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Wakefield Likely to Quit Baseball Refuses to Report To Sox After Trade South Siders Turn Down His Terms When Outfielder Asks jVank Salary Cut Be Restored WASHINGTON, D. C, April 29 UP. — Outfielder Dick Wakefield, who was traded yesterday to the Chicago White Sox by the "New York Yankees, appeared about ready to give up the game today. He headed for his brothers home at Ann Arbor after general manager Frank Lane of the White Sox refused to meet his terms in a long distance telephone conversation. Wakefield, who signed with the Yankees this spring at a 25 per cent reduction— all that is permitted by baseball law— from the 2,500 he received from the Detroit Tigers last year, said he would not report to his new team unless the cut was restored. Earlier in the year he had threatened to quit the game when the Yankees failed to meet his salary demands. However, he changed his mind and signed. Today he explained to Lane that he did it because he figured he had an opportunity to get the cut in pay back because the Yankees had a good chance to win the pennant. "I am not going to report unless the White Sox up my salary to 2,500," Wakefield said after he talked with Lane. He then made a reservation to fly to Ann Arbor, saying the next move was up to Lane. "He knows what I want." Wakefield said. At Chicago, Lane said he told Wakefield hi the telephone conversation that his cut in salary, was not the White Sox responsibility since they bought his contract from the Yankees. May Enter Business "With all due respect to the White Sox," Lane quoted Wakefield as saying, "I think I ought to get that back now." Lane said he replied: "We thought youd be happy to return to your old home town and have a chance to play regularly again." Early in the spring, when Wakefield was a holdout with the Yankees, he said he was planning to go into business with his brother at Ann Arbor. He refused to say definitely today, however, whether he still was going to follow that plan. The Yankees traded Wakefield, who had gotten one hit in two trips to the plate as a pinch hitter this season, to the White Sox for an undisclosed amount of cash and outfielder Johnny Ostrowski. The Yankees immediately assigned Ostrowski to their Kansas City farm club in the American Association. The Tigers gave Wakefield a bonus of 2,000 and a new automobile to sign with them when he still was at the University of Michigan in 1941. They fanned him out to Winston-Salem and Beaumont and he finally made the Tigers In 1943, hitting .316. The next season he hit .355 until he went into service. After coming out, he started to go down hill and the Tigers finally gave up on him after the 1949 season, sending him to the Yankees in a straight player deal for rookie first baseman Dick Kryhoski.
