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Show STEILjflSat Veteran Baseball Expert Thinks Ivulc Should Bf? j Promptly Changed. By I. E. 6 A N BO R f J . ( China'O 'L'riljuii':. i TLey hfvo Ikoh !. buy this trust vir.ter ind rj,riti ir; to prove; :!).,-y v.-'-re not iolatii; the Hii'.-rni.-iu anL'urut law tliat. hoy ha-.: h;d io fimo to -I'-voto to any thcr tU piirlincit ff I'.roff sioi::.l bacl.nll. That. )h why a m.vib-T- lent su;- j ;-flation.i fi um rV ': rx tyv:c-.i for the mpnvemeiLt of tho yri-on diamond pame lave goiaj unheeded. Ono of t Ik in can be put. in for-i if tiic FUtioball Wirtcrs a.yO'-lalion will Kt bjsy ri tl'no. and th:it is tho abolition of tho :hridwj gift rSt.oU-n ba.-:e. whlr:b lias wen a fctandlns Jui; for a Rood m,'iny i'cars, without any r-csinu.-t oorniiiij out o crab the thiiL,"- Dccurs Vvctiy Often. : I am rtforrintc to th- situation which V-.cura pretty often in thib ninth in-nlni,'. nnver in any otlu-r round. Ono team has ;ho other lickr-d by a i;y her'j from three, r o a (J oie n n i n , wo v. i 1 1 f a; , and tho beaten itam g'..-ts a nmnor on first, with two out, or pof-:lbly only one out, acc!'d-'ncr acc!'d-'ncr to the natur.,- of the p;uv.e. Nobody "n the winning team pays the slifThteat attention at-tention to ibu biio runner under such -onditiT-s. The lirst baseman plays ha-k in sho? t ripht fiftld, just aa if the bases were impty, and the plicher ftkeii tho same long windup that he would if there wove nobody on the packs. The lone tally represented rep-resented by that Ktr&y runner is not worth a. fractional part of a Russian war bond. Iinr;e the nonchalance with which the wtn-nirifir wtn-nirifir team regards the b:ie runner. The result la that he frequently steals eeeond and third based, and occasionally steals home, while tile winning- learn is getting" t.lie side out. Play Only for Batsman. That ia all right from the winners' allele. all-ele. The run Is worthless, anyway, and they are merely playing" for the batsman, so as to pet the side out. A score of 7 to .'J Is no 1-etter than oae of 7 to 4, according accord-ing to their dope.. And tho ball playcr.i' rlopo fa rif,ht, because a victory is a victory, vic-tory, and 1 to 0 Is jnat like 1U to 20 in the major herue standings. Mean time a base runner has acquired frorri two to three unearned stolen bases because of his good fortune in getting on first after a game was sewed up. And in a season of 140 games that may mean a lot to the fortunate cusses w ho got on base under those condition.o. Base Stealing Art Lost. The bapc-stealing ort liaa come to be a lost one, in a way, because of the prevalence preva-lence of tho hit and run game, and yet every fall one read; the official averages ) and discovers that somebody has led the league in thievery. He is immediately disposed to ask for an inereaeo in salary because of his baso-r. inning ability, and ithore is no way to check up the official averages 1o ascertain how many of his stolen br sps wero handed out with the best wishes of the opposing pitcher and infielders in a game that was won or iost so far that one run -was of no account.- I do not believe it is overestimai ing this evil to pay that I see at least a dozen of these gratuitous stolen bases in a season. And I am able to look at only one game out of tho eight that are played every day in the major leagues when 'the weather permits. Multiplying a dozen bv eight gives nearly a hundred of those joke stolen bases In a season to the major league players. And there ought to be some way to rule them out. The existing scoring rules give no one a chanco to eliminate tb giJ't steal. I do not know just how the rules could be worded to eliminate them, but if the members of tho writers' association would simply agree among themselves to use common sense and refuse to credit a stolen base to a man who is allowed to advance without opposition from his antagonists, an-tagonists, because of a lop-sided score in the final inning, the worst part of the abuse could be corrected. |