Letters

REAL FOOTBALL
Thank you for Geoffrey Norman's wonderful story Smart Ball (Sept. 3). The game as it is played at Chicago, MIT and Swarthmore is not an alternative to "real" football, it is real football. I am proud to be a University of Chicago ('65) alumnus.
GLENN LOAFMANN
Chicago

Three cheers for Smart Ball. What makes sports so important is their relative unimportance. One can train hard and take on challenges he or she may or may not be able to handle, secure in the knowledge that the rest of the world quite frankly doesn't care.
JEF MALLETT
Lansing, Mich.

My hat is off to the student athletes, coaches and football programs at these Division III schools. The players know why they are in school, and they have their priorities straight. They know that football is an emotional release offering the opportunity to build friendships. It is great that such football programs exist.
PETE ELLSWORTH
Westerville, Ohio

GROOVY SETTLEMENT
E.M. Swift's article about golf equipment (Choose Your Weapon, July 9) contains an incorrect statement. In discussing Ping Eye2 irons, whose grooves were determined by the U.S. Golf Association to be too close together to conform to the Rules of Golf, the article states, "The USGA revealed itself to be a paper tiger by settling with Karsten out of court for an undisclosed amount of money."

The settlement involved no exchange of money. Karsten Manufacturing Corporation, makers of Ping clubs, agreed to stop manufacturing clubs that do not conform, and the USGA agreed to treat earlier models as if they conformed, to protect the interests of innocent golfers who had purchased them. The USGA did not pay, nor would it have paid, one cent to settle.
DAVID B. FAY
Executive Director
United States Golf Association
Far Hills, N.J.

ELIGIBILITY
Your SCORECARD item about Notre Dame running back Braxston Banks (Aug. 27) is another indication of a society that has no sense of responsibility. Banks should have known the NCAA rule about forfeiture of college eligibility when he declared himself available for the pro draft. And who would be interested in drafting someone with only meager stats in three seasons of play? Banks miscalculated on two things: his own worth and the court's decision to stand by the NCAA's rules.
TONY THOMAS
West Chester, Ohio

BASEBALL'S GREATEST TEAM
In the photo accompanying Dave Newhouse's REMINISCENCE about Mark Koenig, the last survivor of the fabled 1927 Yankees (Sept. 3), I recognize Waite Hoyt, Lou Gehrig, Earle Combs and Babe Ruth. Can you tell me who the others are?
JASON MA
West Grove, Pa.

Who is the man holding the H in the picture?
JAMES OTT
Cleveland, Texas

•The pictured players are, from left to right, Benny Bengough, Hoyt, Gehrig, Tony Lazzeri, Joe Dugan, Koenig, Bob Meusel, Combs, Ruth, and batboy and mascot Eddie Bennett.

According to G.H. Fleming in his book about the 1927 Yankees, Murderers' Row, "Bennett was the official Yankee mascot and full-time batboy, but he was no longer a boy. He was 24 years old and had been the Chicago White Sox mascot from 1917 to 1919. A New Yorker, he served in the same capacity for the Brooklyn Dodgers in the pennant-winning year of 1920. He was hired by the Yankees for the 1921 season and remained with the club until he was seriously injured in an automobile accident mid-season 1933.... He died from alcoholism in January 1935. His furnished room on West Eighty-fourth Street contained four pictures on the walls: autographed photographs of Babe Ruth, Lou Gehrig, Herb Pennock and Waite Hoyt."—ED.

PHOTO

NATIONAL BASEBALL LIBRARY, COOPERSTOWN, N.Y.

Letters to SPORTS ILLUSTRATED should include the name, address and home telephone number of the writer and should be addressed to The Editor, SPORTS ILLUSTRATED, Time & Life Building, Rockefeller Center, New York, N.Y. 10020-1393.