Please, Please, Ed Spiezio, Won't You Please Pop Up?

Such fine form made it certain that Spiezio would be invited to St. Petersburg this spring, but there was no doubt what the Cardinals had in mind for him for the coming season, "SPIEZIO GOING TO JACKSONVILLE was what I kept reading in the papers," he remembers, "and I thought they were probably right. But I also thought I would make them remember me for next year. I wasn't thinking in terms of hitting .300. It was more like .600."

The first week of spring training was devoted almost exclusively to conditioning exercises, and it is hard to distinguish yourself doing sit-ups. Spiezio soothed his impatience by swinging a weighted bat in the living room of the house he rented in St. Petersburg and occasionally taking snapshots of his infant daughter, Debbie.

Eventually Spiezio got his chance to bat in an exhibition game, and what should he see but a big, fat, hanging curve. "I kept thinking, wait for it, wait for it—and I didn't. I struck out, and I thought I'd better get back to the batting cage. I don't strike out often and when I do, boy, it makes me mad."

Grover Resinger, who was helping out in the Cardinal camp, watched Spiezio take his practice swings and frowned. "Ed," he told him, "you're not crouching and exploding at the pitch the way you used to." Spiezio says, "Of course. That was it. Spring like a snake. It all came back, and I knew I was the master again. I didn't care what pitcher it was or what pitch he threw me. I was going to hit it." Dennis Ribant of the Mets threw a fast ball, and Spiezio hit it for a single. The next day the Reds' Bill Henry tried a curve, and Spiezio hit that for a single. Two days later three Pirate pitchers tried an assortment of pitches, and Spiezio tripled off the center-field fence, doubled off the right-field fence and lined a single to left. "Hey, baby," said Cardinal Out-fielder Carl Warwick, "are you really human?"

The Cardinals, by then, had some serious doubts. But last week, in the first game between the Cardinals and the Yankees since the World Series, Spiezio came to bat in the seventh inning and meekly popped up. The Cardinal brain trust let out a heartfelt sigh of relief. But the Yankees, who don't care about the Cardinals' problems, tied the score, and Spiezio got another chance in the ninth. Pity. With his weight heavily on his back foot, Spiezio waited until the last second before springing like a snake at Bill Stafford's fast ball, and oops, he did it again. The ball came back to earth well over the left-fielder's head some 430 feet away, Spiezio had a triple, and the Cardinals won the ball game. "Shee," said Red Schoendienst.