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Show LADYLIKE TREND OF BALL GAMES Calm Replaces Fire and Dash of Old-Time Giants. Baseball fans with a memory long ; enough to extend back to the day ',en John McGraw was "Muggsy" and his New York Giants took batting practice on the jaws of their opponents, oppo-nents, took occasion recently to lament the "ladylike" trend of the modern game. When Roger Bresnahan, celebrated in his playing days as one of the flghtingest of the fighting Giants, asked the Pittsburgh police for protection pro-tection during their recent series in the home town of the Pirates, the old timers lamented the reformation of the last survivor of the old time warriors. war-riors. McGraw established a new order of things when he hurled tie "Muggsy" part of his character, tucked away the uniform that had heen so familiar on the coaching lines and went into mufti to lead his team from the bench. Larry Doyle reached the end of his big league playing days and Art Fletcher graduated into the Job of manager. "Oil" Smith, a scrappy young catcher, who had heard of the old fighting Giants and tried to keep the reputation going, was turned loose and the other members of the team were warned that umpire baiting bait-ing and fist-fighting were not essential essen-tial qualifications of a ballplayer. In his fighting days McGraw, no doubt was following a natural inclination in-clination that came from the old Baltimore Bal-timore Oriole school to be a doormat :i fx ' . x m Hi k i : X J " i Manager John J. McGraw. for no man and to fight for etery point. But his belligerence also may have been a by-product of an equally natural leaning toward showmanship. The Giants always drew well on the road regardless of the class of their club. The fans saved their money to visit the ball park when the Giants were there to razz the scrappy manager man-ager and sit in on a few fights that were always threatened and many times materialized. In his maturing days, the fighting nature of McGraw softened as might be expected. Old men, as baseball rates men of McGraw's years, do not have the fire and the spirit of youth and they are not quickly aroused. They learn from experience to think first before swinging. McGraw's reformation, however, was purely' practical. No doubt he still has an occasional inclination to chastise chas-tise an umpire or have his players do it for him but as a man In thp business busi-ness of winning pennants he knows that a star ball player on the bench under suspension is of no value to the club. |