The Birmingham age-herald., 1924-01-06
By HANS WAGNER

In selecting Walter Johnson, Christy Mathewson, Grover Cleve- land Alexander, Cy Young and Rube Waddell as the five greatest pitchers of all time I have the following reasons:
 Walter Johnson deserves extra credit for the fact that he has lasted longer than any other pitcher that recall, excepting Cy Young. They thought Johnson's terrific speed would wear him down. But it didn't. Johnson was smart enough to see | that also, and as soon as he felt the strain he shifted to other forms of pitching and saved that wonderful arm. It is still good.
 Johnson had terrific speed and quick breaking curves when he broke into the league That alone pulled him through until he began to study the art of his job. Being an intelli- | gent fellow Johnson soon got on to ] all the tricks of pitching and de- | vcloped a marvellous control which | enabled him to mix them up. Johnson has the longest pitching arm in baseball. think it Is even dell. He has such tremendous ! reach that the batters used to say 1 they were afraid of swinging hard for fear of hitting him on the fingers when he was turning loose his fast one. That. of course, was just base ball joshing. you know what I mean
 Johnson was always in shape and Is l just as crazy to win now as when he | started. He knows the game thor oughly and is a. good hitter and a l fair fielder. Often he goes in as a 1 pinch hitter. Johnson Is of such even l disposition and so eager to give his best to the club that he is easy to handle.
 Christy Mathewson, in many ways, was the smartest pitcher that ever | walked on diamond. He had a pe- culiar trick of being able to read the other fellows mind, 1t seemed like. That is why he is such great checker and bridge player. I've seen him play against eight checker players at the same time and win all the games. To do that, you know. fellow has got to have a great memory. Do you think you could re- ferent checker boards at the same time and then call out your move on each board? I'll tell the world this Dutchman couldn't,
 | Five Hits And Then No More.
 Mathewson pitched baseball just like he played checkers. He knew | every weakness of every batter in the league. If 1t was a new man he found 1t out in about Is minutes. Poor Eddie Grant used to tell about getting five hits off Matty the first time he ever faced him and then didn't get another for the rest of the season. A lot of boys had that experience.
 Mathewson had q great fast ball with a jump on 1t. He had medium speed-not the tremendous smoke of Johnson and waddell. Then he had a good slow ball, his famous fade away. a drop ball. ordinary curve and the spitball. I never saw him use the spitball often, but he had it when he wanted to turn 1t loose That boy never overlooked anything
 His greatest assent. though. was his perfect control. He delivered every pitch with exactly the same move
 ment. To outguess him was i'm possible.
 Mathewson always saved himself by letting his fielders do most of the work. He let them know what he would pitch and they could set them-
 selves accordingly. He watched the bases very closely and was a wonder when it came to guessing what the l other side intended to do.
 Matty would go along in an easy way until his opponents got men or