SPB
II JULY 1958

The South River Gladiators opened up their American League lead
to eight games against the overachieving Route 66 Hot Rods while the Salzburg Bishops
and Los Angeles Surfers are locked in a tight race in the National with the
Prelates clinging to a two-game lead.
Pete Runnels of the Saints leads the AL with a .348 average and Ernie Banks of
the Hornets leads with 28 homers while his teammate Billy Pierce has 14
victories to lead in that category.
In the NL, Ritchie Ashburn of the Elephants leads with a .353 BA while
Roger Maris has 30 homers and his fellow Cruiser Whitey Ford leads with 14
wins.

The most exciting game of the month, if not the year, took
place on July 15th between the Surfers and Elephants.  The Surfers scored a run in the second
inning and the Pachyderms matched that in the seventh but it wasn’t until
the 19th inning that another run crossed the plate when Hank Foiles
hit a two-run homer to give the Los Angeles crew a 3-1 victory.  Some key statistics are that each team used
six pitchers and the Surfers had a total of 21 players in the game while Evanston had 22.  Every single non-pitcher saw action and
except for the regular rotation starters both pitching staff were also used
up.  The Elephants had 19 hits and 5
walks but only scored a single run as 20 Evanston
base runners were stranded.

The Gladiators kept slugger Stan Musial on the bench to rest
him up for the stretch run but were still able to win 11 of 14 at home by
wining five of seven from the Aces and six of seven from the Monarchs.  The Monarch series was close as all but
one game was decided by three runs or less.

The Frankfort Fortress, nicknamed the Fartless by their
frustrated manager, as they went 5-9 at home and sank all the way to last place
in the AL standings.  They won the first three from the Hot
Rods but to quote the manager “the Hot Rods revved up their engines, blew
some hot air on the fartbags and had a gas taking the last four games of the
series”.  The Gladiators then
came in and won five of seven.

The Goshen Aces had a real pitchers duel with the Saints as
they matched zeroes through nine innings, then the Aces scored in the top of
the 14th on a fielders choice to go up 1-0 but the Aces won it in
the bottom of the frame with two runs on an error, walk and two singles.  Later in the series the Saints built up
an 8-0 lead but then had to hang on for a 10-8 win.  Lew Burdette of the Aces helped his own
cause later in the series with a two-run homer which keyed a 4-2 win.  Brooks Lawrence of the Cruisers pitcher
a complete game victory over Goshen;
winning 8-4 with all four runs unearned and benefited from three Hampton Road homers.  Cruiser ace Whitey Ford lost his chance
for a 15th victory when he gave up a three-run homer to Gil McDougal
in the 8th inning and that cost him as Goshen ended up winning
6-5.

On July 1st the Saints Dick Donovan no-hit the
Monarchs for the first nine frames.
Then Bob Skinner broke the spell with a lead off double in the 10th
and moved to third on a caught fly ball.
Donovan fanned Faye Throneberry for the second out but then Skinner
scored on a Bubba Phillips error to give the Monarchs a 1-0 win and Donovan a
heart breaking one-hit loss.

Below is a direct quote from our man directly assigned to
covering the Rossville Hornets.

Hornets get a bee in their bonnet and take 9 of 14 at home;
first taking four straight from the powerful Gladiators and then dropping three
straight with the last two heart-breakers, 6-5 and 5-3 in 12 innings.  Banks had seven homers against the Glads
including three in one game.  Next
the Hornets stung the Fortress by winning the first three, losing the next two
and then winning the last two in the bottom of the 9th, one on a
two-run homer by Banks and the other a two-out double by Charlie Neal, his
fourth hit and RBI of the day.

We finish up with the Cinderella Route 66 Hot Rods who are
sitting at 54-46, despite a negative run differential.  Orlando Cepeda, the Baby Bull, continues
to carry the team with a .323 BA and 16 homers but the real shocker has been
the pitching staff with a fabulous 3.46 team ERA and especially Ronnie Kline
who is now 12-10 with a 2.42 ERA in 24 starts.  The Gladiators are starting to pull away
but “Hot Rod Fever” has definitely found its way to Route 66!