Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1906-05-06
DistiIIsry at Roxbury, Washington Co., Md.
ESTABLISHED 1885,

and of no particular instance or town-by
roasting any player or players on ball
team. If player Is really incompetent,
the roasting of the home fans is not neces-
sarily going TO hasten the day of his
canning The hackers of a ball club are
pretty well able to see whether a player
Is going TO do or not, and they're not
going to hang on to a grossly incompetent
player. If. on the other hand, the roasted
player is really an able man who for some
reason or other is merely suffering from
lapse In his playing power, nothing
earth that l could ever dope out is to be
gained by getting after him from bleachers
and grand stand That sort of thing only
makes the mans playing worse. 1t taps
his nerve completely.
when a ball player Is going badly and
making bad breaks IN a row, he knows 1t
all rlght-never make any mistake about
that. His laundering may make the fans
sore, but 1t is to be remembered that they
can't suffer one-thousandth part as much
over his punk playing as he does himself.
He's the real victim, the actual Patsy. He
has the cankering consciousness that his
work has been miserable, and, IL he has
any sort of sensitiveness about him at all
and most ball players are even fne-ladyfshly
sensitive as to their own work-that con-
seriousness is going to make him hollow
eyed and haggard and tell savagely
against his physical condition. He doesn't
need the derisiye jeers and the hoarse
hootings Of the fans to inform him that his
work has been away to the punk; but when
he gets that sore of thing heaped up on
his own nervous consciousness that he's
played the game like a one-armed man
engaged in the exercise of bean-bag, he's
well on his way to the discard or the BOBBY
hatch and no mistake. The ball player
who makes a hash of his days work feels
just about like a man who has attempted to
make a speech, only to stammer at the
first word and then fall down completely,
would be likely to<feel. He feels as If
somebody's caught him in the act OF pick
Ing pocket, and no abuse that can pos
sibly be heaped upon him by the home fans
can give him a more acute perception of
his own temporary unworthiness. But the
roasting of the home fans can, and does,
drive the spike in all the deeper, and I've
seen that sort of thing utterly ruin some
coming ball players. The corners are the
fellows who are especially sensitive about
the roasting of the home fans. They
haven't arrived yet, and they know 1t, and
that's why the bolo Of the home fans wit
carves them so deep. The oldtimers who We
been through their fine days and their off
DAYS don't let the goad dig them so hard.
because they know by experience that It's
all part of the little old game of round
ers or one-oId-cat, and that they're just
as likely to be aces up tomorrow as not
Fine theorizing OF mine, all this, but
what's the use? We're not living in Para
disc just yet, but that's just about where
we will be living when the fans forget TO
hand it cut to the ball players who faI 10
show them. Human nature is human ma
ture all over a ball yard, from the boys
who pay their way in TO the boys who are
paid to play And I've lived long enough
to find out for myself that there are
whole lot of dents and cracks in human
nature that could profitably be ironed out,
but probably never Will be. I. L. Z.