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‘Utterly baffled’: the 17-year-old girl who struck out Babe Ruth and Lou Gehrig

In a 1931 exhibition, Jackie Mitchell silenced the greats back-to-back. It sparked still-ongoing debates over legitimacy and opportunities for women in baseball

The Sultan of Swat sounded exasperated. “I don’t know what things are coming to,” Babe Ruth sighed during spring training in 1931.

“I don’t know what’s going to happen if they begin to let women in baseball,” he elaborated to reporters. “Of course, they will never make good. Why? Because they are too delicate. It would kill them to play ball everyday.”

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© Photograph: AP

© Photograph: AP

© Photograph: AP

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Keep off the grass: British tennis players complain of marijuana smell at US Open

  • Aroma wafts over courts from nearby Corona Park

  • Katie Boulter: ‘You smell it a lot. I’m not a huge fan’

Britain’s US Open hopefuls thought they had put the grass behind them when Wimbledon finished, but the smell of it is all around Flushing Meadows and they are not happy about it.

Marijuana is legal for adults in New York and while smoking is not allowed on site, the aroma of weed wafts over some outside courts from the nearby Corona Park.

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© Photograph: Lev Radin/Shutterstock

© Photograph: Lev Radin/Shutterstock

© Photograph: Lev Radin/Shutterstock

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