The evening times. [volume] (Grand Forks, N.D.) 1906-1914, 1906-04-26
CORNER LOT
TEAM
The Small Boy Who Can Throw Curves
O Is Busy These Days-knows
More Baseball "Dope" Than All
Sporting Writer'S Put Together.

The corner lot teams are at 1t again.
To woman the statement doesn't
carry much significance but the man
who at some time in his life did not
hold an honored position on a corner
lot nine. would be harder to find than
the proverbial dodo.
The average small boy between the
ages of 10 and 16 years could put the
most expert sporting writer to shame,
with the baseball statistics he can
quote. He can reef off averages by the
yard, and tell you lust where the
Giants finished two years ago, and
who led the American league pitchers
last year, and the batting and fielding
averages of the Grand Forks players
last season.
He knows the names of all the pitch
ers in the big leagues, and every kid
has his favorite. He dopes up teams
that could whip all creation on the
diamond. His waking hours are spent
trying to master the intricacies of the
out curve and spit" ball. and he
dreams of runs and strike outs.
If the corner lot players followed
the ambitions they held at IA, the
country would have to shut up shop
and devote its attention to baseball
for nine months in the year, and there
would be no one to look on but the
members of the gentler sex. and no
baseball players but pitchers.
1t is the ambition of every boy to be
a pitcher. The position of shortstop
or second base holds out attractions
from an ambitious player, who sees
visions of himself scooping in hot lin
ers, but the pitching box is the dizzy
height of the baseball ladder to which
he aspires to climb. The boy who can
receive the mystic signals from the
catcher, spit on the glove, wipe the
ball on his trousers, whirl his arms
around and shoots something over the
plate that he fondly imagines is
curved ball, is more to be envied than
princes or railroad presidents.
He is the boy who sees before him
self a dazzling career as a baseball
pitcher, receiving fabulous sums from
the big league clubs, and being fea-
tured as the phenom of the day.
Out in the outfield are stationed the
less aggressive players. 1t doesn't
matter if their father owns couple of
iron mines or few thousand acres of
white pine. If they can't catch a ball
without running about an equal
chance of fumbling it, they are rele-
gated to the outfield to loaf around
throwing stones at stray dogs. until
their turn comes to bat. Anyone who
can chase ball will do for the out
field on corner lot team. but the
pitcher must have qualifications to
hold his job He must either own the
only available glove or ball. or else
be able to thrash the other members
of the team individually or collec-
lively, and show a willingness to do
so whenever his authority is ques-
toned.
The names of the corner lot aggre-
cations are wonderful to behold. The
list includes such fancy cognomens as
"The Little Napoleons THE Happy
Hooligans," 1.-THE West End Tigers"
"The Endion Giants" The Lakeside
Demons" and last, but not least, 1.-THE
Sluggers." "The sluggers" may come
from any part of the city. In fact they
generally come from all parts, for it is
the most popular of all the names, and
the locality can be easily prefixed. To
be captain of a team of "Sluggers" is
all the heaven the average boy wants
here below.
Any dissertation on the corner lot
team would be incomplete without
mention of the empire" This gentle
man with the perverted mind and I'M
derhand methods is the bugbear that
always stands between the corner lot
team and victory. With never failing
regularity he beats one or the other
of the two teams out of the coveted
honor, and. with a rotten" decision
at a critical moment dashes the hopes
of one of the mines, and hands to the
other the palm Of victory.
Such are the corner lot teams, and
they will be busy from now until Sep
TENDER.