Omaha daily bee., 1916-12-24
Judgments

will be the cashier. jack mas sisheu
the champion to !. set OF articles py
which Willard agrees to meet any,
one Curley may select for the sum OF
$4,000 il there are any higher bid !
ders Curley holds the option to boost
the price. But Curley won't stage I
the match. He isn't going to give !,
Willard any 100000 Far be it from |
such. The contract with Curley is
to be used to whipsaw promoters into |
giving the champion $oo,O0o tor
fight. There is little likelihood that |
any fight promoter would otter Will
lard $4,000, even though the cham
pion set that price. But by using |
the Curley contract Willard and his !
flock of managers can whipsaw the !
promoters into giving such a fabu-
lous sum. 1t will be remembered
= there was grea. competition among D.,
promoters g. the Willard-Moran
match. Bid and bid was made. When
Tex Richard hit $45,0OO the bidding
stopped. Half of those bids-maybe
all except Rickard's-were converse
ton, but. they served the purpose OF !
making Rickard put up the record
breaking bundle of coin. Curleys |
contract is suspicious OF the same
stuff You have got to hand it to
J. Willard & Co., Ltd, they pull the +,
frenzied finance that makes the war
bride SPECTATORS on Wall street look
like bunch of bush league pertor-
mers from the uncultivated brush
If base ball magnates are so eager |
to curtail the advantage the pitcher
has over the batter so as to introduce
more solid hitting in ball games, why |
not turn little attention to the spit |
4 ball: The twirler hai an advantage |
over the batter even without the
aid of artificial methods such as the
spit ball must be qualified. In addi-
ton the spit ball has been known
to ruin the arm of many good pitch
er; Ed Walsh and Jack Chesbro are
two examples. And the wet ball
causes helders to make many wild
throws. The catcher also has his
troubles with the moist pill because
a pitcher finds it hard to control the
break of the curve. A spit ball pitch
er isn't a truly great pitcher; such
sterling hurlers as Johnson, Alexan-
der, Mathewson, Wood, Rucker, ct
al, never used the saliva, and there's
no reason why the spit ball shouldn't
be barred as was the emery ball.
A short time ago Willie Hoppe and
George Sutton tangled in series of
billiard matches at St. Louis. No
mention Of the matches was made at
all in much of the press of the coun-
try, while the remainder devoted but
scant half dozen lines to the result,
And men connected with billiards |
wonder why. The answer is simple.
Professional billiardists have so re-
duced the game to a commercial busi-
ness means of making more than
a comfortable livelihood, that interest
has died. There's more commercial
ism in billiards than in any other
sport. Billiards is great game, too,
millions play it and like it, but they
don't like the methods of its leading
exponents.
Some day Al Tearney is going to
get somewhere. Al is the president
of the Ill league and the firebrand
of the minors. For years now Tear
ney has been agitating radical re-
form He has been showed under,
steam-rollered, knocked cold and al
most wiped out, but every year he
comes back for more. Some day
couple of more frebrands of the Tear
ney type are going to find their way
into minor league councils, and when
thev do and Al gets. little help the
fur is going to fly and some merry
jousts are going to occur. And the
minors are going to get some place.
The National Trotting Association
fears that automobile racing threatens
to wipe out light harness racing. The
horsemen are unnecessarily alarmed.
Automobile racing is big town sport,
Only a few races can be held each
year. And the country is plentifully
filled with speedways, no more are
likely to be built The gasoline
speedsters won't invade any more
territory and only in one or two cities
do they now compete with the horse |
tracks. There's plenty of room for
both.
The National Lawn Tennis associa-
ton is trying to draw line of de- |
markation between the amateur and |
professional and the executive com-
mittee has drawn up an evasive sort
of law for this purpose. If the tennis
men don't exercise little care they'll
get mixed up in the same kind of
a broil that the United States Coli
association did, and then look out
for the war.
President Allen of Little Rock, in
the Southern league, seems to be an
, other man in base ball is figuring re-
trenchment to the feather edge AL
len wants to tear loose. He wants |
the schedule extended and the player
and salary limits boosted. Either
Allen wants to lose more money or
he figures base ball is going to come
back with lot of noise next year.
Bill James, who once hurled the |
Boston Braves to worlds champion
ship, thinks he can comeback. Bills |
arm it will be remembered, went
back on him after that memorable |
series of 1914 Now James says the
old soup bone is itself again. It's
a tough job to convince EN- that
they're through.
President Navin of Detroit attrib-
utes the precarious condition OF
minor league base ball to motoring.