The Birmingham age-herald., 1923-08-27
Pennant Race In Majors Exciting No Great Furry.
By wEsTBROoK PEGLER Geased Wire ito Age-HeraId)

NEW TURK, August .25.-While tennis tournaments have ragged in their mannerly way on the courts of Newport, Boston and Forest Hills this summer and cauliflowers have sprouted 40 blossoms on the printed page for every blooming In the ring, the contending ball teams of the two major leagues have pursued their schedules amid almost pastoral quiet. It may be no shock, for people sell dom nowadays drop dead in the bleachers during tight ball games, but 1t probably will be surprise to learn that the New York Giants are again involved in a late August pur- suit in the role of the pursued. The reason why people no longer expire in the bleachers may be either:
 1. That ball games aren't tight any more.
 2. That those who go to the ball yards only go to spend the afternoon and don't care any more who wins.
 But the reasons why baseball has ceased to compel the interest of many who once were -star-sport- ing-final fans, are many and far more refreshing than the big league ball business. This has been the most tumultuous, the most breath less season of amateur and profess slonal sport than ever occurred and the summers program has contained events of emphatic importance in sports which few years ago evoked Cnly the most casual interest.
 0 O O
 Much Competition.
 Golf, tennis and racing may be mentioned and prize-fighting, too, for that matter, because there was almost a decade in which the cauli- flower was born to blush unseen and waste it's rank fragrance on such dis tant places as Havana, Las Vegas and Reno. The competition from the boxing champions in New Ycrks ball yards this summer is new competi- tion which baseball owners from other cities have not been very happy to encounter.
 Even in New York, then, the fact that the Giants are in no position to loiter on their way to October will come as news to many and as brief to a few They were sent off on their way with rather formal hoo- rah early in the season, even failing to fill their stands on their opening day of the home schedule and few beside the regular clientele have con-
 
 day progress of the champions. A further reason for this apathy may be found in the early season discus sions of the major league teams wherein the pundits and statisticians agreed that the campaign of 1923 would be another steady, determined march to the world series by both the Giants and the Yankees, with the Giants perhaps a few strides ahead of their annual victims. There was no call cn New Workers to yearn for another pennant in the lee of Coo gan's corpse. The pennant was in the bag.
 Expensive Recruits.
 Even the very expensive Jimmy OConnell of San Francisco, new conner to grace the outfield of the Giants, and the likewise costly Jack Bentley of Baltimore, recruite to the pitching staff commanded nc tense interest because McGraw had benched expensive new players many times in the past and even had sold some of them off at a great discount after lingering them a few times to ascertain that they were flawed.
 O'Connell has only this week re- turned to the lineup of the Giants after a long rest on the slivers and Bentley was more than due by the time he began to win ball games. And as the Giants, now stand, they are only three games ahead of the Reds, going badly, likely to get worse before they get better and threatened from close behind by the Reds.
 This situation is familiar, however. It inspired nice attendance during the last month of 1921 and during the same period of 1922 on both of which occasions the Pirates were the threatening team. It seems to be knack of the Giants to imperial themselves late in the season and to come home by a nostril in the Ma tional league, only to turn around and whip the Yankees In the same casual manner that Jack Brltton would outpoint Luis Angelo Flrpo'