The Montgomery advertiser., 1902-12-14

| Upon the action of the magnates of | the Southern League tomorrow depends | the future of baseball in the South | whether a continuation of the successful | article of the past two years or a mlser- | able, bunging failure.
 | The unofficial circuit of the eight club affair given out at the peace conference in Memphis last week, Is ideal-New Or
 leans, Montgomery Birmingham. Nash vile, Memphis, Atlanta, Savannah and
 Little Rock. This makes one Louisiana town, two Alabama towns, two Georgia towns, two Tennessee towns and one
 Arkansas town. By the elimination of Shreveport and Chattanooga the circuit | IS made more compact jumps and mileage
 reduced and in fact a better condition of affairs than ever before in the history of
 gether too far out of line and besides, its
 unfortunate geographical position 1t was
 dead weight, an old man of the sea, on
 the shoulders of the league in the matter
 of revenue. True. Shreveport has never
 failed to give visiting clubs their guar
 antee but that did not pay a club for the
 long railroad travel. tickets for eleven or
 twelve men and hotel bills after reach
 ing there. While Chattanooga Is more
 favorably located geographically. still
 that town in the matter of attendance has
 been even worse than Shreveport. and
 the three days spent in these two towns
 have footed up 3 considerable loss for
 every club In the league. Now. while
 Montgomery has not been a member of
 the League in either of the two years
 alluded to I know that these statements
 are facts, unless some body has been
 grossly misrepresenting things, and am
 quite sure that they have not. Every
 body who has ever had any connection
 at all with baseball affairs is fully coo-
 versant with the fact that a ten or
 twelve club circuit is the most absurdly
 ridiculous thing that can be imagined. To
 begin with the circuit is unwieldy and
 hunglesome to a degree the jumps in
 the nature of things are bound to be
 long and the railroad and other expenses
 counterbalancing any profits that could
 possibly accrue. Aside from this. with a
 circuit of more than eight clubs the home
 interest-or much of it-at its home dies
 out, and the club is forced to be at home
 so long that the patrons of the game
 became sa atiated-result. interest dies out,
 attendance and gate receipts shrinking.
 It is pretty certain that fight will be
 made by Shreveport and Chattanooga to-
 morrow, but for the good of sound base
 ball in the South 1t is 50 be sincerely
 hoped that the magnates will temper de-
 liberation with wisdom-and there can be but one result. Messrs. Foster of Shreve- port and Hightower of Little Rock, have already made dire threats of taking the ready sorely wounded the Southern
 League and almost nauseated the patrons of the game-the courts. It would seem, however that this is easy for unless l IneTo IS A ClduS0 III luo Constitution of the Southern League pro- viding for this yery emergency. the sub- stance of 1t being that unless a town has an attendance that Is paying to wis., iting clubs that town shall in the dis Cretion of the league, forfeit its fran chise. This will effectually cover the Shreveport and Chattanooga cases, and all that remains is for the voting to- morrow. There is hardly any. question than Newman or Powell IEill vote aye for New Orleans and if MT. Ragland is in cluded in the directory before the vote is taken of course Montgomery will vote the same way. Coffee Jackson of Bir- mir gham, Ed Peter of Atlanta. Newt Fischer or MT. Palmer of Nashville. President Kavanaugh of Little Rock. the Memphis and Savannah people remain to be figured on. Leaving Montgomery and Savannah out when the question of the new circuit comes up it win still leave New Orleans, Birmingham, Nd@ hvile, At lanta and Little Rock voting aye which would be majority. At the peace con ference General Carnes, while agreeing to the proposition to cut out Shreveport and Chattanooga, assured the magnates that he would work as heartily for the success of the old league as he had for the new. It is presumed that the old league people in Memphis will fall in with the plans of the five towns men, | toned and in that event 1t will be and Chattanooga against the | six other towns in the old league circuit. .
 AS to the local end of the situation | is in better shape today than | ever before in the baseball history of the | South Baseball as an investment fur | nishes the Hons share of the revenue to | street railway companies the better ball | that is played. the greater their profits arising from the increased attendance and the increase resultant from the fares they | handle The Montgomery Traction Com- oany quickly realized this and they have taken hold of baseball in Montgomery. The old street railway people have lost thousands and thousands of dollars in the past five years by their short-sighted, narrow policy in this respect. When first became a member of he Southern League some months ago .here was a fight brewing with Charlie Frank and his outlaw league. The old street railway had the local franchise in he outlaw league. the grounds of course. being the ones at Highland Park, the Traction Company grounds being located 1t Pickett Springs. There was never at any time a chance for the outlaw league n Montgomery. for, as The Advertiser has stated before, the two street railways, were certain to be consolidated eventu- ally. and the Traction Company would control the situation. Now that there Is no longer a rival baseball league in the South it by no means removes or miIi- .ates against the chances of the two street railway companies in Montgomery getting +opet her That they will be merged soon