The Birmingham age-herald., 1922-03-05
PLAYERS CLAIM
 TRAINING SEASON
 IS VEROPLAYED
Too Much Time Spent in Travelling Around, Is
 the Claim
By GEORGE CHADWICK Special Correspondent of The Age-Herald (CopyriEht, 1929, by The Age-Herald)

Copyright, 1929, by The Age-Herald)
 New York, March 4.-Some club owners and some ball players are at last agreed about one thing. They feel that the spring training season is being overplayed.
 "Ies getting too much like doU- bIe season. said one club owner to- day, in talking to another magnate. First we have spring season, which is played in the south. Then we have a summer season, which is played in the north, and we would have had a worlds series season if we had not put the brakes on at the last joint meeting of the major leaguers. Hope we'll have a big season and paci- fication one of these days, playing half the year on one side of the con tinent and half on the other side. our California friends could have their major leagues under those conditions and be right in the swim with the rest of us.
 Don't Get Enough Work
 The players don't get enough work in an actual training camp. We take them down south to timber up and get rid of their fat, for some Of them turn up as big as hogs. We keep them a few days al the camp and then hustle them to the road. Their hours are irregular and they sleep al they can. Travelling in Pullman is, not what you would call rough exer- else. Instead of getting into condi- ton they fatten up again and get sluggish. By the time they reach the north for the regular season you wouldn't know some of them had ever been in training camps.
 50 many exhibition games are ar ranged that the teams cross each others trails like bands of Indians. Those games are not good practice but they are exhibitions, all right. If some of them were not labeled base ball they might go for any thing else. The thing has been overdone. Four or five clubs have picked the same route to come north this year and I'll bet half the clubs that play exhibition games won't make enough to pay for their hoe contract.
 If we want real training we should keen our teams in the camps we se lect and stay there and work like real baseball men striving to get lit until 1t is time to start north and begin the regular season"
 Players Growing
 The players have done lot of growing about the preseason work. They insist that the regular season begins about March 10 instead of April Is. They're putting another month on us without extra pay for it." said one athlete today Players contend that the actual work of get ting into condition could be done in a fortnight if everybody really was in earnest. That would mean half a week to get to the camp. two weeks of hard work on the ball field and another half week to get home with the arrival scheduled within 4s hours of the opening of the season. Then would come a dash right into the thick of the flight with a whoop and a hurrah. with no one knowing much about the relative strength of the teams and the fans feverish with in terest.
 Instead, the players insist, the edge of the interest has all been worked off because the fans have been reading so much about present play that they refuse to get interested until some thing sensational shows up. Every team in each league holds the New York clubs responsible for the pro longed training season. The other owners say that if they could get the two New York spend -thrifts-that's what they call them-to curtail their spring training trips, they could do likewise and save some money.
 Can't Train In Pullman
 One of the players of the Giants was growing this winter, We don't play 154 games any more" he said. We play 174. You can't tell me you can train in Pullman car. I've been through it and I know"
 Perhaps riding in Pullman has it's drawbacks. but the other side of the question Is how the ball players would really train If they were not taken south and carted around the country in an attempt to get them so they can play real ball on the opening day After all, the thing resolves itself into an attempt on the part of the management to put on just as good a show as possible on opening day. r the fans saw a lot of shoulder bound and shin anchored men trying to play ball they wouldn't go back to the n rk