But on an old campaigner this show of spikes has no effect whatever. The capable basemen in the League know how to cover the bag so as to get the runner out and still give him room to come in without hurting any one. In spite of an impression that prevails to the contrary, ball-players never spike a man on purpose. At present, I don't believe there is a runner in the National League who would cut down another man if he had the opportunity. If one man does spike another accidentally, he is heartily sorry, and often such an event affects his own playing and his base running ability. The feet-first slide is now more in vogue in the Big Leagues than the old head-first coast, and I attribute this to two causes. One is that the show of the spikes is a sort of assurance the base runner is going to have room to come into the bag, and the second is that the great amount of armor which a catcher wears in these latter days makes some such formidable slide necessary when coming into the plate. If a base runner hits a catcher squarely with his shin guards on, he is likely to be badly injured, and he must be sure that the catcher is going to give him a clear path. Some catchers block off the plate so that a man has got to shoot his spikes at them to get through, and I'm not saying that it's bad catching, because that is the way to keep a man from scoring. Make him go around if possible. But the game has changed in the last few years as far as intentional spiking goes. Many a time, when I first started with the Giants, I heard a base runner shout at a fielder: "Get out of the way there or I'll cut you in two!" And he would not have hesitated to do it, either. That was part of the game. But nowadays, if a player got the reputation of cutting men down and putting star players out of the game intentionally, he would soon be driven out of the League, probably on a stretcher. When John Hummel of the Brooklyn club spiked Doyle in 1908, and greatly lessened the Giants' chances of winning the pennant, which the club ultimately lost, he came around to our clubhouse after the game and inquired for Larry. When he found how badly Doyle was cut, he was as broken up as any member of our team. "If I'd known I was goin' to cut you, Larry, I wouldn't have slid," he said. "That's all right," answered Doyle. "I guess I was blockin' you." Ball-players don't say much in a situation of that kind. But each one who witnessed the incident knew that when Doyle doubled down, spiked, most of our chances of the pennant went down with him, for it broke up the infield of the team at a most important moment. It takes some time for a new part to work into a clock so that it keeps perfect time again, no matter how delicate is the workmanship of the new part. So the best infielder takes time to fit into the infield of a Big League club and have it hit on all four cylinders again.