The Birmingham age-herald., 1916-03-05
Pennant Winners Before Start Never Show Any
 thing in September
PRESEASON DOPE
 NOT HIGHLY VALUED
Impossible to Pick Pennant Winner Before the Season Begins, Says Moley-Instances Show Ex-
 pected Winners Fail


 few teams in the Southern league. which up as world beaters ever showed any thing in the early part of September No? Well, it's fact.
 Consider the instances in the last few years:,
 In 1s12 Hemphill's club at Atlanta was picked by all the experts around the cir cult who indulge in that form of dissipa- ton as a dangerous contender for the pennant if they did not have the pennant already clnched. In 1912 Atlanta finished last
 The same year, New Orleans looked upon askance before tho opening of the season. had to fight tooth and toe nall to grab @ first division berth when the re- turns were all in.
 In 1913 Bill Bernhard at Memphis was giving all other managers around the cir cult sleepless nights. Memphis that year finished sixth.
 In 1914 it was Chattanooga against which the other clubs proposed to get out an injunction to keep her from grabbing the pennant without a struggle. Chatta- nooga in 1914 finished sixth.
 And 30 1t goes. It Is a matter of abso- lute impossibility to tell anything about q pitcher until you see him in action. You never know whether an outfielder is going to swat like fiend or whif like . zephyr. Time only will tell.
 Whenever I see anyone picking pen nant winner before the opening of the season." says c. Molesworth Baron pilot. and c. Molesworth Is the baseball oracle in these parts, "I do not read 1t. It is not interesting to me. I know that 1t cannot be done. Therefore it is foolish to waste time over 1t.
 T have been in the Southern league now over 10 years. and in my experience have not seen one team which was touted before the beginning of hostilties emerge without some terrible scars when the smoke of battle clears away.
 MUST SEE MEN IN ACTION
 You never can tell what your men are going to do until you get into action Take our case in 1913, for instance. Ray Boyd for us the previous year had won 25 games. In the spring of 1913 Boyd re- ported apparently in the best of condition, but in few days he developed a sore arm that stayed with him all the season. We kept carrying him along In the hopes that he would get well and kick in with the kind of pitching that we knew he could do, but he never did He was a dead weight to the team when we had counted upon him being our mainstay.
 And this is true of all clubs. I re- member back In 1912 when Charley Hemp hills Atlanta club was touted as the best that Dixie had ever seen. Of course l didn't lose any sleep over 1t because had been in baseball long enough then to know how to value such reports. But the fans went wild.
 Well, Charley's club did look bad. He had Bailey, himself and O'DelI in the outfeld; Sykes at first, Aperman al third, Howard at second and O'Brien at short. For a hurling staff he depended on Johns, Miller, Sitton and Dessau. On paper that looked pretty good, but when the time came to deliver they were not there, and every team in the league fn- ished ahead of them.
 New Orleans too looked pretty good in 1912. with Knaupp at short, Johnston at first, Bunting at third and Barr, Cal lahan and Spencer in the outfield. Bon- ner. Naples, Wagner and Gipe was as good a hurling staff as you'd want to look at on paper but they, too, flashed in the pan.
 ! BARONS SURPRISED "DOPERS"
 That was the year Birmingham won the pennant, and if I remember correct ly very little attention was paid to us before the opening of the season. Most of them rated us in the second division along about seventh place.
 Tn 1913, Bill Bernhard's second year at Memphis, he had an awful wicked looking CAuu- Cil ScCOHu ne ndu MerrltL, Bder- wald, Schwitzer and Love in the outfeld, Butler at short, Ward at third and Ab- i stein at first. Seabaugh was his first catcher and his hurling staff was liar rell kroh, Parsons and Newton. Which ought to have been good enough for any body, but it wasn't, for Memphis com pleted that season in sixth place.
 The wickedest looking club, though, on paper was Moose McCormick's Lookouts i'll 1914. That club before the opening ought to have hit anything that could have been offered in the Southern league. There was Baby Doll Jacobson, McCor- mick himself and Jimmy Johnston in the outfield. Every man was heavy hit ter and a heady ball player. For infield- CTS, COyle was on first, Balenti at short. Flick at second and Graff at third, with Gahby Street as the first string catcher For hurlers he had Harding, Turner LOrenzen and Fox, a fair to middling staff. Chattanooga that year completed the circuit in sixth place.
 50 you see preseason dope is not al- ways worth much. Let not the fans be troubled by the stories that are coming from Little Rock. You can't tell what a team is going to do until the grueling part of the season comes, and it is idle to speculate.
 "Of course, you can tell what it ought to do, but what it will do. alas! it cannot be done'