Letters

THE CAMPANIS AFFAIR
Thanks to Peter Gammons for his excellent editorial on "The Campanis Affair" (SCORECARD, April 20). It's about time a writer with the power to describe this sorry situation spoke out about it.
LARRY GREER
Boston

In discussing the socioeconomics of tennis in SCORECARD, you gave one of the best reasons I can think of for doing something about baseball's case of institutional racism: "Clearly a huge pool of potential talent is going untapped." Baseball is better for having accepted Jackie Robinson and the black players who followed him. It will be better still when blacks are accepted for their administrative skills as well as for their physical ones.
JOSEPH H. BROWN
Iowa City, Iowa

The reason baseball doesn't have more blacks in its front offices is simple: Jobs are given via an old-boy network.
TOM MAZZA
Lafayette Hill, Pa.

DOLLARS AND SENSE
Thanks for telling us everything anybody has ever wanted to know about baseball players' salaries ($256,296,950, April 20). One question, though. Dennis (Oil Can) Boyd gets $550,000 and Jack (I Want More Money) Morris makes $1,850,000? Something's wrong.
KEVIN NEADEAU
Linden, Mich.

Your piece on salaries brought out some interesting, albeit trivial, statistics. For example: Are the Smiths keeping up with the Joneses? You bet—the four active Smiths listed have a combined income of $3,560,000, compared with the four Joneses' paltry total of $667,500.

There are 10 players named Davis, and they have a total salary of more than $5.4 million. However, your top three outfielders, Jim Rice, Rickey Henderson and Dale Murphy, combine for more income (nearly $6 million) than all 10 Davises.
LEN THUNHORST
Stratford, Conn.

I decided to take Eddie Murray's salary ($2,460,000) and see what I could do with it. I came up with a team of nine starters and one relief pitcher that I think would easily win the AL West: Wally Joyner ($165,000) at first, Shawon Dunston ($155,000) at second, Tony Fernandez ($350,000) at short, Chris Brown ($215,000) at third, B.J. Surhoff ($62,500) behind the plate, Eric Davis ($300,000), Kirby Puckett ($365,000) and Barry Bonds ($100,000) in the outfield, Oil Can Boyd ($550,000) as the starting pitcher and Charlie Kerfeld ($110,037) in relief.

Not bad, huh? And, oh yeah, I still have $87,463 left.
DANNY NEWMAN
De Witt, N.Y.

It seems to me that Larry Mize, with his great Masters victory, was far more deserving of a cover story than these baseball players and their salaries.
STEVE RICHARDSON
Berwyn, Pa.

The Dwight Gooden case (A Crash Landing for an Ace, April 13) demonstrates that players today are paid more money than they know how to spend. I remember when Ted Williams was paid about $18,000 to hit .406—and you could watch him do it from a good grandstand seat for one dollar.