Americus times-recorder. [volume] (Americus, Ga.) 1891-current, 1910-07-03
BASE BALL SLANG
IN ALL ITS BEAUTY
Ordinary English Fails TO
Meet Games Needs.
(The Literary Digest.)


The Providence Journal says that:
Ever since baseball began, it has
had a language of it's own. The slang
that the baseball writer is accused Of
Singing so profusely have become in
separately a part of the game. 1t is
hot off the bat; it is brief and graphic.
1t tells it's story tersely and to the
point always.
There is a picturesquenes in the
line of goods handled by the baseball
writer than you don't stack up against
anywhere else in the paper. The En-
glish he uses may not be errorless
and some of it may be unintelligible
to the common herd, but it is vivid,
concise and usually coherent. And if
| remember correctly, my dear old col
lege professor was always strong for
vividness and conciseness."
The excitement and exuberance of
the game could not be conveyed in
ordinary language to the satisfaction
of the devotee.
Being picturesque and alive, he
demands that whatever is written about
the game shall have similar quail
ties. He refuses to find pleasure in
style that is used in describing a
convention, banquet, or a meeting
of the Blacksmith's Union He doesn't
care about the English of it so long
as there is life and vigor in the de-
tails that he is reading. To gain this
effect the baseball writer has laid most
of the hard-and-fast rules he learned
IN college on the back shelf and has
evolved a set Of his own that suits his
purpose as nicely as a three-bagger
fills the bill with two men on and
two runs needed to- win + Il
English that the college professor
| would 0. X. was never intended for
the sporting page, least of all the
baseball column
TO prove his point the expert pre-
serts a baseball report in language
designed to pass the censorship of the
purist
The baseball games yesterday be-
tween the teams representing the Cit
les Of Providence and Rochester, re-
spectiVely, was one Of the most ex-
citing affairs ever seen at MelrOse
Park The young men on both teams
played marvelously we'll and proved
themselves adept in every department.
AS Providence made four runs, while
its opponent was making three. it
won the game
Thanks to the ability of Mr.. Roy
Rock, the Providence short stop in
hitting the baseball, TIE men reDre-
Sentlng this city were able to get their
four runs. Mr.. Rock DISTINGUISHED
himself by hitting the ball hard m
he fifth inning with two runners on
base, sending it so far he was ena-
Died to reach third base before it was
retrieved. Needless to say, the two
runners scored
In the seventh inning also Mr.
Rock made another long hit which
| oFouSh IN two more runs. His skill
n this respect was the subject of mucn
aFofable comment on the bleachers
md IN the grand stand"
Now, for comparison, follows an ac-
count Of the same game in the vernac-
ular:
The Grays and the Hustlers slam
banged each other in the final game Of
5he series yesterday afternoon. and
The Craps ran away with the candy.
to ). Both teams uncorked the
ginger bottle at the getaway and
Sdanced through the whole perform
J ance for the snappiest work of the
| season.
ROCK was the star with the stick
The little Centerdale toed the plate
with two on in the fifth, bumped a
bender on the trademark, and ziDDnd
it 10 the fence for a triple. He en-
cored in the seventh for smashing
single, and the bleachers aeropIaned
lhelr emotions as two more tallies
tickled the scorebOard."
Now, that's something like it," com
ments the Journals expert. mo
words wasted, no attempt to give de-
tails in the roundabout way the pro-
fesor solemnly declares is correct En-
glish."
Likewise are the nieknames of base
| ball teams defended, and all the low
GUS slang of the game. Fan" is far
more effective than it's definition, "a
baseball spectator affected by enthus-
| ism. To call player "a honehead"
will make him realize his deficiencies
more completely than if one merely
implies that he is mot as intelligent
as he might be" And the term "busn
| Lacquer is more significant than the
phrase, "a young man just being
| broken into baseball"