Spalding's Baseball Guide and Official League Book for 1895
History
Spalding's Baseball Guide and Official League Book for 1895
Baseball -- Periodicals
There is a great difference between first-class single figure games,
marked by batting against skilful, strategic pitching, backed up by
splendid in and outfield support, and the class of contests known as
"pitchers' games." The former are contests in which runners reaching
second and even third base by good hits are cut off from scoring runs by
superior pitching and fielding, and this class of games comprises the
model contests of each season. On the other hand, the "pitchers' games,"
which yield single figure scores, are tedious and wearisome to the best
judges of the game, from the fact that the brunt of the work falls on
the "battery" team and one or two infielders, all the attractions of
base running and of sharp fielding being sacrificed at the cost of
seeing batsman after batsman retired on called strikes, arising from the
intimidating speed of the pitching, this requiring the batsman to devote
his whole energies to defending himself from the severe and often fatal
injuries following his being hit by the pitched ball. Fortunately, the
change in the distance between the pitcher and batsman has decreased the
opportunity for this class of unattractive games. But it will not do to
go over to the other side and by too much weakening of the box work give
the "line-'em-out" class of "fungo" hitters a chance to revel in
over-the-fence hits, and give the batsman undue preponderance in the
effort to equalize the powers of the attack and defense in the
game. Single figure games should outnumber double figure contests to
make the game attractive for the scientific play exhibited, but not in
the line of being the result of "cyclone" pitching.
The Umpiring of 1894.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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