Boston Red Sox

“ And here the “dope” favored the Red Sox. This was due chiefly to the accident that had befallen Hughson. Had that splendid veteran been in his usual shape, it was conceded that New York [62] ought to win and win handsomely. For Boston could not show a pair to equal Hughson and Matson, although the general excellence of their staff was very high.
But with Hughson out of the Series, it looked as though Joe’s shoulders would have to bear the major part of the pitching burden; and though those shoulders were sturdy, no one man could carry so heavy a load as that would be. ”

“ The best fielding features were furnished by Bush, who displayed remarkable ability in covering ground, really making hard plays easy by his phenomenally quick starts. Hooper and Speaker, as well as Barry and Cady, did some sharp fielding for the Red Sox.
But to Shore belongs about 75 per cent of the glory for winning the game, for after the first inning he settled down and was steady as well as effective. He was given what belonged to him by Umpire Evans, and was not forced to suffer as the other Boston pitchers were, with Mr. Chill behind the plate. The score:
[D] Batted for Young in ninth. ”

“ Joe was in fine fettle, and he showed his appreciation of the lead his mates had given him by retiring the Red Sox without a man seeing first base.
Contrary to Robson’s prediction, the Boston manager elected still to pin his faith to Roth, who tightened up after his bad start and for the next three innings held the Giants scoreless.
He was helped in this by the superb support given him. Both the outfield and infield were on their toes all the time, and drives that ordinarily would have gone for hits were turned into outs in dazzling fashion. ”

“ Of course, we don’t know yet just which team we’ll have to face, but we may know before night. If the Bostons win to-day that will settle it. Even if they lose, provided the Athletics lose, too, the Red Sox will be the champions. Of course, there’s nothing sure in baseball, but all the chances are in favor of the Bostons. ”

“ A murmur went up from the players.
“Some sweet hitters!” exclaimed Markwith.
“A bunch of fence breakers,” echoed Jim.
“They’ll give you mighty good practice,” grinned McRae. “If they can’t straighten out the curves of you twirlers, nobody can. I’ll have them all on here in a day or two, and then we’ll start in training.”
The conference lasted till late in the afternoon, [44] and just as it was breaking up, a telegraphic report was handed to McRae. He scanned it hastily.
“That settles it!” he exclaimed. “Boston won to-day, three to two. We’re up against the Red Sox in the World Series!” ”

“ Time is the all-important element with them. The results of a baseball game are wanted within a few seconds after the last man has been put out in the final inning. Whether the writer says the Red Sox defeated the Tigers, or nosed them out in the ninth, or handed them a lemon, means little to the followers of the game provided the information is specifically conveyed that Boston beat Detroit. Slang is freely used,—so much so that the uninitiated frequently cannot understand an account of a game. ”

“ The luck which had been coming their way began breaking against them with remarkable persistency. Plays that had won game after game went wrong and youth was not resourceful enough to offset the breaks. The White Sox began to fall away fast in percentage, but managed to cling to the lead until June 10. Boston passed them right there and the Chicagoans kept on going.
By mid-season Manager Callahan was fighting to keep his men in the first division and their slump did not end until they landed in fifth place for a couple of days in August. ”

“ So there was no protest when the game was formally and finally declared off, and the disgruntled New Yorks gathered up their bats and strode from the field.
“Never mind, boys,” comforted McRae. “We can beat the Red Sox but we can’t beat them and the rain together. Better luck next time.”
“That listens good,” grumbled “Robbie,” who refused to be consoled. “But now we’ve lost the jump on them and it’s all to be done over again.”
“Well, we’re no worse off than they are, anyway,” returned the Giant manager.
“If we could only pitch Matson every day, the Series would be a cinch,” mused Robson. ”

“ We'll have a fat surplus in hand when we're half through the post-season series with the Norvel White Sox—if they happen to tie up with us, as they ought to do seeing that they're winding up the season with the Canaries and we're idle. ”

“ Well Al we are on our way to the coast and they is quite a party of us though it is not no real White Sox and giants at all but some players from off of both clubs and then some others that is from other clubs a round the 2 leagues to fill up. We got Speaker from the Boston club and Crawford from the Detroit club and if we had them with us all the time Al I would not never loose a game because one or the other of them 2 is good for a couple of runs every game and that is all I need to win my games is a couple of runs or only 1 run and I would win all my games and would not never loose a game. ”

“ Had that ancient organization never encountered opposition, the chances are that there would never have developed a national game. And so it needed the American League, with the Boston Americans' victory of 1903, to make the National League managers realize that they had not all the ball players on earth—that there were others. And when the Chicago White Sox in 1906 again took the national pennant from the pioneer League, it served as nothing else could have done to stimulate interest in the sport in every quarter. ”

“ There was another fan who, on that memorable Sunday afternoon when the Sox clinched their claim for the world's pennant, suffered. He is one of the best Base Ball cranks in Chicago, a rooter for the Sox and an ardent supporter of Comiskey. He has the good fortune (although he didn't think so that day) to have a good and pious wife, who is one of the leaders in a little church up in Edgewater. ”

“ The recrut pitchers that is along with our club have not got nothing and the scout that reckommended them must of been full of hops or something. It is not no common thing for a club to pick up a man that has got the stuff to make him a star up here and the White Sox was pretty lucky to land me but I don't understand why they throw their money away on new pitchers when none of them is no good and besides who would want a better pitching staff than we got right now without no raw recruts and bushers.
I worked in Oakland the day before yesterday but he only let me go the 1st 4 innings. ”

“ We’ve got, in some way, to keep Matson from playing. You know as well as I do that he is the mainstay of the Giant team. That’s especially the case since Hughson was hurt. Matson’s the only reliable pitcher they have left. Markwith is as wild as a hawk and may go up in the air at any time. Barclay has the stuff, but he’s green and inexperienced.
“The Red Sox now have won two games to the [149] Giants’ one. The New Yorks must take three more to win the Series. They’re counting on Matson to pull out two of them at least, perhaps all three. ”

“ Every time a man came to the bat, he’d try to lose the ball over the back fence. They wouldn’t bunt, they wouldn’t sacrifice, they wouldn’t do anything that might hurt that precious record of theirs. It was every man for himself and no man for the team, and they didn’t have a manager at the head of them that was wise enough or strong enough to make them do as they were told.
“Now, on the other hand, look at the White Sox. Dandy fielders, but for batting—why, if they fell in the river they wouldn’t strike the water. ”

“ The wish may have been father to the thought, but there was no doubt as to the optimism that existed in the home town of the Red Sox.
The Giants faced the test with quiet confidence. The odd game was against them, but they looked forward serenely to evening up the score that afternoon with Baseball Joe in the box.
McRae had a little talk with his team in the clubhouse before they went out for practice.
“Go right in, boys, and eat them up,” he exhorted them. “Those fellows never saw the day they could beat you if you were doing your best.
“They’ll probably put in Roth against you. ”

“ He sat down until the hymn was finished, and then, walking forward, remarked:
"'Ladies and Gentlemen: I have glorious news for you. The White Sox are champions of the world—I stopped to learn the score, feeling that we could study better if we knew.'
"And the class broke into cheers." ”

“ His father, who attends Base Ball as often as there is no service, or meeting of the guild, was a wild and woolly admirer of the Sox, and one of the most ardent believers that they could beat anything on earth. ”

“ White Sox had listened carefully to every word his mother had said. To him it was a very wonderful story. The more he thought about it, the more he wished to be like White Feet in mind as well as in body. After pondering for a while in silence, he said:
“I can see all the pictures now, mother—the careless caribou herd, the sneaking wolves, and the little band of fawns on the hill. Always the weakest of the herd were sacrificed in order that the stronger ones might escape and live a little [Pg 63] while longer. Always danger, unrest, and fear! ”

“ I see that first corral on the narrow spit, the first little sled and harness, the first little caribou serving man for the love of him. Each needed something the other had to give. The fawns needed protection. The human beings needed beasts of burden that would be a source of food, instead of those for whom food had to be provided.”
“‘Our herders watch us at night only during the season when the ground is bare and we are inclined to scatter.’”
White Sox had learned his lesson. ”

“ The worst of it was that their opinion was justified, for the White Sox—the down-towners jeeringly called them the Silk Sox—beat almost every team they went up against! Last year the Juniors had played two contests with them and had been beaten decisively each time. And so Captain Arthur Humbleton and all the other boys of the Juniors and all their adherents—including mothers and brothers and sisters and an occasional father—were especially keen on a victory. ”

“ And you can see in a minute how it might react against baseball. The public would begin [181] to figure that gamblers were trying to put the Giants out of the race. They haven’t forgotten the Black Sox scandal that came near to ruining the game. We’ve got to think of the game first of all. You remember what hard work we had to save the League last year, and how we had to forego punishing the scoundrels in order to keep every inkling of the gamblers’ scheme from the public. Baseball has to be above suspicion. ”

“ His gesture indicated the bathrobe, the easy chair and the dainty breakfast table. "This, all the morning and a ball-game in the afternoon. Lord, it will be good to see some real baseball again. We'll go to a lot of games this summer. What are the Sox going to be like this year?"
She discussed the topic expertly with him and with a perfectly genuine interest, at some length. "Oh, it would be fun," she finished with a little sigh, "only I shan't be there, you know. At least I don't think I shall." Then before he could ask her why not, she added in sharper focus, "I can't go home, Rush." ”

“ So I am not going to the Federal League Al and I will not go with the White Sox because I have got a raw deal. Comiskey will be sorry for what he done when his team starts the season and is up against it for good pitchers and then he will probily be willing to give me anything I ask for but that don't do me no good now Al. I am way in debt and no chance to get no money from nobody. I wish I had of stayed with Terre Haute Al and never saw this league. ”

“ We was to play 2 games here and was to play 1 of them in Tacoma and the other here but it rained and so we did not play neither 1 and the people was pretty mad a bout it because I was announced to pitch and they figured probily this would be there only chance to see me in axion and they made a awful holler but Comiskey says No they would not be no game because the field neither here or in Tacoma was in no shape for a game and he would not take no chance of me pitching and may be slipping in the mud and straneing myself and then where would the White Sox be at next season. ”

“ The fifth was devoid of scoring, but in the sixth the Bostons not only tied the Giants but passed them.
Loomis, the crack left fielder of the visitors, started the trouble with a sharp hit to Larry, who “booted” the ball, letting Loomis get to first. Hobbs lay down a bunt on which Joe had no time to get Loomis at second, though he tossed out [86] Hobbs at first. Walters lined out the first clean hit that the Red Sox had made so far in the game. If it had been properly played and taken on the bound, it could have been held to a single. ”

“ He will never injure another reindeer in that way. We must forgive him and try to forget it.”
“Mother, I can’t forget it,” cried White Sox. “These wild cousins of ours can look forward to a long life of freedom and safety. They are not the slaves of herders and dogs. I want to stay with them.”
“You are very young, my son. You have much to learn,” said his mother.
“But I know what will happen to me if I stay with the big herd,” he said. “I’ll have to draw [Pg 11] heavy sled loads in winter and carry tiresome packs in summer, if I am not killed by the butcher’s knife when I am two years old. ”