BY BOB FRYE TOPDOG Ballplayers don't typically turn double plays in brushpiles, briar thickets or along overgrown fencerows, any more than beagles routinely chase cottontail rabbits round and round the second base bag. But they live in the same world in one sense: the best of both maximize their potential through hard work. Baseball players improve through constant practice, said Gary Slick, a resident of Hop Bottom in Susquehanna County who spent 33 years coaching the sport. Beagles like those he runs in fi eld trials - he considers them athletes, too - get better by trailing rabbits each and every day. " I used to like watching kids in ninth grade mature by the time they became seniors, " Slick said. " You'd see them get better and get better and get better. " It's the same with dogs. Sometimes you take a dog in the beginning who's just not ready and work them and work them and then they mature and gradually get better and better until eventually they get really good. " Like Hobo. One of Slick's beagles, Hobo - short for " Grand Field Champion Field Champion Gun Dog Slicker's Homerun Hobo Master Hunter " - is the fi rst beagle to earn Grand Field Champion status with the American Kennel Club DOMINATING COMPETITION & COVER JANUARY 2024 37