the first time he has ever failed to try to score from second base on a
hit unless he was tackled."
All ball clubs have certain "must" motions which are as strictly observed
as danger signals on a railroad. A coacher's hand upraised will stop a
base runner as abruptly as the uplifted white glove of a traffic policeman
halts a row of automobiles. A wave of the arm will start a runner going at
top speed again.
Many times a quick-witted ball-player wins a game for his club by his snap
judgment. Again McGraw is the master of that. He took a game from the
Cubs in 1911, because, always alert for flaws in the opposition, he
noticed the centre-fielder drop his arm after getting set to throw the
ball home. Devore was on second base, and one run was needed to win the
game. Doyle hit sharply to centre field, and Devore, coming from second,
started to slow up as he rounded third. Hofman, the Chicago
centre-fielder, perceiving this slackening of pace, dropped his arm.
McGraw noticed this, and, with a wave of his arm, notified Devore to go
home. With two strides he was at top speed again, and Hofman, taken by
surprise, threw badly.
The run scored which won the game.
The pastime of bullyragging the pitcher by the coachers has lost its
popularity recently. The wily coacher must first judge the temperament of
a pitcher before he dares to undertake to get on his nerves. Clarke
Griffith, formerly the manager of Cincinnati, has a reputation for being
able to ruin young pitchers just attempting to establish themselves in the
Big League. Time and again he has forced youngsters back to the minors by
his constant cry of "Watch his foot" or "He's going to waste this one."
[Illustration: Photo by L. Van Oeyen, Cleveland, Ohio
Baker out at the plate trying to stretch a triple into a home run. This
picture shows Catcher Easterly of Cleveland waiting with the ball to touch
Baker. The home-run hero of the Athletics is shown in the picture starting
the fall-away slide in an effort to get away from Easterly. Harry Davis is
approaching the plate, and Jack Sheridan is awaiting the outcome at the
plate.]
The rules are very strict now about talking to pitchers, but, if a
complaint is made, Griffith declares that he was warning the batter that
it was to be a pitchout, which is perfectly legitimate. The rules permit
the coacher to talk to the batter and the base runners.
Griffith caught a Tartar in Grover Cleveland Alexander, the sensational
pitcher of the Philadelphia club. It was at his first appearance in
Cincinnati that the young fellow got into the hole with several men on the
bases, and "Mike" Mitchell coming up to the bat.
"Now here is where we get a look at the 'yellow,'" yelled Griffith at
Alexander.
The young pitcher walked over toward third base.
"I'm going to make that big boob up at the bat there show such a 'yellow
streak' that you won't be able to see any white," declared Alexander, and
then he struck Mitchell out. Griffith had tried the wrong tactics.
A story is told of Fred Clarke and "Rube" Waddell, the eccentric twirler.
Waddell was once one of the best pitchers in the business when he could
concentrate his attention on his work, but his mind wandered easily.
"Now pay no attention to Clarke," warned his manager before the game.
Clarke tried everything from cajolery to abuse on Waddell with no effect,
because the eccentric "Rube" had been tipped to fight shy of the Pittsburg
manager. Suddenly Clarke became friendly and walked with Waddell between
innings, chatting on trivial matters. At last he said:
"Why don't you come out on my ranch in Kansas and hunt after the season,
George? I've got a dog out there you might train."
"What kind of a dog?" asked Waddell at once interested.
"Just a pup," replied Clarke, "and you can have him if he takes a fancy to
you."
"They all do," replied Waddell. "He's as good as mine."
The next inning the big left-hander was still thinking of that dog, and
the Pirates made five runs.
In many instances defensive coaching is as important as the offensive
brand, which simply indorses the old axiom that any chain is only as
strong as its weakest link or any ball club is only as efficient as its
most deficient department. When Roger Bresnahan was on the Giants, he was
one of those aggressive players who are always coaching the other fielders
and holding a team together, a type so much desired by a manager. If a
slow roller was hit between the pitcher's box and third base, I could
always hear "Rog" yelling, "You take it, Matty," or, "Artie, Artie,"
meaning Devlin, the third baseman. He was in a position to see which man
would be better able to make the play, and he gave this helpful advice.
His coaching saved many a game for the Giants in the old days. "Al"
Bridwell, the former shortstop, was of the same type, and, if you have
ever attended a ball game at the Polo Grounds, you have doubtless heard
him in his shrill, piercing voice, shouting:
"I've got it! I've got it!" or, "You take it!"
This style of coaching saves ball-players from accidents, and accidents
have lost many a pennant. I have always held that it was a lack of the
proper coaching that sent "Cy" Seymour, formerly the Giant centre-fielder,
out of the Big Leagues and back to the minors. Both Murray and he
attempted to catch the same fly in the season of 1909 and came into
collision. Seymour went down on the field, but later got up and played
the game out. However, he hurt his leg so badly that it never regained its
strength.
Then there is that other style of defensive coaching which is the shouting
of misleading advice by the fielders to the base runners. Collins and
Barry, the second baseman and shortstop on the Athletics, worked a clever
trick in one of the games of the 1911 world's series which illustrates my
point. The play is as old as the one in which the second baseman hides the
ball under his shirt so as to catch a man asleep off first base, but often
the old ones are the more effective.
Doyle was on first base in one of the contests played in Philadelphia, and
the batter lifted a short foul fly to Baker, playing third base. The crowd
roared and the coacher's voice was drowned by the volume of sound. "Eddie"
Collins ran to cover second base, and Barry scrabbled his hand along the
dirt as if preparing to field a ground ball.
"Throw it here! Throw it here!" yelled Collins, and Doyle, thinking that
they were trying for a force play, increased his efforts to reach second.
Baker caught the fly, and Larry was doubled up at first base so far that
he looked foolish. Yet it really was not his fault. The safest thing for a
base runner to do under those circumstances is to get one glimpse of the
coacher's motions and then he can tell whether to go back or to go on.
"Johnnie" Kling, the old catcher of the Chicago Cubs, used to work a
clever piece of defensive coaching with John Evers, the second baseman.
This was tried on young players and usually was successful. The victim was
picked out before the game, and the play depended upon him arriving at
second base. Once there the schemers worked it as follows:
When the "busher" was found taking a large lead, Evers would dash to the
bag and Kling would make a bluff to throw the ball, but hold it. The
runner naturally scampered for the base. Then, seeing that Kling had not
thrown, he would start to walk away from it again.
"If the Jew had thrown that time, he would have had you," Evers would
carelessly hurl over his shoulder at the intended victim. The man usually
turned for a fatal second to reply. Tinker, who was playing shortstop,
rushed in from behind, Kling whipped the ball to the bag, and the man,
caught off his guard, was tagged out. The play was really made before the
game, when the victim was selected.
It was this same Evers-Kling combination that turned the tide in the first
inning of the most famous game ever played in baseball, the extra one
between the Giants and the Cubs in the season of 1908. The Chicago club
was nervous in the first inning. Tenney was hit by a pitched ball, and
Herzog walked. It looked as if Pfeister, the Chicago pitcher, was losing
his grip. Bresnahan struck out, and Kling, always alert, dropped the third
strike, but conveniently at his feet. Thinking that here was an
opportunity the crowd roared. Evers, playing deep, almost behind Herzog,
shouted, "Go on!"
Herzog took the bait in the excitement of the moment and ran--and was
nipped many yards from first base.
There are many tricks to the coacher's trade, both offensive and
defensive, and it is the quickest-witted man who is the best coacher. The
sentry at first yells as the pitcher winds up, "There he goes!" imitating
the first baseman as nearly as possible, in the hope that the twirler
will waste one by pitching out and thus give the batter an advantage. The
coacher on third base will shout at the runner on a short hit to the
outfield, "Take your turn!" in the dim hope that the fielder, seeing the
man rounding third, will throw the ball home, and the hitter can thus make
an extra base. And the job of coaching is no sinecure. McGraw has told me
after directing a hard game that he is as tired as if he had played.
VII
Honest and Dishonest Sign Stealing
_Everything Fair in Baseball except the Dishonest Stealing of
Signals--The National Game More a Contest of the Wits than Most
Onlookers Imagine._
When the Philadelphia Athletics unexpectedly defeated the Chicago Cubs in
the world's series of 1910, the National League players cried that their
signals had been stolen by the American League team, and that, because
Connie Mack's batters knew what to expect, they had won the championship.
But were the owners or any member of the Philadelphia club arrested
charged with grand larceny in stealing the baseball championship of the
world? No. Was there any murmur against the methods of Connie Mack's men?
No, again. By a strange kink in the ethics of baseball John Kling, the
Chicago catcher, was blamed by the other players on the defeated team for
the signs being stolen. They charged that he had been careless in covering
his signals and that the enemy's coachers, particularly Topsy Hartsell, a
clever man at it, had seen them from the lines. This was really the cause
of Kling leaving the Cubs and going to Boston in 1911.
After the games were over and the series was lost, many of the players,
and especially the pitchers, would hardly speak to Kling, the man who had
as much as any one else to do with the Cubs winning four championships,
and the man who by his great throwing had made the reputations of a lot of
their pitchers. But the players were sore because they had lost the series
and lost the extra money which many of them had counted as their own
before the games started, and they looked around for some one to blame and
found Kling. One of the pitchers complained after he had lost a game:
"Can't expect a guy to win with his catcher giving the signs so the
coachers can read 'em and tip the batters."
"And you can't expect a catcher to win a game for you if you haven't got
anything on the ball," replied Kling, for he is quick tempered and cannot
stand reflections on his ability. But the pitcher's chance remark had
given the other players an excuse for fixing the blame, and it was put on
Kling.
I honestly do not believe that Kling was in any way responsible for the
rout of the proud Cubs. The Chicago pitchers were away off form in the
series and could not control the ball, thus getting themselves "into the
hole" all the time. Shrewd Connie Mack soon realized this and ordered his
batters to wait everything out, to make the twirlers throw every ball
possible. The result was that, with the pitcher continually in the hole,
the batters were guessing what was coming and frequently guessing right,
as any smart hitter could under the circumstances. This made it look as if
the Athletics were getting the Cubs' signals.
"Why, I changed signs every three innings, Matty," Kling told me
afterwards in discussing the charge. "Some of the boys said that I gave
the old bended-knee sign for a curve ball. Well, did you ever find
anything to improve on the old ones? That's why they are old."
But the Cubs still point the finger of scorn at Kling, for it hurts to
lose. I know it, I have lost myself. Even though the Athletics are charged
with stealing the signs whether they did or not, it is no smirch on the
character of the club, for they stole honestly--which sounds like a
paradox.
"You have such jolly funny morals in this bally country," declared an
Englishman I once met. "You steal and rob in baseball and yet you call it
fair. Now in cricket we give our opponents every advantage, don't cher
know, and after the game we are all jolly good fellows at tea together."
This brings us down to the ethics of signal stealing. Each game has its
own recognized standards of fairness. For instance, no tricks are
tolerated in tennis, yet the baseball manager who can devise some scheme
by which he disconcerts his opponents is considered a great leader. I was
about to say that all is fair in love, war, and baseball, but will modify
that too comprehensive statement by saying all is fair in love, war, and
baseball except stealing signals dishonestly, which listens like another
paradox. Therefore, I shall divide the subject of signal stealing into
half portions, the honest and the dishonest halves, and, since we are
dealing in paradoxes, take up the latter first.
Dishonest signal stealing might be defined as obtaining information by
artificial aids. The honest methods are those requiring cleverness of eye,
mind, and hand without outside assistance. One of the most flagrant and
for a time successful pieces of signal stealing occurred in Philadelphia
several years ago.
Opposing players can usually tell when the batsman is getting the signs,
because he steps up and sets himself for a curve with so much confidence.
During the season of 1899 the report went around the circuit that the
Philadelphia club was stealing signals, because the batters were popping
them all on the nose, but no one was able to discover the transmitter. The
coachers were closely watched and it was evident that these sentinels were
not getting the signs.
It was while the Washington club, then in the National League, was playing
Philadelphia that there came a rainy morning which made the field very
wet, and for a long time it was doubtful whether a game could be played
in the afternoon, but the Washington club insisted on it and overruled the
protests of the Phillies. Arlie Latham, now the coacher on the Giants',
was playing third base for the Senators at the time. He has told me often
since how he discovered the device by which the signs were being stolen.
He repeated the story to me recently when I asked him for the facts to use
in this book.
"There was a big puddle in the third base coaching box that day," said
Latham. "And it was in the third inning that I noticed Cupid Childs, the
Philadelphia second baseman, coaching. He stood with one foot in the
puddle and never budged it, although the water came up to his shoe-laces.
He usually jumped around when on the lines, and this stillness surprised
me.
"'Better go get your rubbers if you are goin' to keep that trilby there,'
I said to him. 'Charley horse and the rheumatism have no terrors for you.'
"But he kept his foot planted in the puddle just the same, and first thing
the batter cracked out a base hit.
"'So that's where you're gettin' the signs?' I said to him, not guessing
that it really was. Then he started to jump around and we got the next
two batters out right quick, there being a big slump in the Philadelphia
hitting as soon as he took his foot out of that puddle.
"When the Washington club went to bat I hiked out to the third base line
and started to coach, putting my foot into the puddle as near the place
where Childs had had his as I could.
"'Here's where we get a few signs,' I yelled, 'and I ain't afraid of
Charley horse, either.'
"I looked over at the Philadelphia bench, and there were all the extra
players sitting with their caps pulled down over their eyes, so that I
couldn't see their faces. The fielders all looked the other way. Then I
knew I was on a warm scent.
"When the Washington players started back for the field I told Tommy
Corcoran that I thought they must be getting the signs from the third base
coaching box, although I hadn't been able to feel anything there. He went
over and started pawing around in the dirt and water with his spikes and
fingers. Pretty soon he dug up a square chunk of wood with a buzzer on the
under side of it.
"'That ought to help their hitting a little,' he remarked as he kept on
pulling. Up came a wire, and when he started to pull on it he found that
it was buried about an inch under the soil and ran across the outfield. He
kept right on coiling it up and following it, like a hound on a scent, the
Philadelphia players being very busy all this time and nervous like a
busher at his debut into Big League society. One of the substitutes
started to run for the clubhouse, but I stopped him.
"Tommy was galloping by this time across the outfield and all the time
pulling up this wire. It led straight to the clubhouse, and there sitting
where he could get a good view of the catcher's signs with a pair of
field-glasses was Morgan Murphy. The wire led right to him.
"'What cher doin'?' asked Tommy.
"'Watchin' the game,' replied Murphy.
"'Couldn't you see it easier from the bench than lookin' through those
peepers from here? And why are you connected up with this machine?'
inquired Tommy, showin' him the chunk of wood with the buzzer attached.
"'I guess you've got the goods,' Murphy answered with a laugh, and all the
newspapers laughed at it then, too. But the batting averages of the
Philadelphia players took an awful slump after that.
"'Why didn't they tip me?' asked Murphy as he put aside his field-glasses
and went to the bench and watched the rest of the game from there. And we
later won that contest, our first victory of the series, which was no
discredit to us, since it was like gamblin' against loaded dice,"
concluded "Arlie."
The newspapers may have laughed at the incident in those days, but since
that time the National Commission has intimated that if there was ever a
recurrence of such tactics, the club caught using them would be subjected
to a heavy fine and possibly expulsion from the League. So much have
baseball standards improved.
The incident is a great illustration of the unfair method of obtaining
signs. Since then, there have come from time to time reports of teams
taking signals by mechanical devices. The Athletics once declared that the
American League team in New York had a man stationed behind the fence in
centre field with a pair of glasses and that he shifted a line in the
score board slightly, so as to tip off the batters, but this charge was
never confirmed. It was said a short time ago that the Athletics
themselves had a spy located in a house outside their grounds and that he
tipped the batters by raising and lowering an awning a trifle. When the
Giants went to Philadelphia in 1911 for the first game of the world's
series in the enemy's camp, I kept watching the windows of the houses just
outside of the park for suspicious movements, but could discover none.
Once in Pittsburg I thought that the Pirates were getting the Giants'
signals and I kept my eyes glued to the score board in centre field,
throughout one whole series, to see if any of the figures moved or changed
positions, as that seemed to be the only place from which a batter could
be tipped. But I never discovered anything wrong.
There are many fair ways to steal the signs of the enemy, so many that the
smart ball-player is always kept on the alert by them. Baseball geniuses,
some almost magicians, are constantly looking for new schemes to find out
what the catcher is telling the pitcher, what the batter is tipping the
base runner to, or what the coacher's instructions are. The Athletics have
a great reputation as being a club able to get the other team's signs if
they are obtainable. This is their record all around the American League
circuit.
Personally I do not believe that Connie Mack's players steal as much
information as they get the credit for, but the reputation itself, if they
never get a sign, is valuable. If a prizefighter is supposed to have a
haymaking punch in his left hand, the other fellow is going to be
constantly looking out for that left. If the players on a club have great
reputations as signal stealers, their opponents are going to be on their
guard all the time, which gives the team with the reputation just that
much advantage. If a pitcher has a reputation, he has the percentage on
the batter. Therefore, this gossip about the signal-stealing ability of
the Athletics has added to their natural strength.
"Bill," I said to Dahlen, the Brooklyn manager, one day toward the end of
the season of 1911, when the Giants were playing their schedule out after
the pennant was sure, "see if you can get the Chief's signs."
Dahlen coached on first base and then went to third, always looking for
Meyers's signals. Pretty soon he came to me.
"I can see them a little bit, Matty," he reported.
"Chief," I said to Meyers that night as I buttonholed him in the
clubhouse, "you've got to be careful to cover up your signs in the Big
Series. The Athletics have a reputation of being pretty slick at getting
them. And to make sure we will arrange a set of signs that I can give if
we think they are 'hep' to yours."
So right there Meyers and I fixed up a code of signals that I could give
to him, the Chief always to use some himself which would be "phoney" of
course, and might have the desirable effect of "crossing them."
In the first championship game at the Polo Grounds, Topsy Hartsell was out
on the coaching lines looking for signals, and the Chief started giving
the real ones until Davis stepped into a curve ball and cracked it to left
field for a single, scoring the only run made by the Athletics. Right here
Meyers stopped, and I began transmitting the private information, although
the Chief continued to pass out signals that meant nothing. The Athletics
were getting the Indian's and could not understand why the answers seemed
invariably to be wrong, for a couple of them struck out swinging at bad
balls, and one batter narrowly avoided being hit by a fast one when
apparently he had been tipped off to a curve and was set ready to swing at
it. They did not discover that I was behind the signals, although to make
this method successful the catcher must be a clever man. If he makes it
too obvious that his signals are "phoney" and are meant to be seen, then
the other club will look around for the source of the real ones. Meyers
carefully concealed his misleading wig-wags beneath his chest protector,
under his glove and behind his knee, as any good catcher does his real
signs, so they would not look at my head.
Many persons argue: if a man sees the signs, what good does it do him if
he does not know what they mean? It is easy for a smart ball-player to
deduce the answers, because there are only three real signs passed between
a pitcher and catcher, the sign for the fast one, for the curve ball and
for the pitchout. If a coacher sees a catcher open his hand behind his
glove and then watches the pitcher throw a fast one, he is likely to guess
that the open palm says "Fast one."
After a coacher has stolen the desired information, he must be clever to
pass it along to the batter without the other club being aware that he is
doing it. He may straighten up to tell the batter a curve ball is coming,
and bend over to forecast a fast one, and turn his back as a neutral
signal, meaning that he does not know what is coming. If a coacher is
smart enough to pass the meanings to the batter without the other team
getting on, he may go through the entire season as a transmitter of
information. To steal signs fairly requires quickness of mind, eye and
action. Few players can do it successfully. Perhaps that is why it is
considered fair.