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Show n mm HELPSBALL CLUBS Many Examples of Losing Nines Winning Pennants and Earning Profit. A change of ownership quite often transforms a losing ball team into a money-maker. The Braves never accomplished much in a financial way until Jim Gaffney purchased them. Then they went right out, grabbed a world's championship for themselves and a huge gob of shekels for "Genial Jeems.M The Phillies rarely made money for their owners before William F. Baker took them unto himself two years or so ago. And then what happened? The Phils fractured a record of more than thirty years standing by winning a pennant. pen-nant. .Incidentally, Baker reaped a golden harvest. Frank Farreil struggled along for years at the Yankee helm without being be-ing able to steer the skiff into a port of financial gain. Then came the Kup-pert-lluston combination of 1915-13, and soon the Yanks began to show a balance on the right side of the ledger. Charlie Vomers owned the Cleveland club for something like fifteen years. Once or twice over that sweep of time the club made money a little. But dtiri n g the balance of' that era it was a box office loser; lost so much mouev that it ate into Vomers 's comfortable fortune. Jim Dunn of Chicago, knowing nothing noth-ing about the business end of baseball, then purchase,! the club, and the Indians, In-dians, to dnte, have outdrawn every outfit in either circuit. They probably will show a greater profit than any other major league club, barring the world's series bat! lers. Out in Cleveland thev still nurse the hope that Cleveland will be one of the battlers. If so, it will add from $10,000 to $100,000 more to Dunn 's profits. Joe Lannin. who hardly knew the difference between a baseball glove and a mask, bought the Red Sox, after the Taylor-Me A leer crowd was removed from the zone of operations. A year or two later tho Sox busted into a world's; series and won the championship. |