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Ban B Johnson
Th Greatest Gainm m ttltae World
By Baunio Bo Jlhnsini
jASEBALL appears to be having a more direct and permanent
civilizing influence in the Philippines than has been in
spired by the fear of bayonets and battleships. Such is
the interesting, though not exactly surprising report from
our Far Eastern possessions and it contains food for com
ment and reflection. Far in the interior of the several
islands, where the natives have little use for clothing other than the tradi
tional loin cloth, one can find stored away for safekeeping the apparatus
necessary to play baseball.
Recently, in fact, a company of constabulary landed from a steamer
on Jolo Island, and shortly afterward received an object lesson in the far
reaching results of the game as taught by the American soldiers. As
the military were pitching camp, they heard a tremendous uproar. Cau
tiously deploying through the jungle they reached a clearing, whence the
sounds came, and perceived a ball game in spirited progress, with some
thousand natives making pandemonium over a home-run.
Baseball, as a colonizing or as a domestic influence, is medicine for
millions and its endorsement by the Philippines and by growing num
bers of Orientals simply confirms the verdict of the western world. Base
ball, in the best and biggest way of probably any game, involves the spirit
of fair play. Free of that destroying element, gambling the bane of so
many sports the game calls for the highest development of the mind
and eye of the player, and has positively no equal as an all-round popular
exhibition of athletic skill. Add
the element of luck, or chance,
and the result is an out-door
game about as near perfect as
human ingenuity can make it.
No harmful influence is ever
exerted in behalf of the game,
no artificial stimulant is needed
to keep it alive. There is no
place in baseball for the gambler;
no room in the ball park for his
evil presence. The game, not
withstanding loose occasional
charges, stands solely and hon
estly on its merits.
77ie Squarcst of All Games
TN the heat of an exciting race
1 for the pennant, with clock
work organizations in rivalry,
imagination sometimes runs riot
and assertions are made, under
stress of excitement, that games
are not played on the level. As
a matter of fact, to fix a ball game,
that is, to arrange in advance a
scheme whereby one team would
be sure to win, would be harder
than drawing water out of an
empty well.
If the game were not honest,
it stands to reason that New
York, which spends more money
on it than any two other Ameri
can cities, would never have a
cellar team. Furthermore, a play
er might very often succumb to
temptation and throw a game to
an opponent.
As an instance: Late in the
season of 1908, the New York
Yankees and the Detroit Tigers
were playing the last inning in
the final game of a series of three.
It was a vitally important game.
Detroit was making a desperate
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fight for the pennant, hard pressed by Cleveland, St. Louis and Chicago.
The score was five to four in favor of the Tigers, with New York, a cellar
team, at bat for the last time a runner being on both second and third,
and two out. The New York batter, as it happened, knew that he was
soon to be traded to the Tigers, and that he would share in the cham
pionship prize money if Detroit won the pennant. Nevertheless, dis
playing ordinary loyalty to his team, he made a hit which scored the two
men on bases and Detroit lost the game.
There are two reasons why baseball must be above suspicion. It
would be poor sport and a still poorer business proposition if it were not.
Its lure is the lure of a game where the best man wins. Each is fighting
genuinely, desperately to win. The spectators are thrilled by the zest
of a real contest, by the matching of skill against skill, stirring sluggish
corpuscles and shaking lethargy into life. It is the call of good sport,
and good sport cannot be manufactured. This is not only common sense.
It is tested psychology. Considered from a business angle, a fixed base
ball game would be commercially suicidal. The fact would be bound
to creep to the public and every player knows that proof of crookedness
would spell ruin.
Millions Are Involved
CIXTEEN million people see American baseball games each season.
The expenses of a major league will run to a million dollars in one
year, without including the salaries of league officials, the business staffs
of the local teams, ground rent,
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taxes and other items. One
hundred thousand dollars a sea
son are spent for transportation,
another sixty-five thousand for
hotel accommodations. The bill
for sleeping cars and meals en
route for a single team may
easily amount to thirty thou
sand dollars. Salaries to players
will approximate eight hundred
thousand dollars and the item
of umpires adds another thirty
thousand. Baseball is a big busi
ness investment and risk. The
men who take the risk and put
up the money are not going to
jeapordize lightly or recklessly
their chances of getting it back.
Crooked baseball would be a flat
business and sporting failure.
Furthermore, there is no record
of a man retiring from the game
with a fortune, with the possible
exception of a Chicago individual.
Once let the game be smirched
by the malevolent influence of
gambling, and the whole struc
ture would topple to the ground.
Other sports have been wrecked
by the betting evil; but the men
who now have baseball in their
care, have profited by the lessons
of others and there is little danger
that the sinister shadow of the
gambler ever will fall across the
diamond.
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