“Well, he’s got one now,” replied Dineen.
Clarke had a chance to look at the curve ball later, for, with Dineen, Young did a lot toward winning the world’s championship for Boston from Pittsburg in 1903. The old pitcher was wise enough to realize, when he began to lose his speed, that he would have to develop a curve ball or go back to the minors, and he set to work and produced a peach. He is still pitching—for the National League now—and he will win a lot of games yet. When he came back in 1911, the American Leaguers said:
“What, going to let that old man in your show again? He’s done.”
Maybe he will yet figure in another world’s championship. One never can tell. Anyway, he has taken a couple of falls out of Pittsburg just for good luck since he came back to the National League.
Some pitchers depend largely on their motions to fool batters. “Motion pitchers” they might be called. Such an elaborate wind-up is developed that it is hard for a hitter to tell when and from where the ball is coming. “Slim” Sallee of the St. Louis Nationals hasn’t any curve to mention and he lacks speed, but he wins a lot of ball games on his motion.
“It’s a crime,” says McGraw, “to let a fellow like that beat you. Why, he has so little on the ball that it looks like one of those Salome dancers when it comes up to the plate, and actually makes me blush.”
But Sallee will take a long wind-up and shoot one off his shoe tops and another from his shoulder while he is facing second base. He has good control, has catalogued the weaknesses of the batters, and can work the corners. With this capital, he was winning ball games for the Cardinals in 1911 until he fell off the water wagon. He is different from Raymond in that respect. When he is on the vehicle, he is on it, and, when he is off, he is distinctly a pedestrian.
The way the Giants try to beat Sallee is to get men on the bases, because then he has to cut down his motion or they will run wild on him. As soon as a runner gets on the bag with Sallee pitching, he tries to steal to make “Slim” reduce that long winding motion which is his greatest asset. But Sallee won several games from the Giants last season because we could not get enough men on the bases to beat him. He only gave us four or five hits per contest.
For a long time, “Josh” Devore, the Giants’ left-fielder, was “plate shy” with left-handers—that is, he stepped away—and all the pitchers in the League soon learned of this and started shooting the first ball, a fast one, at his head to increase his natural timidity. Sallee, in particular, had him scared.
“Stand up there,” said McGraw to “Josh” one day when Sallee was pitching, “and let him hit you. He hasn’t speed enough to hurt you.”