Waterbury evening Democrat., 1894-04-20


 games against the big teams of the major league. Early last summer predicted the | reorganization of the Western league and 1 expressed the belief that it would meet | with decided success. There is no reason | to change the tone of that belief. The times are propitious; the circuit is strong and well | arranged; good men are behind the various I clubs; team, seem to be we'll made up, and 1 last of all the league has at its head an eX- | ecutive officer who is in himself q tower of strength to the organization
 1havc the pleasure of a personal acquaint- | ance with President Ban Johnson of the Western league and what is said of him i herein is a matter of knowledge, not of hearsay. He was associated with the sport ing department of the Cincinnati Commer- cial Gazette in 1886, when 1 reported the l Cincinnati games for that paper In later years he took up the baseball work of The | Commercial Gazette and became one of the most pronounced ''cranks" in the west. l During the excitement of a game Ban was accustomed to grow wild and woolly. A | cowboy on a crusade was mot ill it'' with him on such occasions. Itwas nothing un- expected in Cincinnati to see the present presiding officer of ',e Western league l leaning far over the front of the press box and paying his wordy and not ambiguous | left handed respects to the offending um- | pire. No umpire to my knowledge was ever | mobbed on the Cincinnati grounds, but had such an assault occurred it is most prob | able that Ban would have cast the first stone.
 It is of such baseball stuff that President | Ban Johnson is made 11ei is in the game heart, soul, body and creased trousers.
 There is nothing lukewarm or uncertain about his love for the sport. His knowl- edge of the science is not entirely theoretic- al. In his school days Ban was catcher | for the Marietta (O) college team and was accounted the best amateur catcher in the state. With a mind that is entirely impartial, will that is forcible and an en- thusasm that is powerful, Mir. Johnson, it seems to me, is bound to be the right man | in the right place for the Western league. That he is prime fighter was proved by his hearty, whole souled work as secretary of the American association during the latter's war with the National league in 1891.
 Every year the National league appoints committee of three to revise the playing rules, and every year the committee pro- ceeds to do the revision act whether there is need of revision or not. They utter the sentiment of Flannigan of Texas, 'What are we here for?'' and straightway begin to paw over the playing rules like so many
 
 something Inust give way before them sim ply to justify their appointment.
 These rules committeeman usually are "magnates' who can tell the difference be- tween the home plate and the bat bag, but not much more. If ball players like Anson, Comiskey, Ward, Hanlon, Pfeffer, Tebeau or Nash were put on the committee, ''revi- sion" would not be indulged in for the mere sake of making showing.
 The last rules committee made more mis- takes than Bob lngersoll ever laid to the credit of Moses, the ancient lawmaker and the original rules committee of one. The most glaring, asinine blunder of the bunch, however, was the abolition of the trap ball." To do this the committee submitted a rule which was adopted and which says, The batsman is out if be hits fly ball that can be handled by an intielder while first base is occupied, with only one out"
 In recent game Arie Latham put the seal of ridicuousness upon that rule in a way that should call for it's repeal forth. with There was a man on first base;