A WEIRD GAME
Baseball Joe was startled and showed it plainly.
“What do you mean?” he asked, as his mind ran over the names of his team-mates.
“Just what I say,” replied McRae. “I tell you, Joe, somebody’s getting in his fine work with our boys and I know it.”
“Where’s your proof?” asked Joe. “I hate to think that any of our fellows would welch on their contracts.”
“So do I,” returned McRae. “We’ve been like one big family, and I’ve always tried to treat the boys right. I’ve got a rough tongue, as everybody knows, and in a hot game I’ve called them down many a time when they’ve made bonehead plays. But at the same time I’ve tried to be just, and I’ve never given any of them the worst end of the deal. They’ve been paid good money, and I’ve carried them along sometimes when other managers would have let them go.” 120
“You’ve been white all right,” assented Joe warmly. He recalled an occasion when a muff by a luckless center-fielder had lost a World Series and fifty thousand dollars for the team, and yet McRae had “stood the gaff” and never said a word, because he knew the man was trying to do his best.
“I’m telling this to you, Joe,” went on McRae, “because I want you to help me out. You’ve proved yourself true blue when you were put to the test. I know you’ll do all you can to hold the boys in the traces. They all like you and feel that they owe you a lot because it was your pitching that pulled us through the World’s Series. Besides, they’ll be more impressed by what you say than by the talk I’d give them. They figure that I’m the manager and am only looking after my own interests, and for that reason what I say has less effect.”
“I’ll stand by you, Mac,” returned Joe, “and help you in any way I can. Who are the boys that you think are trying to break loose?”
“There are three of them,” replied McRae. “Iredell, Curry and Burkett, and all three of them are stars, as you know as well as I do.”
“They’re cracks, every one of them,” agreed Joe. “And they’re among the last men that I’d suspect of doing anything of the kind. What makes you think they’ve been approached?” 121
“A lot of things,” replied McRae. “In the first place, I have noticed that they are stiff and offish in their manner when I speak to them. Then, too, I’ve come across them several times lately with their heads together, and when they saw me coming they’d break apart and start talking of something else, as if I had interrupted them. Beside that, all three have struck me lately for a raise in salary next season.”
“That’s nothing new for ball players,” said Joe, with a smile.
“No,” admitted McRae, an answering smile relieving the gravity of his face for the moment. “And I stand ready of my own accord to give the boys a substantial increase on last year’s pay because of their winning the pennant. But what these three asked for was beyond all reason, and made me think there was a nigger in the woodpile. They either had had a big offer from somebody else and were using that as a club to hold me up with, or else they were just trying to give themselves a better excuse for jumping.”
“How long do their contracts have to run?” asked Joe.
“Iredell has one year more and Curry and Burkett are signed up for two years yet,” replied the Giants’ manager. “Of course I could try to hold them to their contracts, but you know as well 122 as I do that baseball contracts are more a matter of honesty than of legal obligation. If a man is straight, he’ll keep it, if he’s crooked, he’ll break it. And you know what a hole it would leave in the Giant team if those three men went over the fence. There isn’t a heavier slugger in the team than Burkett, except Larry. His batting average this year was .332, and as a fielding first baseman he’s the class of the league.”
“You’re right there,” acquiesced Joe, as he recalled the ease and precision with which Burkett took them on either side and dug them out of the dirt. “He’s saved a game for me many and many a time.”
“As for Iredell,” went on McRae, “he hasn’t his equal in playing short and in covering second as the pivot for a double play. And nobody has played the infield as Curry does since I’ve been manager of the team.”
“It would certainly break the Giants all up to lose the three of them,” agreed Joe. “But we haven’t lost them yet. Remember that the game isn’t over till the last man is out in the ninth inning.”
“I know that. You’ve helped me win two fights this year, Joe, one for the championship of the league and the other for the championship of the world. Now I’m counting on you to help me win a third, perhaps the hardest of them all.” 123
“Put ’er there, Mac,” said Joe, extending his hand. “Shake—I’m with you till the cows come home.”
“Of course, they’ll be willing to put up big money, Joe. You know that already.”
“It doesn’t make a particle of difference, Mac, how much money they put up,” returned the crack pitcher warmly. “There isn’t enough cash in the U. S. treasury to tempt me.”
“I know that, Joe. And I only wish that I could be as certain of the rest of the players.”
“Well, of course, I can’t speak for the others. But you can be sure that I’ll use my influence on the right side every time. Some of them may weaken and break away, but I doubt very much if they’ll be any of your main-stays. If I were you, Mac, I wouldn’t let this worry me too much.”
“Yes, I know it’s getting on my nerves, Joe, because, you see, it means so much to me. But having you on my side has braced me up a good deal,” went on the manager.
They shook hands warmly, and McRae, evidently encouraged and braced by the talk with his star pitcher, made his way back to his own immediate party.
The teams were slated to play in Salt Lake City and in Ogden. In both places they “cleaned up” easily, and it was not until a few days later when they reached the slope that they encountered 124 opposition that made them exert themselves to win.
At Bakersfield, with Jim in the box, the game went to eleven innings before it was finally placed to the credit of the Giants by a score of three to two. The ’Frisco team also put up a stiff fight for eight innings, but were overwhelmed by a storm of hits which rained from Giant bats in the ninth.
The game with Oakland was the last on the schedule before the teams left for the Orient, and an enormous crowd was in attendance.
Joe was in the box for the All-American team. He was in fine form, and held the home team down easily until the fifth inning, but the Oaklands also, undaunted by the reputation of their adversaries, and under the guidance of a manager who had formerly been a famous first baseman of the Chicago team, were also out to win if possible, and with first-class pitching and supported by errorless fielding, they held their redoubtable opponents on even terms.
At the end of the fifth, neither team had scored, although the Giants had threatened to do so on two separate occasions. A singular condition developed in the sixth. It was the Giants’ turn at bat and Curry had reached first on a clean single to right. A neat sacrifice by Joe advanced him to second. A minute later he stole third, sliding feet first into the bag and narrowly escaping the ball in the third baseman’s hand. 125
With only one out and Larry coming to the bat, the prospects for a run were bright.
Larry let the first go by, but swung at the second, which was coming straight to the plate. His savage lunge caught the ball on the underside, and it went soaring through the air to a tremendous height.
Both the second and third baseman started for the ball. It looked as though neither would be able to reach it, and Curry ran half-way down the line between third and home, awaiting the result. If the ball were caught he figured that he would easily have time to get back to third. If it were dropped, he could make home and score.
The third baseman got under the descending ball, but it was coming from such a height that it was difficult to judge. It slipped through his fingers, but instead of falling to the ground, went plump into the pocket of his baseball shirt.
He tugged desperately to get it out, at the same time running toward Curry, who danced about on the line between third and home in an agony of indecision. Was the ball caught or not? If it were, he would have to return to third. If it were not, he must make a break for home.
The teams were all shouting now, while the crowd went into convulsions. The third baseman reached Curry and grabbed him with one hand, while with the other he frantically tried to 126 get the ball from his pocket and clap it on him. But the ball stuck, and in the mixup both players fell to the ground and rolled over and over.
Larry, in the meanwhile, was tearing round the bases, but he himself wasn’t sure whether he was really out or whether he ought to strike for home. He reached third and pulled up there, still in the throes of doubt. He could have easily gone on past the struggling combatants, but in that case, if Curry were finally declared not out, Larry would also be out for having passed him and got home first.
On the other hand, if Curry should finally escape and get back to third, one of them would still be out because he was occupying the bag to which his comrade was entitled. He did not really know whether he was running for exercise or to score a run.
It was the funniest mixup that even the veteran players had ever seen on a ball field, and as for the crowd they were wild with joy.
The third baseman, finding that Curry was about to get away from him and unable to get the ball out of his pocket, finally threw his arms about him and hugged him close in the wild hope that some part of the protruding ball would touch his prisoner’s person and thus put him out.
The sight of those burly gladiators, locked in a fond embrace, threatened the sanity of the 127 onlookers, but the farce was ended when Curry finally wriggled out from the anaconda grasp of his opponent and took a chance for the plate.
Then there was a hot debate, as the umpire, himself laughing until the tears ran down his face, tried to solve the situation. Had Curry been touched by the ball, or had he not? Had the ball been caught or not?
Players on both sides tugged at him as they debated the matter pro and con.
“I don’t know what that umpire’s name is,” grinned Jim to Joe, who was weak with laughter, “but I know what it ought to be.”
“What?” asked Joe.
“Solomon,” chuckled Jim.