| Show THE THE NATIONAL GAME The great groat American game of ot base baseball baseball baseball ball is in higher favor this year than at nt any period In tho the history of the sport as the attendance records of the tile big league games show The teams seem to be more evenly matched than ever over before and the quality of the tho baseball played Is higher To the lover of the game nothing could be bemore bemore bemore more Interesting than those big league loague races The leading teams In both hoth are separated by only a n few tew points in the percentage table Although tho the season la Is more than half hatt over no leam has a commanding lead none is 18 sure of win winning winnIng winning ning the tha pennant Tho Tile uncertainty of baseball the great variety of possible plays the fact that no two games are alike nUke are all con contributing contrIbuting contributing I factors to the popularity of the tho sport A baseball writer said the other day dap that he once sat down and figured out something like different baseball The Th very next day dap he went to see seo a a game and a play came up that In his list Of Ot course he exaggerated the number of ot possibilities but nobody has ever com corn compiled complIed piled plIed an accurate table of ot them Another curious thing is the tho fact tact that thata a team that stands near the bottom of the list often gives the leaders of ot the league their hardest battle There is the Chicago nine of 01 the American league A few tew weeks ago it stood fifth In the tile race Now thanks to a 0 spurt of ot playing It stands third and Is reckoned a possible pennant winner Chicago recently won five straight games from Philadelphia the leader of the tile league and the champion chr nine of ot last year Baseball is such a fair manly sport that It deserves Its place as a the American national sport It has fewer chances for trickery for tor crooked play playing playing ing bIg and rough work than any other athletic sport Ball Ban players are drafted from every walk of 01 life UCe but the player who is dishonest in the sense of ot being willing for a bribe or other reason to deliberately throw a lL game Is a rarity It would be hard Indeed for a single player to throw a game for the reason that there are eight other men on the diamond 41 iamond who are arc equally Important to the success of ot the team In all the history of baseball not a n dozen men of ot prominence have been blacklisted for dishonorable work that saying a good deal for tor a sport in which thousands of ot men have first and last lost been engaged Can any business or profession show a n better record |
