Show Z IL f OS aar ANGELES rt I 1 read recently I 1 that old mose grove had signed KIS contract with the red sox ii old moses sixteenth major league eague contract he signed his first one with rh the athletics 1 way away back in 1925 he ie was 25 years old then and had come aup jup to the big show latter five e years in baltimore the late jack dunn had kept him in baltimore R for five years be cause in those days the orioles ruled grantland the international rice league as the yankees rule the american league now it was good business for jack to hold onto his ball players for a few years they pulled in the crowds at the turnstiles turn stiles they won pennants and little world series and the longer they remained in baltimore V the more eager the major league club owners were to buy them and the bigger the price they brought jack bentley joe boley max x bishop grove all brought box car I 1 figures when dunn one of baseballs shrewdest traders sent them to market grove brought 1 I dont know what the was for or amusement tax possibly offered to mcgraw at the time the story was and so far as I 1 know it may have been true that john mcgraw had turned dunn down when he offered the big 1 left eft hander to the giants that happened in 1925 the price was with perhaps a little off for the giants but mcgraw paying for a pitcher in 1925 ue he had just won four pen W MOSE GROVE nants in a row thereby cracking an all time record for the major leagues and it looked as though he might go on from there so he interested te at any rate the story the yankees cousin meanwhile durn dunn had haa some sort of agreement with connle connie mack that called for him in the natural course of events to send his better players over the short line from baltimore to philadelphia and in the spring of 1925 grove arrived at the training camp of the athletics he was young eager and tireless he had a strong back and a rubber arm but he a pitcher he was a thrower he won 10 games in 1925 13 in 1926 and 20 in 1927 those were the years in which he was a first cousin to the yankees in the ball players argot a cousin is a pitcher that the hitters like to face and there a pitcher in the american league the yankees liked any better than grove all they had to do was to wait him out or hurry him arid ard then slug him As he acquired poise he became more effective not only against the other clubs but against the yankees as well his figures in the victory column mounted he won 24 games in 1928 slipped to 20 in 1929 rose to 28 in 1930 and to 31 in 1931 he won 25 in 1932 and although he dropped to 24 in 1933 he led the league again as he had in 1928 1930 and 1931 in the winter of 1933 he was sold to the red sox for in 1934 he had trouble with his cism arm and won only eight games while losing as many and it was right after that that he became a real pitcher he was forced to outthink out think the batters and in doing that he became one of the greatest pitchers in the history of baseball learning how hoto to pitch the time had come when he be had to do more than just rear back stretch out and whip that fireball at the hitters the old blaze had bad died out in his fast ball lie he fool the hitters with it any more he had to do something he done before ile he had to stop and think to haudy the hitters and develop a curve ball a change of pace ball and a slow ball and br brush asb up ov oc his control and when he had done all that be was a pitcher a real vit pitcher cher |