Don Newcombe returns to Brooklyn on Sunday--George Vecsey, NY Times

"Eighty-one years old and still working for the Dodgers, Newk (Don Newcombe) is worth knowing for fans who never set foot in the funky little bandbox in Flatbush. He was the burly ace who started both games of a doubleheader in 1950 (16 innings total, won the first, no decision in the nightcap), and slugged seven homers in 1955, known to Dodger fans as “next year.”...

This Sunday Newk comes back to Brooklyn, where the Class A Cyclones have been selling out regularly since 2001 in the handsome little stadium built by New York City and the Wilpons.

KeySpan Park is a spiritual retreat where fans of a certain age daydream of Oisk and Campy playing in Brooklyn and Whitey and Monte playing in Harlem — the good old days, when many Dodgers lived in Bay Ridge during the season, but Newcombe took the bridge or the tunnel over from Jersey, depending on the traffic.....

• In their first seven years, the Cyclones have brought in nearly every living Dodger, including the recent pairing of Danny McDevitt and Joe Pignatano re-enacting the last pitch thrown at Ebbets Field in 1957. Joan Hodges, a Brooklyn girl who married the beloved Gil, is a regular at the ballpark. Newk has not yet been back.....

As he has noted many times, Newcombe often rode home with a different companion — a six-pack. After the Dodgers moved west in 1958, he wound up playing first base in Japan in the early 1960s. A decade later he swore to his family that he would never take another drink and, without going through any alcoholism program, he became sober and productive, leading many players into treatment for addictions."

• Highlights from George Vecsey article in NY Times, "A Jersey Guy's Roots in Brooklyn," 7/19/07. Times Select. (fee)

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