The Washington times., 1932-06-18
WESTERNERS
FIND MACKS
J. EASYMEAT
RxAnA;n@ By

CHICAGO, June 18.-1t strikes
me that the Mackmen are begin
ming to show signs of the break
down which has affected every
pennant winning team Of the
past. For a time a team seems
to have something which makes
it stand out over all contempor-
aries. Then it gradually takes
on the appearance of just an
other ball club. So it is with the
AS.
One of the marked signs is the
inability of the Mackmen to win
consistently over the Western
clubs. Last year. while on their
way to a third straight pennant'
the Mackmen lost only three
games all season to the White
Sox, only four to the Tigers and
four to the Indians, and the
only trouble they had with a
Western team came from the
st. Louis Browns who defeated
the AS eight times. The COM
plete figures for the season
showed the AS winning sixty
nine games from the west ana
losing only nineteen.
> Indians Hove Edge
What a difference this year.
The Indians had as many VIC
tories over the AS this year IN
their first seven games WIN
Mack's teams as they scored IN
the full season a year ago. Tne
Tigers won three of their first SIX
games this year. as against 1our
all last season.
When 1 predicted before the
start of the season that the AS
would undoubtedly run into that
letdown which all clubs have
gone through after spell OF sue
cess. 1 hardly expected that IL
would be so pronounced in the
early part of the season. I be-
lieved it would show itself more
and more as the season wore on.
/ was basing my prediction on
baseball history, and I have been
through two of these letdowns by
championship teams myself. The
Yankees of 192l-22-23 and the
Yanks of 1926-27-28 were both
three.time permanent winners but
they flopped after all this success.
No matter how much we tried 10
shake it off, we found ourselves
helpless.
At first we figured it as a tenn
porary slump and agreed among
ourselves that we would get going
almost any day and win games as
we did in the past. 1t was a
happy way to feel about it but
the results did not justify our
expectations. Finally we realized
that we simply couldn't click as
we had been doing while winning
pennants.
AS Still Hopeful
No doubt the AS today believe
firmly that one of these days
they will get started and over
come all opposition as they have
been accustomed to overcome it
in the past three years. Perhaps
they will upset the dope and
rush to the front. But I don't be-
lieve they can. I am quite sure
from the talk I hear while 60
ing around the circuit that other
clubs no longer hold the same
feeling toward the AS that they
did in the past three years.
Gust another ball club like
the rest of us. They have come
back to meet us, as all cham
piOn teams must do in time"
That is the way I heard one
ball player express it the other
day when We were discussing the
pennant prospects of various
teams and the drop of the AS.
It wouldn't have surprised me
If the Mackmen rushed to the
front this year and held a lead
for a long time, only to begin to
fade later. But they did just the
opposite. They lost 10 of their first
IA ball games and have been
trailing by several games most
of the time. I believe they were
in first place just one day and
that was during the first week of
the season when they had three
victories against one defeat.
Then they started to skid and
they never have come back.