Evening star., 1921-09-13

In the same period the Giants won
four games from Brooklyn and lost
one to them, and won one from Bos-
ton and lost three. That gave them
base ball by any means. but look at
the difference between that and what
Pittsburgh has done.
Bucs Flunk Horribly.
The Buccaneers flunked horribly to
the western teams. against which they
had been very strong all of the sea-
son. 1t was bad enough to lose to st.
Louis, but might have been accepted
with good grace in view of the fact
that st. Louis has outplayed every
thing in the National League recent
ly. but to break even with Cincinnati
and Chicago, both of which were
teams that Pittsburgh had beaten.
and should beat if the chamulonshlp
pcnnant was to be flung to the Pitts
The foozle of Brooklyn to the
Giants was quite as unexpected as
the success of the Bostons over New
York. The latter had been pie for the
Giants most of the year, while Brook-
lyn had been hard nut to crack, ana
season came the Giants ran away
from their over-river rivals by hit
ting their pitchers hard and timely.
while Brooklyn played dumb base
ball.
Tnus it will be noted that Pitts
burgh has been losing to weakness
and New York has been winning from
strength. Draw your own conclusion
as to what that means in champion
shin race. If continued 1t can have
but one conclusion.
Pirates Weaker With Stick.
There is yet another reason why
Pittsburgh is not cracking out the
runs that the Giants are making. 1t
lies in the batting. Young. with .33S;
Frlsch, .335; Meusel. .329: Bancroft,
1920; Burns. 800, and Kelly, 400, are
in the game every day. with COM
bined batting average of 1920.
The Pirates haven't six men who
are In every day and hitting .3oo OF
.349. who is not playing regularly;
Robertson, $3.50, who has not played s
regularly; Sigbee, 1922; Carey. .S07;
Maranville, 1902. and Tierney. who has
not played daily, 300. That Is d d
combined average of .31S. and II
low that if Cutshaw were taken out
and a hitter below 300 were supstl-
tuted for him.
Base ball games cannot be won
without runs, no matter how wen
pitchers defend, and the lack of runs
tells why the Pittsburghs have run
down, the percentage gamut until
they have only a fraction over S00
as opposed to a margin which should
have carried them to one of the
easiest National League pennants
that had been won in recent years.
Cooper's Failure Hurts.
A16ther fact which has probably
tended to weaken the morale OF tne
team is :he loss of games IN Wnlcn
Cooper pitches Whether or not ne
is persona lily responsible for the loss
has little to do with the erect Inat
their loss has on the team. iney
have been accustomed to figure MIN
as a winner, and too many recent
defeats have upset their reliance IN
him.
Broadly speaking, it says little Tor
the quality Of base ball In the Ma
tional League that two teams, neltner
of which can play base ball much
better than average, and one OF which
can't play that well, are coming down
to the finish of the race as the con-
tenders for the pennant. Both OF them
should be able to fight the second
division to q standstill, and one OF
them has lost all it's fight appa-
rently, while the other, by Ns vic
tories over Brooklyn, has established
self-confidence. It is just possible
that the game Of Saturday. Septem-
Der 10, in which the Giants won from
Brooklyn and defeated Grimes, per-
hans the best pitcher in the National