Original Scouting Report on Dick Allen

Curiously, much of Dick Allen’s original scouting report is written in Greek.

Over at NY Baseball Digest, the keeper of that site, Mike Silva, has shared with the reader three photos he took from a recent sojourn to the Baseball Hall of Fame — photos, specifically, of three original scouting reports on three excellent baseball players.

It’s a coincidence that, shortly after noon today, the NotGraphs Investigative Reporting Investigation Team itself came into possession of a similar item — namely, an original scouting report of Dick Allen.

Curiously, the report is devoid of the sort of language one might expect. There are no comments, for example, regarding Allen’s arm strength or his speed on the basepaths.

Instead we find these somewhat cryptic, barely relevant, notes:

• “Never suckled at his mother’s breast and instead was fed the innards of lions, wild swine, and bear marrow.”
• “Anointed in ambrosia and put on top of a fire to burn away mortal parts of body.”
• “μῆνιν ἄειδε θεὰ Πηληϊάδεω Ἀχιλῆος οὐλομένην, ἣ μυρί’ Ἀχαιοῖς ἄλγε’ ἔθηκεν.”