The Washington herald., 1920-01-26
|STOVEY BEST
BASESTEALER
Stole l56 Bases in One Sea.
son-Old Timers Held
Advantage on Paths.

An old baseball fan stopped me on
the street yesterday and asked me
why didn't write a story about the
| present-day base runners and the old
| ones.
Right away I could see that he
wanted to argue why we have no Billy
Hamiltons or Hairy Stoveys so ! let
him do his little spiel.
Now this gentleman has a good
argument we must confess, but like
/ other old-timers who cannot see the
present-day ball players. he does not
stop to figure the why's.
stovey stole 4I4 Bases.
Back in 1SSs Harry Stovey stole 156
bases; this is the record for any
league. In 1887 he pilfered 143. and
in 1889 he swiped lis. making IA
| bases stolen in three years.
Then We will take John Ward.
with the New York team in 1887.
who stole Ill bases.
In 1890 Billy Hamilton comes along
with 10e steals, and the very next
season he goes that thirteen bet
ter by stealing 1l5.
As late as 1896 Big Bill I.ange. of
the Chicago club. established a rec
| ord for that club when he stole an
The above are the only players
who have stolen 1c0 or more bases
during a season in major leagues.
Not one of our present-day players
has reached the century mark.
Getting down to modern baseball.
Cobb in 1915 stole ninety-siX bases
the American League record.
/ IL Hit Over 400.
a -
bases he batted 40S. That was in
: 1887, the year every man was given
base hit every time he reached
! first base on balls. The batter that
year also had four strikes to his
credit. 1t was that season that for
, ty-one batters hit better than 400.
! The year Billy Hamilton stole i02
bases he was up among the leading
! hitters.
Now am going to try to show how
! easy 1t was in those days to steal
bases. II is a hard matter to il
: lustrate exactly how a runner got
jump on the pitcher, but to demon
strate it l will tell you under what
rules the pitcher worked those days.
We will take the pitchers in 1883.
when Stovey stole 156 bases.
I The rules that year were: The
pllCHtT DON NTeInefnDeT Iney Qlu
not pitch from a slab, like they do
now), was fifty feet from the home
plate. and they had a box. five and
one-half feet by four feet. The
( pitcher was compelled to stand in
the rear of the box when he started
to pitch. and he was then permitted
to step to the front before he let
go of the ball. That was generally
two steps. The moment he took a
step forward he could not stop to
throw to first. And with the dis
tance fifty feet instead of the pres
. ent distance sixty feet six inches the
base runner had a tremendous ad-
vantage. The pitcher had TO turn
his body halfway round in order to
look at first; now he can see that
bag by Hooking out of the corner OF
his eye.
/ Runners Held Advantage.
! In the old days he could not do
that. Then just as soon as he turned
back to pitch he was compelled to
get on the rear edge of the box. and
before he could take 4 step forward
the base runner was half way to
the base he was trying to steal.
! This was the rule Ward and Ham
: ilton did their stealing under, for
the rule was not changed until
1898, when the pitcher was moved
! back to the present distance.
! II we went back to the old rules
players like Cobb and Carey would
steal 200 bases
! l hope this answers the question
! to the satisfaction of the old-timer