Upon Further Review…

I bought the team autographed ball of the 1937 White Sox for a few signatures, including Jimy Dykes’ and Monty Stratton’s and Zeke Bonura’s. But there are others, and they come with a story. Like infielder Tony Piet, a journeyman infielder whose name is pretty much seared into my memory. Piet’s full last name was Pietruszka, which carried a certain cache if you wanted to sell cars on the South Side, which Piet did on Western Avenue with his Pontiac dealership. I can close my eyes and see the neon sign outside his showroom. Or Jackie Hayes, a pretty talented second baseman whose career ended three years later when glaucoma led to eventual blindness. Or pitcher Merritt Patrick Cain, not that he signed his name that way. No, he used his nickname: Sugar Cain. Or Dixie Walker, a 26-year old outfielder who was still playing in the majors ten years later. Walker was a career .306 hitter with 2064 hits to his credit, though that’s not why most people remember him. That offseason, the Sox traded Walker to Detroit, where he played for a season and a half before the Dodgers claimed him off of waivers in July of 1939. The lefty-hitting outfielder found a home in Brooklyn, where hi hit .311with 725 RBIs over eight-plus seasons. But the Georgia-born Walker did not want to play with Jackie Robinson and even tried to organize a player walkout. It didn’t happen. Walker’s autograph appears right below John Rigney’s, with Bonura’s above Rigney’s.