[CHAPTER XII]
HAL IS DISCOVERED
The season was coming along rapidly. The first big game of the year with Armour was only a week off and the Varsity was hardly prepared for it. Baseball in the big colleges had come to be almost as scientific as in the professional leagues, which by the way were full of college men—they having been rapidly replacing the old-time every-man-for-himself sluggers who learned their baseball on the back lots, and who while “Kings of the game” in their days were no match for the scientific brainy players of inside baseball which had been developed in the colleges. Also the fact that college-trained men were taking positions in the professional leagues, took a good deal of the rowdyism out of the game and increased its popularity with the “fans” all over the country.
Lowell University had been the first to develop the clever “inside ball” as it had come to be called and the other colleges had taken it up. A big part of “inside ball” is made possible by the “signals” which each of the players had to know and remember.
They had signals for every combination that could be imagined, some of the players, as, for instance, the shortstop, the key to the infield, had fifteen signals, all of which he had to keep in mind, and any one of which he might have to use at any moment. The other players had their own signals, too, and every player on the team must be familiar with every other player’s signals, while at bat. Otherwise if two men used the same signals the opposing players would soon catch on to what was going to be tried.
And so before this first big game with Armour, Hughie spent most of the practice hours training the men in the use and understanding of the signals, so that each man on the bases could tell by watching just what the batter would try to do, and if the opposing team was at bat, the Lowell boys in the field signaled to each other how to play if the ball went here or there.
Then there was practice in base running, sliding, etc., particularly the fall-away slide. Ty Robb and Honus enjoyed the sliding. These two stole more bases in practice and regular games than all the other men on the team put together.
The rules of the game give the runner absolute right to the base paths, otherwise a baseman could always block a runner. The average player, even though courageous, starts his slide when about fifteen feet from the bag, so that by the time the bag is reached the slider is not coming at very fast speed—he is almost stopped in fact, and it is easy for the baseman to tag him without much danger from spikes. But Ty and Honus were daredevils. Neither knew what fear was. They got onto the fact that by starting to slide when about eight feet from the base they would sail into it full speed, and that nine times out of ten the baseman was afraid to try to touch them even if he had the ball. So Ty and Honus were detailed to teach the others how to slide, and everyone was working hard to perfect the team work.
At the end of the week the team took its first trip out of town, when they went to Hudson City for the annual game with Armour, which always had one of the best teams in the East. The boys arrived after an all-night ride in the sleeper, but by the time breakfast was over and they reached the ground for a little warming-up practice, everyone was feeling fine with the exception of Huyler, the substitute infielder who sprained his ankle, and had been sent to a hospital to have it attended to, and Hal, who had been brought along, but who saw no chance whatever to get into the game, since Miner was in fine form and Babe had developed into a pretty steady winner. Nothing but an avalanche of singles, two-baggers, and homers would give him a chance that day.
It looked like rain almost up until the game had been called.
Hudson City was one of the largest college towns in the country. Fifteen thousand people could be seated in the stands, and they were filled, while five thousand others stood or sat on the ground. A thousand Lowell boys and two thousand Lowell graduates were seated in the stands back of third base where the visiting players’ bench was also located.