The Birmingham age-herald., 1923-01-05

to see me ne saw W1dC l was uOlilg Say, Mac" he said, tell me W. ballplayer, the college boy or the i from the town lots?"
 I looked up at him in downriG Ght gratitude for the suggestion. It gives me a start-a keynote that would like to sound throughout these me moirs.
 College Boy Best.
 "The college boy. of course" told him. He has at the start the very thing the less fortunate young fel- low has to acquire. He steps right in with the advantage of mental training. With the same amount of natural common sense behind him the college boy has full two years jump on the town lot boy.
 "The difference is simply this-the college boy or any one with even partially trained mind, immediately tries to find his faults; the un- schooled fellow usually tries to hide his. The moment man locates his faults he can quickly correct them. The man who thinks he is keeping his mistakes under cover will never advance a single step until he sees the light"
 That in a nutshell is the differ ence and it may explain why I have Scientifically tried to get college boys with natural ability on my many ball clubs. Usually they arrive quicker and last longer
 Never Went To College.
 Some of our greatest stars have never been to college, but that does not mean that they were better off without such training. It means that they had brains enough to see the handicap and through persistence and determination overcame it. Men of this type are Hans Wagner, Iris Speaker, Napoleon Lajoie, Delehanty -oh. lot of them. l might add that Hughey Jennings and myself also were of that type, but we were quick to see the need of what other young fellows had been given by their par ents As to how we did 1t I will tell later on.
 How the Giants Won.
 It is not my purpose to moralize, even if 1 am lat the age where men begin to get philosophical and point out things to the youngsters. In the first place, it is hard to make the youngsters listen. l do think, though that all successful endeavors in life are based on that idea of being able to find faults and of being just as quick to correct them.
 That is largely the way we won the last worlds series.
 I have been somewhat at a loss to know just what in my 30 years of baseball would be of the most inter- est. Candidly, I didn't know where to start.
 TO get a line, though, we sent out questionnaires to fifty men in differ afrNr NVN1A veteran players and some fans. We made a point of not asking too many men of expert knowledge. In these questionnaires we asked for sugges- rions as to what the public would be most interested in-what ques- tions that particular person would like to have answered.
 What They Wanted.
 The first one came in from major league umpire--a man of imagination and unders standing.
 q. They would like to know" he began. how the Giants won the worlds series."
 "2. Tell why you shifted from waiting out the Yank pitchers to swinging at the first ball? Several times you made this shift"
 In the first place, We won the worlds series because we thought we could win. Though we said nothing we took advantage of the fact that cur opponents and the public had un- der estimated the strength of our pitchers. After the end of the season I did not say one word to our players about the series until the day before it actually began. l purposely kept away from them. In the mean time f,fl1 nf q dicn1 e. eions of the weakness of our pitch CTS and of the strength of the Tank pitchers. They told of what Ruth and Meusel would do to us, and so on. This put the odds up to to with the Yanks as fayorltes. Not once did I discuss this with the men.
 What McGraw Said.
 On the day before the first game l went to the club house and had a heart to heart talk with the players. "You can beat thsee fellows, T told them. q don't think there is ques- lion about it. We have big advan tage in that they are the favorites. Not once since we started on our last drive have you pitchers failed to come through when called on, and tie rest of the team has backed you up. You can do it just as well in this series All you've got 70 do is play ball just as if you were playing a regular game in midseason. There ia no difference. The team that gets impressed with the idea that there is a difference will become self-con- scious and lose. Now, practically all Of you have played in big series and it is nothing new to you. In way vou have observed the playing of vour opponents. A lot of people have an idea that because I frequently changed pitchers in our last 20 games these pitchers were not able to stand the pace. You know better than that. We changed them for very good req sons. We'll change them in this se- ries if necessary, but l don't think if will be necessary. All I ask of won is forget about those odds-those figures merely represent the opinions Of sporting writers. Get out there and play baseball just as you have all season. I'll do the directing and if anything goes wrong I'll take the responsibility"
 Didn't Fear Ruth.
 That is all that I ever said to them.
 It might surprise many to know that. at no time did we have the Slightest fear of Ruth. There seemed to be an imnyession that I was un- familiar with the playing of Ruth and Schang. As matter of fact I knew more about Ruth. Schang and Baker than any other members of the Yankee team. My club has played in fully twenty games against Ruth.