 free passes in 268 innings.

1957 was a rough year for Brooklyn. Campy, Snider, Pee Wee, Hodges and Furillo were all aging. The Dodgers fell from 1st to 3rd place, 11 games out. Attendance was off by 200,000 and at the end of the year, owner O'Malley announced they would move to LA. After an 0-6 start out West, Newk was traded to Cincinnati. Rumors of a chronic drinking problem surfaced and he was devastated by the car crash that paralyzed Campy. And Jackie Robinson had retired.

He rebounded in '59 with a 13-8 record, but 1960, split between the two Ohio clubs, gave him a 6-9 record and the end of his big league career.

The three years in the service and the drinking problem kept him out of the Hall. (He played in Japan for a season, where he made a fool out of himself. Later he kicked the habit and has had a successful career as alcohol counselor for ballplayers, and as a Dodger V.P.) In the early '50s, there was no pitcher more feared or successful than Newk, who won 20 games three times, plus 19 and 17 in his first 6 seasons. Overall, he won 149 and lost 90 (.623), with 24 shutouts.