The Newark star and Newark advertiser. [volume] (Newark, N.J.) 1909-1909, 1909-07-23
MISS REAL
PART OF BASEBALL

1t is seldom that spectators at any
game get a glimpse of the brain work
behind the movements of the players
and even to hardened fans the game
looks haphazard, says Hugh Fullerton
in the American Magazine. They criti-
else because they do not understand
They see only the individual, what he
does, where the ball is hit, or caught,
or thrown, and the intent and purpose
of it all is lost, without thinking how
much thought may have been wasted
on the play that the individual at
tempted TO carry out, or how well
planned the game may have been.
They imagine. most of them, that the
players are individuals who walk to the
plate. hit or miss the ball, make a. safe
nit or go out, and they do not know
that behind the way the man hits, be
hind the movements of the base run
ner, behind the position the men take,
are hidden a code of signals. and a series
OF orders to be obeyed without question,
Tor the general good.
Ihey scarcely imagine that games are
planned before they are started. or that
as soon as a pitcher is named the man
ager and his advisers map out a scheme
OF action and plan an attack upon the
weakest point of the opposing team.
They do not realize that rs soon as
M~arquard, of New York, or Pfeister, of
Chicago, is named to pitch the opposing
manager orders a bunting game. or thai
weak arm or to throw badly, or a pitcher
who does not watch base runners care
fully is elected to perform battery duty
for the day the opposing manager signals
steal. " steal "steal,' to every fast
man who reaches a base.
Listen to a coacher, Doc Marshall,
first base, running up and down, paving
the, dirt, acting like a mailman. and
perhaps one not deeply versed in the
game imagines he is trying to rattle
men to greater efforts. A hundred of the
words or phrases he uses may near
nothing, but somewhere among them the
which tells him Marshall has seen a sig.
nal for a fast ball, flashed the batter a
signal to hit and is warning the runner
to start as soon as the bali is pitched
Or he may catch, now were at EN-
and leap forward to save himself from
being, forced when the batter hunts a
sacrifice.
game; the brain work, the generalshiL
of baseball is hidden under those coops
behind first and third base where the
masters of baseball use fingers. eyes,
and senseless words. all of which are in
the code, to direct their wonderful pup-
pets. The public never gets a chance tc
md out what is behind all the running
and throwing and batting unless some.
one tells and then it is impossible to tel
even the half.
One knows that when he sees Chance
raise his hat. a double steal is to be
attempted, that if he raises four fingers
the. batter is to be given a base or
balls. One knows when Billy MURRAY
changes places with the man next tt
him on the bench he is ordering his
players to hit and run. One knows thai
when a Chicngo coacher uses the giver
name of the base runner the given name
is part of that code. One knows tina
when Doe Marshall yells, that's get.
ting them" that getting" is the catcf
word, and that when Hughie Jennings
pulls grass with his right hand he means
one thing. with his left another. and one
can hear behind Grifith's watch his
foot, an order to steal. But no ono
knows it all.