Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1919-01-26


dim distant past. So much has been
that 1 wanted to be satisfied in my o
three men, whom I believe eminently
Last summer when the opportunit
over with that once great star. Willie
coupons off his bonds, and collecting 7
apartments. I sought an expression {
nings of Detroit. in his day one of the
wise, / interviewed Kid Gleason, a b
ago. and recently appointed manager
of stars all played with the old school,
With the modern players in some capa
All three, without the slightest hest
tation. expressed the opinion that the
game had made rapid strides forward
in the last twenty years. They ad-
mitted that the brand of ball played
was considerably faster. All were
unanimous in the belief that pitching
as whole was much more difficult to
was In the past The reason given
was that each major league club in
these modern days had three or four
high-class pitchers. while in the old
days a club that had rnore than one
real classy boxman was indeed ex-
tremely lucky. To illustrate the
point I am trying to make. 1 will sum
UP what both Keller and Jennings.
who were with Baltimore when that
club was winning pennants, had to
say on the subject of reforms in
pitching:
Back twenty-five years ago when
we were winning remnants with the
then famous Baltimore Orioles. we
had only one really high-class pitch
er, Sadie Mcmahon. We had Hawke.
Gleason, Esper and Hemming at the
time, but Mcmahon was our mainstay.
1t was the same with all other clubs
In about one out of every three
games batter was forced to face
the finest of pitching; on the other
days it would be just ordinary. That
of course. made for higher batting
averages. In the big leagues today,
instead of carrying five pitchers. a
good many clubs carry ten. Usually
four OF five of the pitchers are stars,
the others second-string men. 1t is
average facing high-class pitching
every day than to see it only every
third day"
Therefore, If you would take the
word of Messrs. Jennings. Gleason
and Keller. who. to my way of think
der an opinion, the pitching as a
whole is much better today than it
was in the past
Rusie the Equal of johnson.
What pitcher in the last. twenty
ffve years had the most stuff on the
ball? That question brought about
some difference of opinion. Keller.
who faced in his day as player
two of the admittedly fastest pitchers
in the history of the game, Amos
of nj Uyo1 T@I
leaned toward Rusie as having bit
the more stuff. He insisted that the
curve ball of Rusie, which carried
almost as much speed as the fast
ball. was harder to hit than John
sons hook. According to Keller.
curve, but it broke sharply right in
front of the batter. and was usually
perfectly controlled. Kid Gleason
was inclined to believe that Cy Young
was about the last word, when con-
sidering natural ability. According
to Gleason. the way Young could
skim that fast ball of his under your
chin made you lose any desire you
might have had to crowd the plate.
Hughey Jennings. while admitting
that Rusie had a fast-breaking curve
and terrific speed. said that Walter
Johnson, when he cuts them loose,
puts as much. if not a little more
stun on the BAH than did Rusie. Jen-
nings also remarked that. because
Rusie was up over the head with
his delivery most of the time, his
ball was much easier to follow than
that of Johnson. who is side-arming
you practically all the time.
When it came to considering first
basemen. the vote was unanimous in
favor of Hal Chase. All three paid
their respects to Fred Tenney, Tom
Tucker, Frank Chance, Dan Brouth-
ers. Pat Tebeau, Stuffy McInnis. and
Jake Daubert, but to each one Hal
Chase stood out as the last word in
the art Of first basing.
In selecting Chase the trio received
my approval, because to me 1T has
always seemed that no human being
other than Chase could possibly pull
the remarkable plays I have seen him
make around first base. Chase was
enc of the first guardians of the in
itial sack to come in close on an in
tended hunt. and instead of being
satisfied with getting the batsman at
first. Chase was getting them at sec
and and third with such great fire.
auency that clubs did not look on the
sacrifice with much favor when Chase
was playing first base. In a great
many cases Chase was thinking a
fraction of a second-ahead of the rest
of his infield, and veTs7 often he would