Peters Trying to Regain Last Year's Fastball Grip

Junior Ray Peters leaned back in practice yesterday and fired his famous fastball, but it didn't jump the way it did last season when he boasted a 1.67 ERA.

The sizzle's been out of the fast-ball since Peters began throwing in February, and if it doesn't come around, the baseball team will have trouble holding onto its Greater Boston League championship.

Peters's long bout with mononucleosis last summer has been pointed to as the cause of his slump, but he doesn't think that's right. "I'm fully recovered from it," he said.

For three hours a day, five days a week, Peters has been throwing, working hard on his pitching rhythm. "I just can't get anything over. I've got to get the rhythm," he said. The 6-5, 210-pound righthander suffered a similar slump in the middle of last season when he lost to Princeton, Columbia, and Dartmouth, and he thinks he'll pull out of this one. "It's not an insurmountable problem," he said. Coach Norm Shepard agreed yesterday, "I don't see why he shouldn't pull out of it."

1-1 Record

Peters' record stands at 1-1 after four starts. Last year at the same time he was 4-0. On the spring trip Peters knocked off Penn, 6-4, but Wednesday a B.U. team that he described as "not terribly good" knocked him out in the fourth and went on to win, 5-1.

In spite of this, Peters is optimistic. "We've got the potential to be better than last year. We've got better hitting, and the other pitchers are doing well."

He is the question mark and more people than Harvard fans will watch his performance. The Tigers drafted the fireballer from the Buffalo suburb of Cheektowaga after he graduated from the Nichols School, but he accepted Harvard's offer instead. Pro scouts kept their eyes on him during his first two years at academia and lured him with offers after his sophomore year, when he had a 9-3 record.

The Tiger price was right, and the mound ace was set last summer to sign a contract that would have let him finish his education. But when mono struck, Peters struck out with Detroit.

The pros like to sign stars as soon as they graduate from high school. Chances aren't good that any organization will take a chance on a college junior, particularly a junior in an Ivy school who's apt to head for grad school after a year or two.

That's fine with Peters. If he had the opportunity to sign now, he said he'd probably turn it down to go to law school.

Peters faces Springfield this Saturday in a home game.