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Show CATCHER OF TODAY IS WALKING FORTRESS -S- azumir Catchers are protected by all sorts and manners of armor. They have masfts, mitts, chest protectors and bauds on their shoes to shield them from foul tips. In only one place are they liable to injury. This is their neck. Occasionally a foul hits them there, and the injury is not only unusually un-usually painful but dangerous. Jack Lapp, now catcher of the "White Sox, was struck there some years ago, and for a few days it was feared he had lost the power of speecti. Even today his voice is not what it was before he was hurt. Lapp has tried all sorts of contrivances con-trivances to protect his neck, but in no instance have they proved prac- ticable. A man who comes along with a real Idea will be welcomed by the vast army of backstoppe-rs. Sometimes a mask breJks under the shock of a foul tip, and more than ono catcher has narrowly escaped having his eye permanently Injured. Some backstops, like Billy Sullivan, resolder their masks, but this makes it so heavy it becomes a burden. Catching is, in short, some job. He not only has to give signals, watch every move on the bases, jolly his pitcher and block runners off the plate, even though it means danger from spikes, but he is so loaded down by equipment that he is a walking fortress. |