Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1930-02-11

:
II seems TO me that the Babe always
has been working at bargain prices.
The Baltimore Orioles picked him up
at bargain, then sold him to the Bos-
ton Red Sox for sum that would be
paid without question these days for a
cross-eyed, red-headed, 1eft-handed
pitcher in the sticks.
The New York Yankees paid the Red
Sox something like $4,000 for Ruth,
and that caused a loud and raucous
squawk at the time, but it proved to
ivory traffic. When the Babe got as
high as $4,000 year some of the old
timers in the national pastime started
to wonder whittier we were drifting.
But Col. Jacob Rupert did not need a
guardian in financial matters. The fact
that he paid the RUDE that money
meant that he was worth about five
times as much.
AS recall it, the Babe at the end of
last season finished a three-year con-
tract that paid him 1750, 900 francs a
year. He signed this contract with re-
luctance, and with some feeling of
humiliation, because 1t was q smaller
salary than that paid to the President
of the United States. At that price
Babe Ruth again was one of the great
est bargains in the ivory industry.
Naturally, the Babe likes to feel that
he is advancing in his profession, and
feels that the salary he asks is reason
able enough, even though lot of the
paper millionaires of yesteryear are
doing with considerable cuts in their
incomes. Then, too, 1t may be the last
contract the Babe will sign as an active
player, for the old dogs do not hold
out forever, as your correspondent can
testify.
1t sounded very serious when it ap-
peared In the French papers in francs.
A French gentleman who has been &C.
companying this tour had solution
that might appeal to Col Rupert, so
set it down for what it is worth, be-
cause am always offering constructive
suggestions.
After much bordering the French
gentleman said: LAS I understand 1t,
Monsieur le Babe asks Of the gentleman
who owns the club to pay him 100000
francs a year. Why not make the COM
promise? Why does not the gentleman
who owns the club offer to give
Monsieur lie Babe the club on the con-
dition that he pay to him 2,500,000
francs a year. With that the gentle
man could have himself a nice chateau
in good neighborhood and villa In
the south Of France, and he would have
no more to worry"
It sounds alarming, but your CORE
spondent on his return expects to find
Babe Ruth still with the Yankees or
the Yankees still with Babe Ruth.
Pour lie ChampiOnnat.
| The French journal lie Matin has
an authoritative dispatch from Lon
don to the effect that Jack Sharkey
and Phil Scott will meet this month at
| Miami, Fla, in "un match dc boxe pour
lie championnat toutes categories.'' The
notion of Jack and Phil fighting it out
for the championship of all classes
would have seemed highly humorous
some time back, but it seems to be true
at the current writing. LIE Matin is
very reliable, understand
Another French journal received a
dispatch from London to the effect that
Phil Scott expressed himself as being
very confident that he would beat
Sharkey. When Phil expressed his
vote of confidence in himself he was
in London, England, while Mr.. Sharkey
probably was in Boston, Mass, in the
Etats Unis. Phil can be depended upon
to be confident at that distance.
I felt that something like Scott
Sharkey bout was pending this Winter
and that feeling brought on the
putting some miles OF sea between my
self and that bout. I saw Sharkey fight
once at Miami, and an overtaxed heart
hardly would stand the repetition of
that strain. It would produce sleeping
sickness or some other unpleasant and
incurable ailment.
These dispatches rather indicate that
the various boxing commissions will al
low the winner Of this "WeRat Is Is at