ManDak Baseball League 1950 - 1957

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1950

In January 1950, player applications were sent out to prospective players along with extra application forms for “other fellows that might be interested”.

 By late May the Mallards had completed signing a full squad players. Included were five players from the 1949 Merchant team: Zoonie McLean, Cliff Kempf, Del Triplett, Norm Felde and pitcher Steve Wylie who was the “ace” of the 1949 team with a 15 – 6 record. Other players included Ev Faunce, the football coach at Minot Teachers College, Brad Tolson and Ted Fowler, college players at the University of Arizona and Marly Strong, a college player from the Fargo-Moorhead area. In early May three “colored” players were signed through Syd Pollock of the Indianapolis Clowns, who previously supplied players to the Brandon Greys. Included were second baseman Leonard “Preacher” Williams, pitcher Jimmy Peet and pitcher Lester “Big Spoon” Witherspoon. Just before the season started, third baseman Ted Strong who also played for the 1949 Merchants, pitchers Bob Cope from the University of Montana, and Bob Danielson, a Minnesota area semi-pro player were added to the team. Pitchers Harold Dark and Cranston Shaw were given tryouts in pre-season exhibition games but were not signed for the season. Since college team players were not available until the college season ended and school was out, the Mallards contracted with Bill Anderson from the Fargo-Moorhead area as an early season fill-in player. Former major leaguer Wilfrid “Lefty” LeFebvre, baseball coach at Brown University was contracted as player/manager for the team. LeFebvre had pitched for Boston and Washington. Since LeFebvre was unavailable until mid-June, Ev Faunce was appointed interim Manager.

 On May 11, as the season approached, the Mallards announced that Satchel Paige, the legendary Negro League pitcher, had been contracted by the Mallards to pitch in three of the first five Mallard games. This of course generated a tremendous amount of local interest. Paige’s first appearance in Minot on May 27 brought 2236 excited fans to Municipal Ball Park to watch him hurl three shutout innings against the Carman Cardinals. The following day he batted for first baseman Norm Felde against the Cardinals and reached base on a fielder’s choice. Monday May 29, The Mallards played a non-league game against Moorhead and Paige struck out four in three hitless innings. In his last appearance he started the second game of a doubleheader against the Brandon Greys and gave up one hit in three innings while striking out seven.

 The Mallards started out well and had an 8 – 5 record through June 13. They then lost their next three games and stood at 8 – 8 on June 17 when Lefty LeFebvre arrived along with two new players from Brown University. Paul Wasseth took over at third base for the injured Ted Strong. Harvey Lapides was inserted into the line up at center field.

 Just when the Mallards thought they had finally gotten their roster settled and team together, Steve Wiley “jumped” the club on July 1 and joined with Swift Current, Saskatchewan Team. A week later Ted Strong and Leonard Williams also jumped the team to join Wiley at Swift Current. The Mallards record at the time was 10 – 12. This was the first of several seasons that this happened to the Mallards. Always involving one or more key players around the 4th of July.

 The Mallards started the month of July by entering a four-team tournament in Brandon. The Brandon Greys lost to the Brooklyn Cuban Giants in the first game and the Mallards lost to the Harlem Globetrotters in the other first round game by a score of 5 – 4. The Mallards took third place by beating the Brandon Greys in the second round. Rain had washed out an evening game between the Mallards and the Globetrotters the evening before at Minot but the Globetrotters beat the Mallards 2 – 1 at Garrison that afternoon.

 On July 2 the Mallards returned to Minot for another exhibition game and were beaten by the House of David team by a score of 13 – 10.

 The Mallards were in fourth place on July 8 with nine wins and 12 losses in league play.

 Cincinnati native Willie Cathey was signed in mid July from the Atlanta Brown Bombers to replace Wiley. Cathey went 9-3 the rest of the season for the Mallards. Syd Pollock rushed in Henry Smith to take Williams position at second base. The team also brought in Leo Henry, a right handed pitcher, and infielder Gervis Fagan to replace the departing players.

 The Mallards clinched fourth place on August 27 with a 6 – 5 win over the Elmwood Giants. Their season record was an even 24 and 24. In addition to the 48 game ManDak League schedule, the Mallards played a total of 37 exhibition contests, winning 26 of them.  They took on several traveling black teams including the Brooklyn Cuban Giants, the Harlem Globetrotters, and the Traveling Kansas City Monarchs.  Sometimes these games were played in smaller area towns such as Sherwood, Bowbells, Garrison and Westhope.  The team entered tournaments, often with prize money in excess of $1000, in such far points as Detroit Lakes, Minnesota and Moose Jaw, Sask.

 In the first game of the league playoffs, a best of five series, the Mallards took on second place Winnipeg.  Minot sent ace Willie Cathey to the mound for the first game in Winnipeg. The left-hander held the Buffalos in check until a two run bad hop single by Lyman Bostock Sr. in the ninth inning gave Winnipeg a 3-2 win and a 1-0 series lead.  In game two in Minot, the Buffalos erased a 5-1 Mallard lead with four runs in the eighth and one more in the ninth for a 6-5 win. Cathey returned to the hill for game three back in Winnipeg. The Buffalos bombed the Mallards ace 13-4 to sweep the North Dakotans and end their initial season in the Manitoba-Dakota League.

 By the end of the season, only five of the original players, all North Dakotans, remained with the squad. Included were Zoonie McLean, Norm Felde, Cliff Kempf, Marly Strong and Mel Triplett. Not including “tryout” players and exhibition game players, the Mallards numbered thirty players for the first season. This high number of player changes hurt the competitiveness of the team. Over the years the Mallards learned to contend with this problem along with the problem of fielding a team at both the beginning and end of the season when players, especially college players and players that coached area high schools were not available. The other factor that hurt the Mallards in their first season was lack of power. Only six home runs were hit in ManDak league games.

 

 

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