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Show SERIOUS BALL PLAYER Frank Snyder of Cardinals 13 Greatest Catcher in Game. Discarded New Automobile Because It Interfered With Batting Smiled Once When Donlin Tried to Get His Goat. Frank Snyder of the Cardinals is the greatest catcher in baseball today, bar none. John McGraw says so, and there are few fans who have seen Snyder Sny-der play who will deny what McGraw says in this case. A little incident previous to the departure de-parture of the Cardinals on their last trip east last fall indicates why Snyder Sny-der is a great ball player and why he means to stay one. says Sporting News. Several St. Louis ball players had bought automobiles. Snyder hadn't given the buzz wagons much attention, but he finally got to thinking about it, so one day he took a walk along automobile au-tomobile row in St. Louis. He hadn't any particular intention of buying, but just thought he would give them the once over. Passing a show window, he saw an -automobile that struck his fancy. He may not have known a carburetor from a friction drive, but the machine had class that even Snyder could fathom. . In he stalked, and pulling his six feet and two inches and his 44 chest up to the approaching salesman, said shortly: short-ly: "How much for that automobile in the window?" "That will cost you two thousand dollars, complete, with all the latest " - . Frank Snyder. and the salesman began to extol the-various the-various advantages of the car. "That's all right. I'll take her," said' Snyder shortly. "Trot her out and. show me how she runs." Snyder learned the points of his machine ma-chine and ran it. for a week or two. One day he appeared al the Cardinal ball park via street car. "Where's the( automobile, Frank?" a. fellow player inquired. "Shipped her home to Texas. Can't" lead the National league In hitting and: catch good ball if I run that thing around," was the answer. Nobody had noticed that Snydor's work had been affected by his automobile auto-mobile driving, but the attitude taken.-by taken.-by the young catcher shows his seriousness seri-ousness of purpose. It's the something in Snyder that wins while other players play-ers fall and complain and seek alibis. They say Frank Snyder never smiled but once, and he seldom talks. That smile came to his lips when Mike Donlin Don-lin tried to get his goat one day by calling him a name no Texan takes. It was a smile terrible to behold. That l II i I "A" ' 'A U ' J J Jj-is . ....vi..--'-"i?f Mike Donlin. Mike Donlin is alive today, or at least ' Is not a cripple for life, Is due to th fact, probably, that Cardinal players who Know Snyder's disposilion anil realized what his short luufth meant for Donlin grabb'-d him bodily., a half dozn or more of them, and ludJ him until Donlin ould escape to tiie club-uou?e.. |
