Seesaw Battle

Maybe Corporal Billy Martin was just fired up, and maybe the opposing pitchers had forgotten how to throw to him. But when the 27-year-old infielder returned to Yankee Stadium last week on terminal leave from the Army, he and the Yankees looked almost as good as they did in the 1953 World Series--when Martin's last stint produced a heroic .500 batting average, a sixth-game, ninth-inning single that gave the Yankees the crown. Against the Washington Senators Martin sparked his team with two crackling hits. Whitey Ford pitched a brilliant one-hitter, Mickey Mantle slammed out his 36th homer, drove in three runs, winning the game 4-2. In the dizzy seesaw American League race with Chicago (ahead by half a game) and Cleveland (half a game out), it was good, pennant-grabbing, Yankee ball.

But next day the Yankees' pitching turned sour against the Senators, wasting nine good hits (including two home runs by Hank Bauer) and an early lead to lose 10-5. Chicago followed suit, succumbed to the hungry Cleveland Indians, whom they had walloped 8-1 the day before. With two homers by Centerfielder Larry Doby and Early Wynn's six-hit pitching, the 6-1 victory pulled Cleveland back up to a second-place tie with the Yankees, left Chicago still in front by half a game.

Over the weekend, the American League race turned upside down. Winning a desperate doubleheader (5-3, 5-3), Cleveland pushed the faltering White Sox from first place to third, snatched the No. 1 spot a bare half-game ahead of the Yankees. A three-run Mantle homer helped the Yankees humble the Senators, 8-3, stay in second place. With some 20 games left to play, the stretch, even for veterans like Casey Stengel, was fast becoming a manager's nightmare.

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