| Boxing's Mr. Big

gO RI em ol: Oa, 5;

F % Norris calls tune in three NHL arenas >&

Toe

controls pucksters

__ The scenesis Crosley Field in Cincinnati. The time
is late September, and the antagonists are the Redlegs,
who are fighting for first place, and the Giants, who are

Struggle to keep out of the cellar.

Just before the

Same is due to start the Giant catcher comes up with a

tummyache. He can’t play.

The umpire then orders
Cincinnati to “lend” the Giants
its own second-string catcher

-for this game. So Smoky Bur-

Sess catches for the Giants.
“1¢ hits two home runs, send-
ing his team down to:a defeat
that eventually costs every
Redleg (including Burgess
himself) a cool $10,000.

Fantastic? Sure. It couldn’t
@ppen in baseball or foot-
ball or basketball, But it can
and does happen in hockey,
and I don’t mean a corner lot
same in Kamsack, Saskatche-
Wan, but in the huge arenas
of “the National Hockey
€ague (writes a staff re-
Porter on Labor’s Daily, the
LT.U. publication).

The last time it happened
Was last season in Montreal,
When the Canadiens “lent” a
80alie to the New York Ran-
8€rs who turned around and
Shut out his own teammates.

he volatile partisans of Les
Habitants nearly tore down
the Forum after that one. But
It was all “legal,” according
0 @ strange rule in the Na-
tional Hockey League, which
Specifies that if the visiting
team’s goalie is incapacitated

e home team must make a
sepetitute goal-tender avail-

If this would seem to be in-
Consistent with the theories of
ree enterprise, let it be not-
€d at once that laissez-faire

S been dead in the NHL for,

More than 15 years,

It’s
the ki
J

_2 tight monopoly and
ngpin is none other than
es Norris, the man who
pouldn't turn his back on
Tankie Carbo, the New York
whom the New

Tacketeer,

JIM NORRIS

York State Boxing Commis-
sion has accused of being the
real power in professional pu-
gilism.

Norris, of course, is best
known as the president of the
International Boxing Club.
Some people also know that
he is one of the owners of
Madison Square Garden,
which, in turn, is the. owner
of the New York Rangers hoc-
key team.

Somewhat fewer persons
know that Norris is also the
owner of the Chicago Stadium
and of the Chicago Black
Hawks, also in the NHL. And
only a comparative handful
know that Norris’ sister was
the owner of the Detroit Red
Wings—a gift from Big Jim.
Eventually Marge Norris gave
up the Red Wings — to an-
other brother. :

Since there are only six
teams in the NHL, this means
that~the Norisses control ex-
actly half of them. To draw
the parallel with baseball
again, this would be analogues
to Dan Topping owning the
Yankees, belonging to a cor-
poration that owned the Bos-
ton Red Sox, and having a
sister who owned the Detroit

Tigers. It wouldn’t necessarily -

mean that something was rot-
ten in Denmark—but a lot of
the boys in the bleachers would
still hold their noses.

For more than a decade
now the Black Hawks have
been the weak sister of the
league. There are some Black
Hawk fans—yes there are still

some left—who insist that is.

so because the Hawks have
been run as a “farm club” for
the Detroit Red Wings.

Some of the recent dealings
between the two clubs has
done nothing to dispel this be-
lief. Take the case of Metro
Prystai, a big, hard-checking
tobacco farmer from Simcoe,
Ontario. Metro was originally
the property of Chicago. Sev-
eral years ago he was traded
to the Wings and helped De-
troit win four championships.
Two years ago he was shuttled
back to the Hawks and the
Wings missed him severely. So
last season Metro was “traded”
back to Detroit. s

There can be little doubt
that Jim Norris’ hand was in

. there on that deal. It is the

hand that could eventually
strangle major league hockey
in this country—if ever the
fans catch wise.

ers

Three of the six National Hockey League teams operate under the direct or indirect
control of Jim Norris. Two of the “independents” are Maple Leafs and Canadiens,
shown tangling in this picture.

Training methods of Zatopek
copied hy athletes everywhere

New sports records are being set up every year in most events throughout
the world. Some records stay on the books for a long time, even decades: as for ex-
ample, the 100 metres, the long jump and the pole vault records. Others — the shot,
the hammer and others are broken very frequently.

However, no previous period has registered such strides as the most recent

one. This may someday be
called Zatopek’s Era because
Emil Zatopek by his own ex-
ample of training, based upon
speed and increased training
schedules, demonstrated the
way towards these peak per-
formances. This example was
followed by many of the best
athletes of the world.

Kuts, in the Soviet Union,
Stephens in Australia and
many others are grateful to
Zatopek for his advice. The
method used by Hungarian
athletes, whose performances
are now admired by the whole
world, do not differ greatly
from Zatopek’s methods.

In. spite of the fact that all
of Emil Zatopek’s world re-
cords in Olympic events have
already been broken he still
remains one of the finest long-
distance runners of the world.

Not only because of his four
Olympic victories and a num-
ber of world records, but be-
cause of the unique example
which he has set to athletes
everywhere. “I want to be
another Zatopek”—this i§ the
answer which many boys will
give you while training some-

. where on a meadow, cr on a

sports ground or a country.
lane. Not only in Czechoslo-
vakia but probably wherever
his successes are known,

The 5,000 and 10,000 metres
events at Olympic Games and
in all track and field matches
are among the most dramatic
and interesting races, One re-
calls the 1948 Olympic Games
in London when thousands of
spectators cheered for several
minutes the thrilling duel be-
tween Zatopek and Gaston
Reiff of Belgium to win the
gold medal,

At the 1952 Olympic Games
in Helsinki many of the 100,-
000 spectators at the Olympic
Stadium declared that the
5,000 metres event had been
the greatest thrill of the entire
Olympic Games,

In Melbourne the 5,000
metres again was the most
dramatic and the finest sport-
ing event.

These races are inseparably
linked to the name of Emil
Zatopek. He has been follow-
ed by many new talented run-
ners some of whom achieve
brilliant performances today.

A few comparisons will il-
lustrate the great rise in the
standards of performance in
these events during the past

.ten years. The year 1946 may

be taken as the beginning of
Zatopek’s international career,
In 1946, the Swede Haag was

the only athlete in the world
who had run 5,000 metres in- |
side 14 minutes. Only seven
athletes did better than 14
minutes 30 seconds. But in
1955 six athletes covered the
5,000 metres inside 14 minutes
and 77 athletes ran inside 14
minutes 30 seconds.

And in 1956 13 are on the
world’s books for having cov-
ered the 5,000 metres in less
than 14 minutes.

This progress has been even
more striking in the 10,000
metres event. In 1946, not a
single athlete had been cap-
able of running 10,000 metres
inside 29 minutes. In 1955,
Emil Zatopek held the world
record with a time inside 29
minutes, and ten athletes cov-
ered the distance inside 29.30
minutes,

There is every indication
that these figures will again
be revised during 1957. Emil
Zatopek himself says: “Re-
cords are made in order to be
broken.”

And _ should we ask Zatopek
what pleased him most in his
great competitive career he
would certainly. answer that
it was the tremendous im-
provement in the standard of
performance in long-distance
events, ©

JANUARY 25, 1957 — PACIFIC TRIBUNE—PAGE 15