With Mask and Mitt

by Albertus T. Dudley

"Now, as long as you can keep the batter uncertain whether the ball that's coming is good or bad, you have him at a disadvantage, haven't you? But when you're so fixed that you must put 'em over, he's got you at a disadvantage."

"I can see that," said Patterson.

"Well, if you give two balls right off, you've changed the chances from four to three in your favor, to three to two in his; and he feels pretty certain that the next one will be over, because you've got to begin to get strikes. After that, if you get a single ball, you must put every one over, and the batter knows it. So to get two balls at the start is to put yourself in a hole."

"Then the first ball to pitch to a man is either one that he'll strike at, thinking it's a good one, or a really good one that he can't hit, or doesn't think of offering at."

"That's the theory," said Owen. "As a matter of fact, most of these fellows couldn't hit a straight ball more than half the time, if you told them where it was coming. McLennan says you can fool most amateurs with speed alone. He's coached college teams and ought to know."

"And if you can get two strikes on him early, you have him worrying," mused Patterson.

"Yes, but it won't do to let 'em think that's your only method. The idea is, never get into a position where you've got to give a strike. Always keep them guessing."

Rob batted to the infield of the Second nine before the game, and came to the conclusion that Patterson would receive little help from the men behind him. At second base was a short, round, red-headed lad rejoicing in the name of McGuffy, who fumbled every other grounder, as if alternation were a rule of the game. At short played another fatty, most inaptly named Smart, who always threw either over the first baseman's head or at one side of his feet, and seemed quite ignorant of the very elementary rule that shortstop covers second on hits to the pitcher's left. Peacock at third combined the faults of his two neighbors. The one redeeming feature in the near landscape was Ames, the tall, raw-boned, awkward junior who crouched on his long legs like a grasshopper at first base, and flung out his big hands to incredible distances for the poor throws served up to him by the trio of incompetents around the diamond. Rob grinned with amusement as he watched the fellow gathering in the balls, hopelessly clumsy and inelegant from finger ends to tips of toes. The spectators on the benches laughed and jeered, until Poole shut them up by a peremptory message. Long Ames paid no attention to them; he was too busy scooping Peacock's short bounds out of the dust, and pulling down high sailers that Smart had started on their way to the bleachers.