The Washington times., 1930-05-10
BABE SHOWS
! HOW BREAKS
HELP TEAM
By BABE RUTH

NEW YORK, May 10.-The
longer I stick around baseball the
more I'm impressed with the
queer breaks that win and loose
ball games. Pitchers, pitching
great ball for seven or eight in
nings, suddenly lose their stuff
hitters who have been hitting like
wildfire, suddenly go into slumps.
Other hitters who ordinarily
couldn't hit one out of the infield
suddenly pound a ball out of the
lot for home run and win
ball game.
You can't explain things like
that; they just happen,
Waite Hoyt was talking about
something that happened the
other day against the White Sox
! that illustrated my point. Willie
kamm hit Waite for home run
and when Waite came back to the
bench he tossed his glove down in
disgust.
That was a perfect pitch"
he said. "It was a curve ball,
and was the best curve ball I
tossed all afternoon. BY all
the laws he never should have
touched it-and yet he pounds
1t over the wall for a homer"
The average fan in the stands
Judges pitchers work by whether
he wins or loses. Out there on the
ball field we get different slant
I've seen pitchers go out there
with all their stuff and get wal
loped out of the box in the first
inning. And then I've seen the
same pitchers come back on days
d when they didn't have thing
1 days when their curve ball was
i just wrinkle and their fast one
as straight as a string-and they
would win by shut out
The same thing goes for hitters.
I played in game the other day
in which we hit the ball and hit
hard. Of the 27 put-outs no less
than ID were made by the out
f1elders. and lot of them drives
that they had to make great plays
on to get. Yet in that game we
got only seven hits. and the other
fellows. who hit only five balls to
the outfield ali day long. came
up with nine blows and won the
ball game
You see one fellow come up and
hit the ball right on the nose to
the fence only to have some out
! fielder run out and make a great
!. one-hand stab for putout And
the next hitter comes along, tries
to duck out of the way of a wild
pitch, it hits his bat and pops over
first base for a double.
That's what they call the
breaks of the game. What I
wish some smart fellow would
figure out is some new system
of records which would give
fellow credit on things like that,
I don't know how you'd do it,
but there ought to be some way
of giving a man credit who hits
D that ball on the nose time after
time and is robbed of baSehits
by great catches.
The same for pitchers.
The pitcher who goes out
there and makes the Oppon-
entS hit at bad balls and
keeps them hitting on the
ground deserves almost as
much credit for losing his
game as the fellow who is
pounded hard and is saved
deserves for winning his.
Breaks are funny things.
When We are going bad they
all seemed to so against us.
Now that we're on our stride
again they seem TO break with
us. Some days you go up there
and pound the cover off the
ball and all you get is a horse
collar. Other days you're not
hitting half so we'll but every
thing you hit seems to fall safe
for basehits.
!. The more I stick around the
more I'm amazed by the breaks
and the more I'm convinced
that good breaks make good
ball clubs and bad breaks play
big part in making tailenders.
Copyright 1881 by the Christy Walsh
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