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
Ross Barnes, who held down the second bag, was one of the best ball
players that ever wore a shoe, and I would like to have nine men just
like him right now under my management. He was an all-around man, and I
do not know of a single man on the diamond at the present time that I
regard as his superior. He was a Rockford product, but after his ball
playing days were over he drifted to Chicago and was at the last time I
saw him circulating around on the open Board of Trade.
"Harry" Schafer was a good, all-around player, but I have seen men that
could play third base a good deal better than he could. Sometimes his
work was of a brilliant character, while at others it was but mediocre.
He was a native of Pennsylvania and his usually smiling face and
unfailing fund of good nature served to make him a general favorite
wherever he went.
George Wright, a brother of the lamented Harry, was another splendid
all-around ball player, and one that up to the time that he injured his
leg had no equal in his position, that of shortstop. He was one of the
swiftest and most accurate of throwers, and could pull down a ball that
would have gone over the head of almost any other man in the business,
bounding into the air for it like a rubber ball. As a cricketer he
ranked among the best in the country. Retiring from the ball field, he
became a dealer in sporting goods at Boston, Mass., where he still is,
and where he is reported to have "struck it rich."
Andrew J. Leonard, a product of the Emerald Isle, was brought up in New
Jersey, and excelled as an outfielder, being a splendid judge of high
balls, a sure catch, and a swift and accurate long-distance thrower. He
was a good batsman and a splendid base runner, and was nearly as good a
player on the infield as in the out. He is at present in Newark, N. J.,
where he is engaged in business and reported as fairly successful.
Cal C. McVey, the heavy-weight of the team, came like myself from the
broad prairies of Iowa, and was built about as I am, on good, broad
Western lines. He was a fairly good outfielder, but excelled either as a
catcher or baseman. He was conscientious and a hard worker, but his
strongest point was his batting, and as a wielder of the ash he had at
that time few superiors. He is somewhere in California at the present
writing, and has money enough in his pocket to pay for at least a
lodging and breakfast, and does not have to worry as to where his dinner
is to come from.
Young Kent, the Harvard College man, who took Jim White's place on the
trip, was a tall, rangy fellow and a good amateur ball player. He never
joined the professional ranks, but since his graduation has written
several books, and made himself quite a reputation in literary circles.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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