A Ball Player's Career: Being the Personal Experiences and Reminiscensces of Adrian C. AnsonAnson, Adrian C. (Adrian Constantine)
History
A Ball Player's Career: Being the Personal Experiences and Reminiscensces of Adrian C. Anson
Anson, Adrian C. (Adrian Constantine)
Baseball
The Chicago team for that season consisted of A. Gumbert, Hutchinson,
Luby, Miller, Hollister and Meekin, pitchers; Kittridge and Schriver,
catchers; Anson, first base; Canavan and Decker, second base; Dahlen and
Parrott, third base; Dahlen and Cooney, shortstop; Ryan, Dugan, Wilmot
and Decker in the outfield. The majority of these were green players,
as compared with the seasoned material of which some of the other League
clubs boasted, and it was only by switching them about from one position
to another that it was possible to tell where they best fitted.
Although I had signed six pitchers at the beginning of the season, there
were but three of them that fulfilled my expectations, viz., Gumbert,
Hutchinson and Luby, and of these three Hutchinson did the lion's share
of the work, pitching in no less than seventy of the one hundred and
fifty-six games that we played. The team was not an evenly balanced one,
however, and though it boasted of some individuals that were away above
the average yet it lacked the ability and practice to play as a team and
consequently finished the season in seventh place, Boston again carrying
off the pennant with 102 games won and 48 lost, while Cleveland came
second with 93 won and 56 lost, Brooklyn being third, Philadelphia
fourth, Cincinnati fifth, Pittsburg sixth, Chicago seventh, New York
eighth, Louisville ninth, Washington tenth, St. Louis eleventh and
Baltimore last.
I remember one rather queer incident that occurred during that season,
and while we were playing in Boston. Henry E. Dixey, the actor, who was
then playing a summer engagement at the "Hub," had driven out to the
grounds as usual in his buckboard, with his pet bull terrier "Dago" in
the seat beside him. Dixey always retained a seat in his rig and took up
his place right back of the left field. Dixie had not been on the ground
more than twenty minutes when Dahlen swiped the ball for a three-bagger.
It was one of those long, low, hard drives, and sailed about ten feet
over the left fielder's head and in a direct line for Dixey. He couldn't
have gotten out of the way had he tried, but the fact was that he didn't
see it coming, and the first he knew of it was when he heard a sharp
yelp at his side and saw poor "Dago" tumbling off his seat between the
wheels.
The dog was dead when picked up, the ball having broken his neck.
Between the yellow buckboard, the dead canine, the frightened horses and
Dixey's excitement the whole field was in an uproar and it was fully ten
minutes before we could get down to playing again, but Dahlen, the cause
of it all, didn't even see the affair and scored on the death of "Dago,"
his being the only genuine case of making a dog-gone run that has ever
come under my observation.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
Reviews
Reviews
No reviews yet
Be the first to share your thoughts on this work.
Elsewhere in the archive
Join the Discussion
Join the discussion
Sign in to leave a comment or review.
Sign InorCreate an account