Norwich bulletin., 1915-01-15
GAME BEST DRAWING
 CARD IN BASEBALL
Fans Have Their Idols But the Games
 the Thing Not the Players.


 Who is the best drawing card in baseball? The question is heard often enough and never fails to start an argument but there is only one an sWer-the winner. The American army of baseball fans has it's idols, rlatoons | of them, and there is not a major league player in the land who has not his array of admirers, ranging i'll num- Der all the way from millions down to a few friends
 The late George E. Waddell. world famous al5 'Rube," had perhaps as great a personal following as any ball. player of modern times on account of his marked cccentricitieS. which were widely advertised. When Waddeu was l in his prime it was only necessary to announce that he was expected to ritch to draw hundreds of fans who would not otherwise have gone to that particular game. Tyrus Raymond Gu1b has drawn a good many thousand spectators to ball games during his major leagne career just to see him. He is another eccentric individual al- though of different personality and temperament
 A great Emany Americans not to mention foreigners-have gone to games to see Christy Mathewson. or | Walter Johnson pitch. There is noth- | ing eccentric about eitheR of them per- i sonally, but thousands proba bly have 1 paid coin hopingto see Matty's famous i 'fadeaway'' in action (and not one in a thousand of them knew when they saw iD. Other thousands have grati- | fled their curiosity regarding Johnson'S speed, only to be disappointed because l theys could see the balls he delivered, | having gained the idea they were as 1 invisible as Mauser bullets.
 l Nobody knows how many people 1 have gone to ball yards to see Frank i Baker knock home runs and felt like demanding their money back because he did not get to first base. Bakers 1 phlegmatiC personality never drew d l cent at the gate. Heine Zimmerman is another eccentric. however, who has 1 attracted fans just to watch him per- form antics. That was before he be- | gan to kick himself out of the picture so often that he was able to give his admirers only half a performance in 1 an afternoon
 This is no attempt to catalogue. and classify all the public idols of the | decade or even of the day. Only few samples have been given to point the argument-which is that the ball play CT himself is comparatively small factor in the aggregate baseball at tendance for a season.
 Tn the closing years of his checkered career RUbe Waddell was not d great | drawing card, because his cccentrici- ties no lonser appealed to the fans ! after he lost the strength and peculiar
 
 pitcher. If Cobb went to Chicago as center fielder of the tail team of the Georgia State league all his nation wide reputation would not i1 itself draw thousand people to COmiskey park. He might attract 999 curious persons if he beat up a butcher or a hotel Watchman the night before and the papers advertised it.
 MatheWsOn is not nearly the drawing card he was ten years ago, partly be-
 
 have seen him: but more because his masterly pitching no longer is as effective as it was. Walter Johnson's falIn- off after the middle of last sea- son reduced his value as a turnstiIe clicking magnet appreciably
 i The reason for the foregoing is that the American public dearly loves C 1 winner and deSpiSeS q loser when il dCes not compromise bY sYmpat hizins 2 with one. This is particularly true ii baseball which depends for it's exist | ence so much on civic pride. The onll
 other thing the baseball rooter loves
 anywhere nearly as much as q winner
 is young phenom, but that is another
 story yet
 one ball player who probably is re- sponSible for as many revolutions o the tulnStlle in a comparatively ShOr1 time as any person living prObably drew fewer people to the games thaI 1 amoSt anyone else by his persOnalit! l alone. That player was Fielder Jones and his drawing power was exercised
 as manager of the White SoX rather than as an outheIder. In the opinion 7 of the men who kRow baseball iron , the inside out there have been few outtielders the equal of Jones. bu comparatively few spectators evel realized it because so much Of hi ) ouUfielding was done within the COT } fines of his skull and so little of i consisted of exhibitions of sPectacula