The Salt Lake herald. [volume] (Salt Lake City [Utah]) 1870-1909, 1907-08-11
BIG SUMS PAID
FOR BASEBALLS
Average League Team Uses
from Twenty to Sixty Dozen
Every Season.

1t probably never has occurred to
you as you sat on the bleachers or
grandstands that an enormous amount
of baseballs are used every season by
the league clubs, college mines and in
dependent clubs. Some expert out
west ventured to guess that 10000 nice
white balls were sent to their doom in
one season by the sixteen clubs of
the American and National leagues.
No one has attempted to guess how
many all the other mines throughout
the country use in one season, and
nothing but a guess could be secured
by him who scouts for the statistics.
But for those who want to get half an
idea" it may be stated that any league
club, major or minor, uses from TWEEN
ty to sixty dozen balls in one season.
The majors use more than the minors,
but he is certainly a manager for
small details who could tell you the
exact number of balls which his club
uses in one campaign. The manager
buys his balls much cheaper than YOU
think he does, and he will probably
figure by the dozen when he takes
the census of his supply of ammuni-
ton. His unit is a dozen and, though
he is not tossing the globes at the
sparrows, he'll be satisfied if he knows
that he has so many dozen on hand,
says a writer in the Springfield Re-
publican.
In the Connecticut league about
twenty dozen a season is the average
amount which a club manages to use,
though some of the teams may use
even twenty-five or thirty dozen, de-
pending probably in part on the
amount of friends who seek souvenirs
from the managers. The league adopt
ed a rule recently requiring the home
team to furnish the umpire with three
immaculate spheres and three second
hand ones in good condition at the
beginning of every game. But the
fact that these must be three new balls
on hand at a certain park three or
four times a week will not lead you
anywhere if you attempt to figure
from this the amount used up. 1t
takes more than one game to put a
ball out of commission. Still, there
are times when the round things wing
away from the home coop. Then balls
are lost vaulting over fences and 101
other ways, and the fact is that the
general consumption is very large.
The average amount secured by the
eight managers of the clubs for one
season varies from $50 to 200 dozen,
which is probably just half the supply
The American association has a rule
requiring sixteen new balls for every
game, and it is figured that each club
in that circuit sends fifty dozen to
the dump every year. The Western
association is credited with smashing
thirty-five dozen to each club in a
season. One who has followed the
vital statistics of the curved and
walloped figures that each one of the
American and National league club
batters from forty to fifty dozen of
baseballs out of existence in their
chases for the pennants. One man
says that the New York and Chicago
teams use sixty dozen each a season,
and places an average of nine balls
a game for every matinee on the home
grounds. American league teams are
very likely to toss out brand new am
munition when the umpire announces
a shortage. and of course this encour-
ages an increase in the population of
the ball. 1t is figured that an Eastern
league club viii get away with thirty
dozen q season, and ten to fifteen
dozen is placed as the amount for the
small league teams.
OF course, the number of baseball
mines in the land is constantly increas-