The Middlebury register and Addison County journal. [volume] (Middlebury, Vt.) 1883-1885, 1883-09-07
THE NATIONAL GAME.

THE P%rovidences and Bostons lead the
league in fielding.
DENNY, of the Providence club, has made
six home runs this season.
MANsELL, Creamer and Tayler, of the AL
legheny club, have been fined 800 each for
dissipation.
ONE error in twenty-one games played is
the great record of ice Hornung, left fielder
of the Boston club.
THE record shows that over sixty thousand
people have attended the league games at
Cleveland this year.
JOHN ORoURKE, of the Metropolitan club,
who a the longest hit on the Athletic
grounds, Philadelphia, is credited with the
same feat on the Polo grounds.
THE national game has been introduced in
the Sandwich Islands, the Honolulu and the
Oceanic clubs contcnding in Honolulu, with a
result of II to 10 in favor of the former.
CAPTAIN O'RoURKE, of the Buffalo club.
claims to be the inventor of the baseball mask.
I'M 1877, when with the Bostons, he had two
made for his own use, but gave one to Hol-
bert. George Wright obtained his model
from O'Rourke.
AT Washington, D.. c., recently there wasa
match played between teams composed of nine
one-legged men nine one-armed men.
Five innings were played, when darkness put
an end to the sport. The game at this stage
stood thirty to twenty-nine in favor of the
one-legged men. The umpire had but one
leg, the scorer but one arm. Many laughable
incidents occurred, but no serious accidents.
A MOVEMENT is on foot to organize an in
dependent baseball association, and for that
purpose representatives from Chicago, 1ndi-
inapolis, Pittsburg, New York, Philadelphia
Brooklyn and Hartford will meet on October
= at PittSburg. 1t is the intention of the
new organization to ignore the "eleven-men'
ule now in vogue in the league and the Amer
can association, and to make a number of al
terationsi in the playing rules. e
THE credit of being the first baseball pitcher
10 deliver curved balls-balls which seem to
ne going straight over the home base, but
suddenly turn aside and go out of the batter's
reach or snite him in the legs-is claimed in
behalf of several players. Nearly all college
men, except those from Harvard, insist that
the art was discovered at Yale. Harvard
men generously credit n Princeton player
with being the father of curve pitching. 1t
= held by others that deceptive pitching-in
eality curve pitching, but not then recog-
lized as such-was practiced by professional
players some time before any amateur ac-
Iuired it. A player who retired in 1874 says
that he learned the secret from a veteran sew
eral years earlier than that season. Arthur
cummings, of the Brooklyn Stars, was the
first man to curve the ball.
OF recent eminin baseball game the New
York Times says: The batter alone showed
no signs of fear, for there was, of course, no
probability that the balls aimed at her would
tome near her. The other players, whenever
ball came in their direction, would exclaim
loudly, "Oh, my!" and would frantically
lodge it. No casualties either among the
girls or the spectators occurred, for the rea-
son that no girl was able to throw the bal
Witty enough to infict a severe blow. Still,
had it hit a girl in the eye or in the back hair
It might nave caused some Inconvenience. OF
course the girls did not venture to catch the
ball. They could not have caught it if they
had tried, for the simple reason that they
were standing on their feet and were without
aprons. To expect a girl in such circum
s-ances to catch a ball would be absurd.
LEAGUE CLUB
The official record of the league champion
ship games played up to the LIST is as follows