Word: mclain
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Dizzy's remarks were sadly akin to those of baseball's most recent 30-game winner and reigning righthander, Detroit's Denny McLain, presently under indefinite suspension for investing in a bookmaking operation. "My biggest crime is stupidity," said McLain. No doubt. But the sorry truth remains that in less than two weeks, two of baseball's greatest players cast black shadows on the national game-and on all professional athletics...
Lingering Stink. "McLain," reports SPORTS ILLUSTRATED, "who had previously been betting basketball and hockey with the Syrians-and losing-agreed and put up the money. Poor, dumb Denny-who is also known to his teammates as Dolphin, because he is a fish as a gambler-was easy game. The money the bettors lost was taken by the Syrians. The payouts on winning bets came from the money McLain and fatherly Ed Schober invested...
Trouble came when a local high-roller wagered $8,000 on a race at the Detroit Race Course. His horse won, and the payoff was supposed to be $46,600. When McLain failed to cough up the money, says SPORTS ILLUSTRATED, he was called before Tony Giacalone, strong-arm man for Detroit Cosa Nostra Boss Joe Zerilli. Tough Tony put his foot down-hard, right on McLain's toes. According to SPORTS ILLUSTRATED, Denny explained in one of several versions that he had dislocated his toes at home while chasing raccoons away from his garbage cans. At the time...
Shortly before the SPORTS ILLUSTRATED article appeared, Baseball Commissioner Bowie Kuhn called McLain in for a long discussion about "certain off-the-field activities" in 1967. Though Kuhn later announced that there was "no indication" that McLain's actions "in any way involve the playing or outcome of baseball games," the stink lingered on. Citing a gangland source, SPORTS ILLUSTRATED says that Tony Giacalone's brother Billy bet big money on Boston to win the 1967 pennant, and that he also bet heavily against Detroit in their final, pennant-deciding game of the season with the California Angels...
...week's end, when the Tigers opened their spring training camp in Lakeland, Fla., McLain was among the missing. He had just been called in for another long talk with Commissioner Kuhn, after which Kuhn announced that he was suspending McLain until a full investigation into his bookmaking was completed. If any of the allegations prove true, it could well mean the end of McLain's career...