The Pacific commercial advertiser. [volume] (Honolulu, Hawaiian Islands) 1885-1921, 1907-10-15
Hard Work Is Baseball

Perhaps no question is heard oftener
at a baseball game than that OF
whether the players participating IN
the contest derive any pleasure from
their efforts. Taking their own feel
ings in regard to the game as criteri-
on. a great number of fans fail TO put
this proposition in the form Of Ques-
ton and. being crazy over the game
themselves, take it for granted that all
players of the national game would
rather play than eat. In consequence
these quite certain persons are in
clined TO be envious OF those who, in
their eyes, are getting big money for
gamboling on the green for two hours
each day, with nothing else to do but
wait for the ghost TO walk
But these offhand ones do not know
The simple fact is that perhaps
majority Of the men who have been
playing the professional game for ten
years or more become so tired OF base
ball that particularly at this waning
stage of the season they actually dread
the hour when they are TO put on their
uniforms, says the New York Sun.
In an expansive moment, not long
ago, Muggsy ,McGraw told group Of
cronies that he'd never really cared
a great deal for the game, even when
he was one of the most successful
players in the country.
THE game of ball always took too
much out of me, even back in the kid
days when I played hockey TO bat EN-
around on the lots" was his way of
putting it. THE game always hashed
nv nerves and unstrung me so that /
wasn't fit to be seen or heard for
some time even after a scrub, skinned
lot game
Clark Griffith is another of the man.
ayers who look with an expression OF
sullen surprise when the mere sug-
eestion is made that a ballplayer can
actually get any fun out Of the game.
GRIFFITH GIVES HIS OPINION.
Fun, eh?' he said TO a group down
in Atlantic City one recent Sunday
when the Yankees were playing
series with the Athletics in Philadel-
phia. Well, it's about the same kind
of fun for me as carrying the hod or
moving pianos would be, and you can
dope that out for yourself.
II can't figure out where the fans
get the idea that it's fun for ball
players to mooch out on hot, sticky,
sun-soaked lot every afternoon and
sweat and grunt around for q couple
of hours at the same old game that
most of them have been playing ever
since or before they began TO shave"
CIV Young. the veteran Boston Amer
lean pitcher, is ordinarily one Of the
most taciturn of men, but he recently
expressed himself in pretty round
terms about the fun element Of base
ball. so far as the players are con-
eerned.
I'D sooner take a pick and trot out
in the sun for couple of hours every
afternoon and chop away at asphalt.
was the way he expressed it. Il think
most OF the old-time pitchers have the
same way of feeling about it. even if
they don't bulge to the front and say
so.
DIsTAsTE OF GAME.
"A pitcher is liable to have the dis
taste Of the game grow upon him even
more than the other players. The best
pitcher
going to perform when his day to go
in and work comes around.
He may feel all right and work out
all right before the game, and yet go
in and get slaughtered in the very first
inning, and then get dragged cut and
chased to the bench with the whole
mob bowling at him. The dread OF all
this keeps a lot of pitchers awake
=1v in M
draw along.
Bill Coughlin, the captain Of the De-
troits. dweIt upon the thanklessness OF
the ballplayer's job in some observa-
tons ne gave utterance TO not long
ago.
Most Of the work Of the player he
said. is done on the road, in the
cities of the opposition. where the fans
are naturally ag'in him and disposed
TO pick on and 5eer al him at every
stage Of the route. There's no exag-
gerating the effect Of this terrible
strain
George Davis. OF the Sox, who, ae-
| cording 10 some authorities, has been
PLAYING the game ever since the Black
Hawk war, is another Of those who
| frankly admit that while habit is so
strong with him that he can't keep out
| of the harness. the game Of ball itself
! has been a drag upon him for a good
many years now.
| It's just treadmiu work, when ali :
! told" was Davis way Of putting it.
| same old thing yesterday, today. to
morrow, forever. It's like walking IN
a circle.
why do keep on playing the game
! them Wen. why does a man keep on
doing anything? Because, I suppose
t most Of Us are fellows who can on
| lust the one thing and We don't khan
! Of any way % get out" On
/ The veteran Of them all, old jim an