News Herald from Port Clinton, Ohio • 8

8 News-Herald, Friday, April 21, 1978 Ottawa Outdoors Thomas traded baseball for new life Major leagues didn't want six-day-a-week player Walleye catch encouraging By RICK NEMECEK The recent release of "Status of Ohio's Lake Erie Fisheries" has some facts that should prove interesting to all local anglers. This survey is prepared annually by the Ohio Department of Natural Resources Lake Erie Research Unit, under the supervision of Russ Scholl. Of particular interest are statistics about Lake Erie walleye fishing. The report says that total angler harvest of walleye (pickerel) has increased dramatically over the past three years. Although anyone who has fished around Vacationland during the past three seasons certainly doesn't need a government report to prove this, the figures are enlightening.

The estimated harvest has grown from 47,394 in 1975, to 144,932 in 1976, to 476,078 in 1977. Further examination of the report indicates that the 1978 walleye outlook should be great. Fishermen who made it over to the Sandusky River earlier this month have already had a taste of the size and quantity of fish we can expect. The good 1975 year class is showing up as 18 to 20 inch fish and there are a number of "lunkers" around from the excellent 1974 hatch. Based on the survey, we can expect beauties from these two classes to make up about 70 percent of this year's catch.

Couple this with the When the major league season ended, the Brewers sent Thomas to Venezuela to play in the winter league. "I didn't want to go, hut I thought maybe when I got there and hit a couple of line drives I would feel more comfortable, but I didn't." Finally, the pressure became more than he could stand. "I took 80-100 sleeping pills, trying to kill myself. I got drunk first because I didn't have the guts to do it without being drunk. I passed out and woke up in a mental hospital Thomas still isn't sure why he took the pills.

"My mind was racing all the time and I didn't know what was wrong. I think the big thing was my fear of failure. I lost a lot of weight and I felt like crying all the time. I was right above death and death seemed the only solution. If I die, I don't feel the pain anymore, no more inadequacy.

No more feeling uncomfortable about yourself." Thanks to the mildness of over-the-counter sleeping pills and a stomach pump, Danny didn't die. At the hospital, "they kept asking me, 'Do you hear any They crossed my legs and hit my knee with a rubber hammer, but my reflexes were dead. They asked me to put two blocks, like a child plays with, on top of each other and I couldn't do it." In the next four months Thomas spent time in what he refers to as "nuthouses" in Milwaukee and St. Louis. "One shrink said, 'Dan, your Dad whipped you too Another one said, 'Dan, it's your fear of Different ones were telling me different things." He was left with $7,000 worth of therapy and no answers.

"That's when I asked myself why I was there, where I was going, why I was born and what's the purpose of life. "I didn't have anything left, so I prayed. I had never prayed I didn't figure I needed God. Money was my God and everything I did was for money. I prayed for direction and I got it.

I narrowed it (his trouble) down to the fact that I had violated God's commandments. "I had to obey them or die, it was as simple as that." out even though he left the other starters in." Thomas said he finally became so incensed that when the second half started and Dupo was to receive the kickoff, he inserted himself into the game. And when a teammate went to pick up the ball, "I yelled at him, 'Leave it alone! That startled him and I picked it up and ran 75 yards for another touchdown. The coach took me out of the game and really chewed me out." And then there was the umpire incident at Thetford Mines in June 1975. "The man cost us the ball game," he said, his tone quickening.

"He blew a call against one of my teammates on a double play. I screamed and said some profane words I shouldn't have and he said something to me, something I didn't want to hear. "So I told him I would take him and his partner outside and whip both of their butts. After the game, I waited outside the unpire's dressing room. When he came out, I told him what a lousy job he had done and he told me he would fine me.

I told him what he could do with his money. Then he said if I didn't shut up he would shut me up, so I unloaded on him." That time, the price was suspension without pay for the rest of the season. Thomas' breakdown came in 1976, the year he won the triple crown. He started the season fast and although the Brewers were struggling, he didn't get called up until the last month of the season. For Danny Thomas, that was too late.

"By Aug. 15, I started getting sick, mentally and physically," he recalled. "I lived on 7-up for three days because I couldn't eat anything. And when Milwaukee brought him up, Thomas said he wasn't comfortable, even though he hit .276 with 4 homers and 15 RBIs in 32 games. "I got the cold treatment," he said.

"Those guys weren't doing anything and here was this rookie knocking the cover off the ball. My presence there threatened their jobs. If just one established veteran had said to me, 'Dan, relax. You're trying too hard. You've got a great swing.

You can help this ball But they didn't. I was a threat to them. I could tell." fact that 13-inch fish from the outstanding 1977 hatch will be entering the fishery in August, and the future outlook is tremendous. Generally speaking, the report reveals that the hatch was the best in years for all of our game fish. Besides the extremely high walleye count, RICK WOODSON Gannett News Service SPOKANE, Wash.

This is not the saga of a famous big-league baseball player, although perhaps it could have been. This is the story of a young man's struggle for survival with himself and a world he can't relate to. This is the story of Danny Lee Thomas, who at age 25 saw a promising career blow up in his face. He is the Milwaukee Brewers outfielder who refused to play baseball on what the Church of God considered the Sabbath sundown Friday to sundown Saturday. And after 22 games of the 1977 season, the Brewers decided that if Thomas was going to play five days a week, he was going to do it in the minor leagues.

So "The Sundown Kid," as he became known during his religious stand, went to Class AAA Spokane, where he barely hit his weight. Then the Brewers reassigned him to Holyoke, and instead of reporting, he "retired." It was an easy decision to make. It didn't matter that Thomas had won the Class AA Eastern League triple crown in 1976 .325 average, 29 home runs, 83 runs batted in and hit .271 in those 22 games with the big club. It didn't matter that he finally was a major leaguer, What did matter was.that, maybe for the first time in his life, Danny Thomas could cope. The inferno that had raged within him, that had made it easy for him to attack an Eastern League umpire after a game in 1975, that had made him have a nervous breakdown and attempt suicide in 1976, was quenched.

Because of his new-found faith, he had stability. Nothing would make him compromise it. Thomas requested and received his outright release from Milwaukee in February. Then he went to spring training in Arizona and tried to "get back into ball," without playing from sundown Friday to sundown Saturday. There were no takers.

"I saw him for five minutes," said John Felske, whc managed him two years in the Eastern League. "He asked me if I would talk to someone for him, so I talked to Harry Dalton (Brewers' general manager) and he wasn't interested." "I talked to 10 other clubs, and they all rejected me," Thomas said. "I don't know why, but I think it was my religious beliefs. They think that because I'm a Christian I won't play as hard." "He changed his lifestyle and he lost his desire to play," Felske said. "His mind seemed to be on religion more than baseball.

I don't think anybody wanted him to give up God. I thought he could've been an excellent offensive player, but he did what he thought was best for Danny Thomas. It was his choice." Now, Danny Thomas, 26, his wife Judy and their two children have moved into a one-room cabin 40 miles from Spokane, where Thomas can get away from it all and write a book about his life, which he'll call, "The Sundown Kid." Instead of a baseball salary, he is supporting his family on the $119 a week he receives in unemployment compensation. had a job in a factory in Spokane, but I got fired there, too, for the same The Thomas' new home has no water and no electricity. "It's kinda remote," he said.

"We'll have to be self-sufficient, but if we farm right and get some help, we can do it. We have about 20 acres and I hope to farm 5 to 10 of it. "God willing, we're gonna stay here. I've lived in the city and the city has people. And right now I don't want to be around people." Ever since he was a kid, Danny's constant desire was to succeed.

To make it big. To be rich. To prove himself. But there always seemed to be someone in his way. And when his progress was impeded, he burned inside because he felt he was getting a raw deal.

Ultimately, he would lash out, and pay the price. Like the time when he was a junior halfback on the Dupo, 111., high school football team. "We were playing this team, and I scored four touchdowns in the first quarter," he said. "I had a chance to break Gale Sayers' (high school) record, but the coach pulled me white bass were hatched.at their best rate since 1969. This is encouraging since white bass harvest has been on the decline over the past three years.

The 1977 perch hatch and survival was rated as excellent by the fisheries report, and outlook for this season's catches should be good. Spring and summer harvest will be comprised of the fair 1974 and good 1975 year classes present at 7 to 9 inch fish. Some other "fishing statistics" the report revealed were as follows: Nearly 300,000 Ohio licensed anglers fish in Lake Erie spending an estimated $50 million in the process. Yellow perch (not walley!) was still the most sought after fish on the lake. The total 1977 estimated sport harvest by winter ice, spring river, summer lake and charter boat anglers was 4.6 million fish.

Shore and boat anglers fished some 2.5 million hours to harvest some 3.9 million fish weighing 1.8 million pounds. Last year's average catch rate of 1.57 fish per angler hour was the best in the three-year study 1978 may even be better Baseball standings By The Associated Ffen AMERICAN LEAGUE U. 1 1 vr -X: 4 Sax, East Pet. GB Detr 7 2 .778 Bost 8 3 .727 Mllw 6 6 .500 Vk NY 5 6 .455 3 Clev 3 5 .375 Bait 4 7 .364 4 Toro 3 8 .273 5 West KC 8 1 .889 Oakl 8 3 .727 1 Cal 8 4 .667 114 Chi 4 5 .444 4 Minn 6 9 .400 5 Seat 5 11 .312 6'A Tex 2 7 .222 6 Ping pong diplomacy NATIONAL LEAGUE broke a diplomatic freeze that had existed since 1949. In 1971, the Chinese invited the American team as a gesture of friendship.

The North Koreans are accepting the American players because they are hosts for the 1979 world championships, to be held in Pyongyang in late April. Kennedy said the USTTA plans to select a squad of nine players, five men and four women, at tryouts in December. WASHINGTON (AP) The United States table "tennis team, which blazed a trail to China in 1971, plans to play in North Korea next year. 4 The visit apparently will bj; the first trip to North Korea by a sizable United tates group since the prean War, State department officials said Thursday. will not, however, be a diplomatic breakthrough of the magnitude of the 1971 trip to China, which East Pet.

GB Phil 5 3 .625 14 NY 88 5 .615 Chi 6 5 .545 1 Mont 5 5 .500 Vk SLou 5 7 .417 2'4 Pitt 3 7 .300 314 West Cine 9 4 .692 LA 8 4 .667 14 SFran 6 5 .545 2 HOUS 6 7 .462 3 SDieg 3 7 .300 414 Atla 3 8 .273 5 SCENE ONE DOUBLE PI.AV in the third inning of their game Thursday at Fenway Park. The relay to first was time for a double play. Boston won the game, 10-4. (AP) Milwaukee Brewers' Lenn Sakata is forced at second base by Boston Red Sox' Jerry Remy on Brewers Buck Martinez's grounder to shortstop Rick Burleson who threw to Remy, Mail bag? Longtime Tribe voice Jack Graney is dead TOM team in 1920 and had a lifetime batting average of .250. Perhaps his main claim to fame as a player was being the first batter faced by Babe Ruth in 1914 when Ruth was a rookie left-handed pitcher with the Boston Red Sox.

He also is believed to be the first ex-major leaguer to become a broadcaster. ur i i i vv-1 been in the nursing home since January. Graney broadcast the play-by-play of the Indians' games after ending a 14-year major league career with Cleveland, during which he was an outfielder and usually the team's leadoff man. He played on Cleveland's first world championship CLEVELAND (AP) -Cleveland Indians fans who listened to the broadcasts of their favorite baseball team anytime from 1933 to 1953 were flooded with memories Thursday when it was learned that Jack Graney was dead. Graney, 91, died Thursday in a nursing home in Louisiana, Mo.

He had lc "I Wither a king among Princes Blake Witker, a standout athlete at Woodmore High School, a few years back, is literally tearing the hide off the baseball for the Heidelberg College School Princes. The college sophomore is ripping the ball at a .425 clip, good enough to rank sixth in the Ohio Athletic Conference. Witker collected two safeties in Heidelberg's recent win over Oberlin. The Princes are 6-5-1 overall and 5-2 in the OAC, just a game behind Baldwin-Wallace. Sandusky Speedway officials announce a three-hour pre-season practice session this Sunday afternoon.

The one-half mile oval will be available to the drivers to test their cars and make final chassis preparations prior to the season opener. The pit area is to be open from 1:30 until 4:30 p.m. There is no charge for general admission. Gene Cook, general manager of the new Toledo Mud Hens, announces Photo Day for the media and fans for Sunday. The Hens are to take the field at 11:30 a.m.

and will be available from then until 1 p.m. Game time is 2 p.m. against Pawtucket. Tuesday, April 25, is family night at the Lucas County Stadium at the Lucas County Recreation Center complex. The Charleston Charlies are the opposition, and the entire family can see the Hens for $2.00.

In a related matter, Pete Redfern of the. Minnesota Twins is now a Hen. He appeared three times and pitched nine and two thirds innings for the Twins where he gave up 10 hits, 12 runs, seven which were earned. He allowed two home runs. For Pete's sake! NOW WE HAVE THEM KING SIZE SOCKS FOR BIG MEN 78 DODGE MAGKUmI XL Sox rip Brewers By HERSCHEL NISSENSON AP Sports Writer When the Milwaukee Brewers opened the season by battering Baltimore for 40 runs in three games, Manager George Bamberger, who spent 10 seasons in an Orioles uniform, cracked that "things could be worse.

I could still be their pitching coach." Bamberger was singing a different tune Thursday after the Brewers received a taste of their own medicine. "They wiped us out and I just want to get out of here," he said after the Boston Red Sox bombed the Brewers 10-4 with a 16-hit attack and scored 26 runs in sweeping a three-game series at Fenway Park. "They're the best hitting team in the league," Bamberger added. Butch Hobson, called best No. 9 hitter in baseball" by Texas Manager Billy Hunter, belted a three-run homer and Fred Lynn, who had four hits, lined a two-run shot in the third as the Red Sox breezed to their seventh consecutive victory and a 6-0 home record behind Bill Lee's seven-hitter.

"Hobson and Lynn certainly are hitting the ball, but so is everybody," said Manager Don Zimmer. "It doesn't surprise me in the least. I knew we could hit the ball. Seeing Lynn get four hits, Butch a long homer, Carlton Fisk and Jerry Remy get three hits apiece and others drill the ball doesn't surprise me. Virtually overlooked was Carl Yastrzemski's career hit, a fourth-inning double that moved him into a tie with Goose Goslin for 32nd place on baseball's all-time hit parade.

With 936 extra-base hits, Yaz is 20th, two behind Eddie Mathews. Milwaukee pitcher Moose Haas suffered a partial tear of the flexor muscle In his right elbow and will be sidelined for a month or more. What else can folks say alter they've seen Magnum XE? The exciting new car with a bold new look And handling and performance to match. You see, Magnum XE isa remarkable automobile that combines the attributes of a touring car with those suggested retail prices Magnum is priced less than these comparably equipped cars: the Monte Carlo Landau. Pontiac Grand Prix, Olds Cutlass Calais and Buick Regal Limited.

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This is two more than the previous high of 90 in 1967. Racewav Park. Toledn SPANGLER-NAU MOTOR SALES Oak Harbor, Ohio wrv. IM 1 Ml OVWIUll Ul harness racing Friday, April 21, with a post time of 8 p.m. for the 10-race program..