Evening public ledger. [volume] (Philadelphia [Pa.]) 1914-1942, 1916-10-19
BOSTON HAS HAD
BREAKS" in ALL
WORLDS SERIES
Five Times Hub Teams Have
Been Favored by Dame
Fortune
RED SoX LUCKY IN 1908

No Boston team over has lost worlds
while Dame Fortune continues to smile so
sweetly upon the athletes from the city OF
culture and baked beans
Five times Boston has entered In the blue
ribbon event OF haseball--and fve times
mas Boston taken unto itself the FIRST prize
why Partly because those Boston clubs
nave been great ball clubs, but, oftener, II
would seem, because luck Is with Boston I;
that every time some break" comes Il
comes to favor her.
Skidding back TO 1903. when the Hub
city made its first entry in the big aftair
one finds that luck saved the Red SoS
OF that year from being beaten when it
seemed that all hope was lost.
Tho game had gone 20 the ninth inning
The SoN were three runs behind, and II
they lost that game the series went TO the
Pirates. In some way or other they got
three men on bases. and needed exactly
-FOUR runs TO win. Two men were out. The
batter rolled puny grounder TO Wagner
at short. The Flying Dutchman" picked
Il up. pulled back his arm and swung to
make the throw to first for the final out
which would give tho championship TO the
Pirates.
Unsettled Honus
But at that very second the Boston
rooters' band struck up '"Tessle." then n
new and popular song. IL doomed out the
hrst strains at the very fraction OF n second
that Wagner's arm was swinging for the
throw, and the noise so unsettled Honus
that he threw the ball into the grandstand.
permitting four runs TO score. giving the
game-and ultimately the series--to the
Sox.
In 1918 luck again was with the Sox.
They got the majority OF the breaks" all
the way In the Anal inning OF the ANAL
game, Fortune smiled again upon the Boa-
tonian battlers The Giants were in the
lead and II looked like the game and the
series for them. Up stepped a Boston bat
ter who promptly knocked the ball out In
the direction OF Fred Snodgrass. The
Giant outflelder didn't have TO move more
than three feet for a. II was one of the
easiest chances ever offered to any player
in the series. And Snodgrass made the
mum that now is history. The foozle en-
abled the Sox to rally enough to win the
game and the championship.
Hank Gowdy Lucky
II II wasn't luck. what was It that as.
sisted Hank Gowdy In that 1914 affair?
The Braves catcher never hit much beyond
$50 before that series or since Yet in that
event he was the batting demon. the boy
who belted the balls TO all portions OF the
lot who hit for extra bases almost every
time he was up. AT least a half dozen
other times I'm that series luck was with the
Braves-and the Braves went over the hur-
dies In four jumps.
In 1915 the Red Sox beat the Phnlies
four out OF five. They were n better team
perhaps. but none can deny that Il was
luck that aided them materially In their
triumph, Everything broke nicely for them
In that final game their only chance fol
victory was to pole out few homers And
they did II. But all Of their circuit swat.
were lucky ones. the balls bounding into
the bleachers. Not one was an out-of.the.
lot belt. not one would have been better thar
a two-bagger ON any other ball field.
Breaks Favored Sox
Coming now 10 this 1916 affair. one finds
that luck favored the Sox again. Even
without II they probably would have van.
quished the men OF Ebbets. but luck en-.
abled them to do It quickly, They won that
second game, the fourteeninning affair, "a
1. Yet the Dodgers should have won II
to In nine stanzas They didn't because
the Sox were lucky.
With the Dodgers one run TO the good
and man on third. Ruth bounded easily
to Cutshaw. Had Cutshaw picked up the
ball ceanly and thrown II TO the plate he
would have nipped Scott by ten feet But
Fate ruled that he should bobble. and Scott
scored the run that tied II up and prolonged
the game until the fourteenth. when Gamer
won It with long single
That was just one Instance OF several
where the breaks favored the Sox, where
the proverbial Boston luck which had saved
It's teams on four previous occasions helped
It's 1916 aggregation 60 keep untarnished
the Beantown record OF never having lost
worlds series quarrel.