Word: wagnerism
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...honored custom among ballplayers to brag loudest about what they do worst. So a pitcher who manages to beat out an infield roller struts around gloating, "Man! I really put the wood to it that time!" And Leon Wagner of the Los Angeles Angels confides: "I'm one of the best defensive outfielders in the game." At 29, Wagner may not be the game's worst gloveman (unlike Yogi Berra, he has never let a descending fly ball conk him on the head), but the tag of "Butcher" has stuck with him through three ball clubs and five...
Twist in the Dugout. Wagner is the Angels' clowning glory. He heckles opposing players "unconsciously" (he means unmercifully), dances the twist in the dugout, and gleefully polices the "Outhouse"-the section in the back of the team bus reserved for goof-offs after each Angel game. Wagner's credentials are perfect for the job. Part Negro, part Cherokee Indian, he grew up in Detroit, and decided early that the way to fun and fortune was to be afootball star. But, alas, at Alabama's Tuskegee Institute he learned that college football players do not always get paid...
...concertos for neglected instruments such as the trombone and guitar. He swoops through the Alban hills in his Maserati, sunning himself in "the Italian humanity" and perfecting his Roman dialect. "I live in a tradition of German artists who have lived in Italy," he says. "Mozart, Goethe and Wagner all went to Italy, and when Handel stayed in Naples, he had 20 valets. I think that's wonderfully extraordinary...
Minus & Plus. But Thayer does profess to see a silver lining among all those thunderclouds. "Most advertisers," says he, "have said that any doubts they had about the value of newspaper advertising were dispelled by the strike." Perhaps. There are some advertisers, like Gimbels' Sales Promotion Director Carl Wagner, who confess that they are beginning "to think seriously about spending in other directions...
Just as surprising has been the fall of the Angels. The Los Angeles club has been getting hitting from big Leon Wagner, catcher Bob Rodgers, and one or two others, and its pitching has been passable, if not brilliant. But the club that won all the close ball games last year has been losing them this time around. The relief pitchers have been frittering away leads in the late innings, and some shoddy fielding has hurt, too. The Angels, now in seventh place, have not been playing like contenders...