The Birmingham age-herald., 1924-12-19
ENORM is desirable but not entirely

necessary. Form appeals to the
 artistic sense. It is the correct model for play, the perfect style. But some of the greatest athletes have been ,fmost entirely lacking in form.
 The subject of form is much dis cussed. Golf is responsible. Before golf became popular there was little mention of form. Now we get long dissertations on the subject in every sport. As re- suit too much stress Is being put upon it.
 Rabbit" Maranville was great field ing shortstop, but his style was not correct. Maranvilles habit of cupping his hands and pressing them against his chest to catch a fly ball was the nntithesis of form, but Maranville drop ped less fly balls than any shortstop of his time. Although his method vio- lated all dictates of fielding form it was still the best for Maranville.
 When Ty Cobb made his debut he had batting style that was strictly in opposition to the model style in vogue at that time, but there are not many that will find fault with Cobb's lifetime batting average, He may have lacked the accepted form, but he created the best batting record of any player in history.
 Honus Wagner's fielding was some distance from what could be called good form, but his equal as shortstop has not been seen. Track and field athletics, football, rowing, swimming, tennis and golf have oil produced champions whose style of play was lacking in form. They could never have gained supremacy had some one changed their style. They did their work in the manner that proved easiest for them. They were better while lack ing form than some of their rivals who lad perfect or near perfect form.
 Not that form is to be ignored. It is the thing for the novice. The begin ner should try to acquire 1t. For the beginner form is the short cut to sue cess.
 But many men that engage in sport are self-taught, They did not have the advantage of proper instruction. That is true chiefly in baseball. The self-taught who have proper form are men that mad natural ability, but of these there are comparatively few.
 To take self-taught man and at tempt 10 change his style has often proved disastrous. He is too deeply schooled in his ways. The self-taught man will do a great deal better in most instances by doing a thing the wrong way than he could possibly do by trying to change to proper form.
 
 Baseball managers have seriously in- terfered with players by trying to change their style.
 In recent years there was one big leaguer who had certain ideas on pitch ,rg. He had conceived what he regarded as proper form. There were IA pitchers on his staff and he tried to make every man pitch according to the form he illu- strated. Here were IA pitchers all try ing to pitch exactly the same way. And the manager could not understand why they were not winning games.
 We doubt whether there is a major league pitching staff that has two men pitching exactly the same way. Each pitches according to his physical abili- ties and peculiarities.
 It wuold be splendid to have every pitcher use the style of Grover Cleve- land Alexander or Walter Johnson. They have perfect pitching form or as nearly perfect as you will see. But what other pitchers can pitch exactly as Johnson and Alexander pitch Not many.
 Carl Mays is winning pitcher through the use of his underhand de livery. He wuold be a losing pitcher if he tried to pitch like Johnson and Johnson could not win if he tried to pitch like Mays.
 It is much the same story with bat ters. Managers often try to change the style of their batters. We have seen managers try this with men batting 900 and better. The result has been the same in nearly every instance. The bat ters went into a slump. Some never came out.
 One would think that a man batting 300 or better should be left alone, but some managers place form above everything with the result that they lose what would otherwise be capable batsnen.
 Heinie Groh used to have fine bat ting form. He slumped. Finally he murdered" form ever since. John J.. adopted the most unorthodox style that any man has ever used in the jors. It was contary to all accepted form. Groh got out of the slump and he has McGraw did not try to change his ostyle. "As long as he is getting hits he