Baseball like a battle—Two big divisions, offense and defense—What
they are—Old-fashioned defensive play—The shift to modern
offensive baseball—Great defensive teams of history—Some pitching
marvels—Pitching the keystone of defensive play—Offensive stars of
today.
You know a game of baseball is like a battle. One outfit digs in behind
the barb wire of good pitching and great fielding and the other side
tries to shell them loose with a barrage of base hits. Just like war,
it’s a battle of defense against offense and the best organization wins.
If you happen to be a baseball fan who reads the newspapers you’ve
probably noticed that before a world series or any other big series the
writers always print long stories of comparisons between individual
players. They point out that Lou Gehrig, for instance, will hit a ball
further and harder than Joe Harris, but that Pie Traynor can go farther
to his left than Joe Dugan. That’s interesting—but so far as doping
out the winner of the series is concerned, its bunk. And it always
gives the ball players a laugh.
For ball players know that it isn’t individuals who count. It’s the
way a team plays as a whole, that determines its offensive power or
its defensive strength. Smart ball players and smart managers consider
offense and defense as units knowing that it takes nine men to do the
fielding and nine hitters to make up a batting order that will score
runs.
That’s where Miller Huggins is a smart guy. Hug doesn’t worry about the
other fellow, and he won’t let his players worry. Before we went into
the world series last fall the boys were sitting around the clubhouse
punching the bag and “barbering” a little about what we might expect in
the series.
Shawkey and Shocker and Pennock had been discussing the Pirate hitters
and how to pitch to them when Mark Koenig broke into the conversation.
Mark is a nervous, high strung fellow who takes his baseball mighty
seriously.
“I guess this Wright is quite a whiz,” he remarked. “They tell me he
can go a lot further after a ball than I can. And Traynor is getting
a lot of play too at third. I wonder if Joe and I will be able to
hold our own with them.” Hug overheard him.
“Listen,” Hug said, and it was one of the smartest remarks I ever
heard. “You fellows don’t need to worry about the Pirates. In baseball
all a fellow has to do to win is to drive in a few runs and then field
well enough to keep the other fellow from scoring as many. I’m not a
darn bit interested in whether Wright is a better shortstop than you
are, Mark, or whether Lou or Tony are better men than they have. We’ve
got just nine men to play the nine positions. Good or bad, they’re the
ones who have to do the job and all the worry about the other fellow
don’t help a bit. Our job is to make the most of what we have and the
Pirates be durned.”
Now, if you know a better philosophy for baseball than that, go to it!
I don’t.
The ideal baseball team, of course, would be one that was equally good
on defense and offense and perfect in both departments. But teams like
that don’t exist. And my experience has been that the team which is
particularly strong offensively is apt to be a little weak on defense
and vice versa. It’s up to the manager or the Captain to make the most
of what he has in the way of material, and he naturally builds up
the department in which he is strongest even if he has to weaken the
other department a bit to do it.
Baseball has changed a lot in the last ten or fifteen years. I haven’t
been sticking around the big leagues as long as Ty Cobb and Eddie
Collins and some of those fellows, but I’ve been around long enough to
notice the change. And it hasn’t been in one club or two clubs either,
but in the whole game.
When I first broke in baseball was a defensive game. The pitchers and
fielders had all the best of the argument, and a two run lead could be
cashed in most any time.
What an array of pitchers there was in those days! Walter Johnson was
in his prime then, and Alexander, and Rube Marquard and Eddie Plank.
And those boys could pitch, believe me. They had everything it takes to
make a great pitcher, and in addition they were permitted to rough the
ball, use trick deliveries and do anything else they could think of to
make a hitter’s life miserable. And besides that the ball they used in
those days was dead into the bargain.
I guess that period is what you would call baseball’s defensive age.
And naturally with the big leagues playing defensive ball the sand
lotters and the amateurs took it up too. Kids in those days dreamed of
becoming great pitchers and hitting was just a matter of course. Even
hitters like Wagner and Lajoie had to play second fiddle to the Mattys
and the Browns, and though a fellow like Cobb might be a marvel, folks
kept their eyes on the pitchers.
Even now before a world series you find a lot of the experts predicting
that “pitching will win the series.” And, all other things being equal
it will. But the fact is that the statement is a throw back to the
old defensive age when pitching was the big thing in baseball and
everything else could run for Sweeney.
The change from defensive to offensive play came gradually. John McGraw
was one of the men who was most responsible. There’s one cagey hombre,
that McGraw. He’s always just a couple of jumps ahead of the other
fellow when it comes to thinking, and he’s always looking for something
new and unusual to pull. I’ve had my run-ins with John and once or
twice when we were playing the Giants in the world series I’ve
wanted to sock him in the nose, but he’s a baseball wizard just the
same.
And while all the other managers were going nutty over defensive play
and making themselves bald trying to dope out ways to develop and
aid their pitchers, John took counsel with himself and decided that
what baseball needed was more action. So he went in for hitting and
base-stealing, and the first thing the rest of the managers knew John
was stealing a pennant right out of their laps.
While other fellows were content to string along with the old fashioned
sacrifice with a man on base, John took a gambling chance with the hit
and run, and the steal. Instead of sending hitters up to the plate with
orders to “Wait ’em out,” John would pat a fellow on the back and say:
“Go up there and lay on that onion. Knock it a mile. You’re better than
he is.”
And how the fans liked it!
They had been watching pitching perfection for so long that they craved
a change, and given a taste, they began to yell for more hitting and
more action.
Other managers began to copy McGraw’s style, too, and it wasn’t long
before they passed rules limiting pitchers on trick stuff. They did
away with the spit ball and the emery ball and the other freaks. They
built a little more life into the ball and they ordered umpires to use
new and clean balls as much as possible.
The boys began smacking the fences with long drives, outfielders began
playing with their backs to the wall and infielders had to move back
on the grass or have their legs torn off with hot drives. And that’s
the story of how baseball’s era of defensive play passed into history
and offensive play became the main factor in the game. At least that’s
the way it seems to me—and most of the changes have taken place since I
first put on a big league uniform.
Right here, too, let me say that I’ve been a pretty lucky fellow in
that respect. In the old days when defense was the big thing, I was a
pitcher and a pretty good one if I do say it myself. And when things
switched over and hitting became the rage Ed Barrow, then managing the
Red Sox, turned me into an outfielder and gave me a chance to “take my
cut” with the rest of the sluggers. So I got a break going and coming.
You can’t beat that!
A lot of folks, and particularly the older fans, still think that
the old style was best, and they sit around and pine for the good old
days when “Pitchers were pitchers instead of throwers,” and teams had
to fight for one run instead of “getting ’em in clusters.”
Maybe they’re right I’m not arguing the matter one way or another. I’m
just trying to point out that baseball, as a game, can be divided into
two big departments. One is defensive play. That’s the business of
stopping the other fellow, and it includes pitching, fielding, throwing
and the inside strategy that makes two putouts where one grew before.
The other is offensive play and that’s simply the matter of your own
attack—hitting, base-running, stealing, etc.—the business of _scoring
runs_.
Both departments are necessary. And baseball strategy, when you come
down to it, is simply making the most of your strength in these two
departments.
Right now the fans demand emphasis on offensive play. And what the fans
want they get. They like plenty of hitting—so modern baseball is built
around the slugger. Some day perhaps public sentiment will switch back
the other way, back again to the old days of pitching battles and low
scores. If it does you’ll see a return to the old style in a hurry
and there will be new Mathewsons and new Browns springing up to take
the place of the Speakers, the Cobbs, the Gehrigs and the Hornsbys of
the present slugging era.
As concerns the fine points of the two styles, there’s plenty of room
for argument. Managers build their ball clubs from the material they
have available. If they have too much defensive strength, then they
have to make defense their specialty. If, on the other hand, they have
plenty of offensive power, then they must build such a club and make
their defense a secondary thing.
But to get back once more to cases instead of generalities. Take the
time to go over the baseball records and you’ll find the great teams of
history excelled in one department or the other. They can be classified
either as defensive teams or offensive teams.
The greatest defensive team of all time, I guess, was the Chicago
White Sox of 1906. Those boys hit so little that whenever a player got
a two-bagger he wrote home about it, and if they got more than four
hits in a game Commy threw a banquet in their honor. But just the same
they won a pennant and a world series, and the reason they won was
that they were so good defensively that they managed to hold the other
fellows to even fewer runs than they got.
They had great pitching. I never saw them, but the old boys are still
talking about Ed Walsh, Frank Smith, Doc White, Nick Altrock and the
rest of that famous outfit. And along with their pitching they had
wonderful fielding strength plus baseball brains. And brains is one of
the biggest assets in defensive play. A fellow can stand up there at
the plate and take his cut without any deep thinking, but to play the
field properly a fellow has to have something besides curly hair above
his shoulders. He’s got to know his onions.
The old Athletics were another great defensive team, too. I’ve played
against them and I know. But coming as they did, at the time when
baseball was changing—they had real offensive strength too. Just the
same it was the fine pitching of fellows like Combs and Bender and
Plank, plus the high class work of that million-dollar infield that
made them one of the greatest teams of all time. Despite the swatting
power of Baker, McInnis, Collins and the rest I still figure that
they class as a defensive rather than an offensive team. Among
modern teams, the Washington Senators of 1924 rate as one of the best
defensive teams, combining fine pitching with some corking work in the
infield and outfield. You’ll go far and look plenty before you’ll find
a better infield combination than Bucky Harris and Roger Peckinpaugh
put up that year, for instance.
When it comes to great offensive teams I’m just cocky enough to believe
that the Yankees of 1927 were the best ever. Believe me that outfit of
ours could hit and score runs. The records tell the story—and there are
mighty few hitting records that we didn’t shatter to bits.
Incidentally there’s another place where I’ve had to argue with my
good friend John McGraw. John maintains that the old Baltimore Orioles
were one of the great offensive clubs. And he rather has me there.
John saw both the Orioles and the 1927 Yankees while I wasn’t taking
much interest in baseball at the time the Orioles were good. Under the
circumstances I’ll have to take his word for it—but I’ll never admit
that the Orioles packed a greater wallop than the Yankees last year. I
don’t think it’s possible.
The Detroit Tigers, winners of the American League pennant in 1907,
1908 and 1909, were a great offensive club. They had Cobb and Crawford
and McIntyre and Jones and big Schmidt—all of them hitters. And as
an offensive club they stood out in an age when defensive play was
considered quite the thing. Real hitters those fellows, and they have
proved it during the years that have followed, with the now-bald Tyrus
still able to stand up there at the plate and hit with the best of
them, despite the weight of more than 22 years of baseball activity.
Discussion of great offensive teams would not be complete without some
mention of the 1912–1913 Giants—the team that was responsible for the
gradual swing from defensive to offensive play. There was a team that
was great offensively, not so much on account of its hitting power, but
because of its cleverness in base-running. Old-timers still maintain
that the Giants team of that era literally “stole” the pennant. They
were masters at base running in an age when base running was a real art.
Perhaps I’ve rambled a bit through these pages. The point I want
to make and leave strong is simply this. Baseball, as a game, is
divided into two great divisions. One is offense, the other is
defense. They are equally important, but in building up a ball club
it is very seldom, indeed, that you can find men equally proficient
in each department. Consequently most managers determine in which
department they are best, and they make their playing plans along that
line—weakening one department a little perhaps, in order to strengthen
the other.
And at the present time baseball is going through an offensive era with
hitters holding the edge and the science of steal and sacrifice playing
second fiddle to brawn and power and wallop.