BOXING—The New York State Athletic Commission suspended the promoter's license of Rosensohn Enterprises, Inc. (Kahn, Velella & Co.) and the matchmaker's license of Bill Rosensohn. Commission Chairman Melvin Krulewitch said the action was based on Rosensohn's account of the behind-scenes power scramble at the time of the Johansson-Patterson fight as first told in SPORTS ILLUSTRATED.
FOOTBALL—Hard on the heels of Bill Shea's announced third major baseball league Lamar Hunt, 26-year-old Texas oil millionaire, disclosed the formation of a second professional football league. Four of the six cities so far franchised are also included in Shea's baseball league: New York, Houston, Minneapolis-St. Paul, Denver (represented in both leagues by Robert Howsam), might presumably share the same stadiums. The two other football cities are Dallas and Los Angeles. The new league—to be called the American Football League—plans to kick off in the fall of 1960.
Bert Bell, NFL commissioner, announced that all 76 National League games will be taped for TV and the best 26 repeated postseason as a source of player pension funds.
HORSE RACING—In the 57th running of the $57,500 Saratoga Handicap Bald Eagle, running third in the swing to the back-stretch took flight under the whipping hand of Manuel Ycaza for a neck victory over Grey Monarch (see below). A 7-5 choice, the Cain Hoy Stable colt, carrying top weight of 120 pounds, covered the mile and a quarter in a snappy 2:03.
The never-ending search for a bargain in horseflesh (SI, July 27) reached a climax in the annual Saratoga Yearling Sale of Thoroughbreds, where 249 head went for a total of $2,775,300—an average of $11,145. The Saratoga sale rounded out a lively three-week selling and buying period in California, Kentucky and New York, which between July 27 and August 14 saw 653 yearlings go under the hammer for a record total of $6,922,600 at an impressive average of $10,601.
GOLF—Burly Mike Souchak, 32, choked off all competition in the $25,000 Motor City open in Detroit by whacking out a blistering 72-hole total of 268, 16 under par, five strokes under the old tournament record, including four straight birdies in the second round for a 63 and a course-record tie at Rolling Meadowbrook CC. With the government now taking the larger part of his earnings, Souchak headed home to spend the rest of the year with his family.
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BALD EAGLE WINS SARATOGA HANDICAP
