Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1908-06-14
Nv Clarence L. Cullen.
H. S. oMoHUNDRo.


Base ball players may have a natura
tendency toward grouchiness and some
| of them, too, may, upon achieving great
success, become victims of what Is known
as fairness under the hat.
But the players are distinctly right in
one view which the more experienced
among them take, namely, that the ap'
plause of the multitude is a vain and an
evanescent thing.
You don't catch the old-time players
swelling so that they burst the seams
of their uniforms, when after pulling Of
fine play, they are staked to the gigan-
tic mitt by the bunch in the stand and
bleachers. Nary q swell. The veterans
know how to estimate that stuff
Quite few of them. in these inspiring
circumstances. firmly decline TO doff their
caps in response to the wild acclaim OF
the gang, Hey, snatch off your lido'
the enthusiastic ones yelp at the player
who has just done the right and the
vital thing, and If the player rigidly
declines to pull off his headgear they
set him down for a crab and Sulky Jim
and growl behind their teeth about his
lack of appreciation.
But the vets know what they're about.
They don't like to take the chance OF
being made to look like chimcanzees a
from having stuck around and watched
the thing for long years. that If they
pulled off the slightest kind of a little
boOterino only couple of minutes after
the mob had yowled for them to show
their hair, the gang would turn right
around and hate 'em with deep dark,
vindictive, vitrioic hatred; whereupon
naturally enough, player so fixed
would feel like a simian, when he re.
membered how Of he'd yielded to the
ho b,d
visor of his cap only little while before.
Nothing in this life is so tickle and
ephe as the enthusiasm of a base
ball audience. The ball player who
moOcheS along doing the right thing day
after day, week after week. spiking the
guns of the enemy at critical junctures
and helping to pole out victories when
the issue is desperate. is. of course, the
slick-haired Tommy in the view of the
gang, and they'd all fairly love to have
him drop in on 'em for supper any old
time he feels like home cooking.
But when that same player makes one
count it, just One-little bootskyoff. why
he's more different kinds of a tramp than
doors for handouts. and all the hoarse
diapason of hysterical laudation turns
to one huge rumble of razor-edged
knocks.
A little while before the Yankees started
west on their western trip 1 saw, at one
of the hillside games, an extraordinary
exempliflcation OF the way this thing
works out. The victim in this instance
was no less a stellar figure of the dia-
mond than Willie Keller
Now, everybody savvies Keller and
knows what crackerjack he has ALWAYS
been on the ball lot. Ever since he broke
into swift company he has stood at the
forefront in the ranks of the top-notch
players, and although he has been in
the game for nearly two decades now, the
best judges unite in declaring, in their
calmer moments. that he's pretty nigh as
good now as ever he was.
Keller had been out of the game for
quite a spell before this game l speak
of. owing to a badly bruised hand. He
shouldn't have played at all on this day
because his hand still was in bad shape
But nc was needed. and he hoped in
Keller made good in his garden and
with the clout stick right up to the min
ute when he had his little fall down. At
this stage of it the enemy had three men
on bases. Somebody raped hot liner
smack at Keller. who was playing in
The ball caught Wee Willie square on the
meat of the bad hand, and it was too
hot. 1t bounded out of keeler's grasp and
rolled almost down to the fence, while
the three men on the sacks picked up