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TTEATtST’S RI’XPA V VMKRTCAN’ BASEBALL AND OTHER SPORTS. SUNDAY. MAY 25, 1013.
13 D
AN RANKS GEORGIA AND ALABAMA EVEN
How Coach Heisman
Classifies Teams
Class A
[ Alabama
(.Georgia
( Auburn
Clem3on
Tech
(Mercer
Class C J Vanderbilt
Sewauee
(Mississippi A. & M.
(Florida
Class D < Wofford
(L. S. U.
| Tennessee
Jeff Can Sing Hawaiian and All That Stuff
c8o
C&J
C&J
By “Bud” Fisher
Class £
j Tulane
j Millsaps
(Citadel
By .T. W.- Heisman.
(Famous Coach of the Tech Team.)
T HE man who would seriously at
tempt the pleasantry of award
ing a baseball championship of
the S. I. A. A. for the season of 1913
soon to close needs be a daring spirit
—a man much braver than myself.
Never within my somewhat
lengthy recollection has the matter
of a proper ranking of the teams at
the season’s end been in such a fear
fully messed-up condition as this
year, and no one with any right to
speak with authority of the subject
has, so far as I know, been so fool
hardy as to attempt a definite pro
nouncement on the subject.
As has often been explained before,
there is no* such thing as a real
championship of the S. I. A. A., and
this holds good even in football. But
in the latter sport the teams come
much nearer to playing a common
schedule of games, and for other rea
sons as well it is much more easy
to predicate the strongest team of the
year than can be the oa^e in base
ball.
Some years it has been satisfac
tory to all to award a tentative cham
pionship in baseball to that team
which had not lost a single series
during the season. This plan would
never do in professional baseball, for-
it is not series won and lost that
count here, but the mere number of
individual games won and lost.
But while the percentage plan of
individual games won and lost is
eminently satisfactory in figuring out
a pennant winner in a professional
league it will rarely do in the^-S. I.
A. A., for the reason that the 22 mem
bers do not play the same number of
games, the same opponents, the same
number at home and abroad, etc.
It comes to this, that unless one
team nas made such a stunning and
practically unsmirched record as rea
sonably puts it out of the class
of all the rest of the teams in the
association a just disposition of the
title “Champions” is out of the ques
tion. This really happens with rea
sonable frequency, but it certainly
has not happened this year, and
hence no uncontested assignment of
the title is likely to be made by any
one. Still, a careful review of the
work of the various teams, and a
painstaking contrasting of that work
should not be without profit.
* * *
/CONSIDERING the percentages
they have rolled up from the
particular teams they have encoun -
tered, it is clear that the figures for
Georgia and for Alabama loom up the
largest. Prior to the Tech series
with Georgia, the Athenians had suf
fered but two defeats in the S. 1/
A. A., and that was the size also of
Alabama’s defeats. Georgia’s per
centage was nevertheless a shade
higher than Alabama’s for the reason
that the Red and Black had played,
and therefore won, more games than
had the Tuscaloosans.
It was also true that the two de
feats suffered by Alabama were at'
the hands of th§_ Georgians them
selves; so that, it' appeared, when it
came to direct matching, the Ala
bama team seemed to be a bit in
ferior to the Georgia team. On the
other hand, this was sofnewbat offs a.
by the fact that the two gam'es be
tween the two had been played in
Athens and, further, that nearly all
of Georgia’s S. 1. A. A. games had
been played on home grounds, while
about seven of Alabama’s games ha I
been played aivgy from home.
But now that the smoke of th-
Tech-Georgia series has also clearer
away, there does appear considerable
ground for Alabama’s insistent plea
that they have a better claim to firs:
honors than has Georgia, for now the
records show that Georgia has lost
five S. I. A. A. games, while Alabama
has still lost only two. To go with
this, Georgia has won 13 S. I. A.
A. games, while Alabama has woh
11 such. Unfortunately, these did no.
include for Georgia victories over
Mercer, Sewanee or Mississippi A.
and M., while Alabama’s wins fail to
include contests with Auburn, Clerri-
eon or Sewanee. Tn other words,
there is no real basis of oomparls >a
tva liable.
'What seeming advantage on a per-
lentage basis Alabama enjoys may
disappear when it encounters un
derbill on the 26th and 27th; but on
the other hand it must be remem
bered again that Alabama is going to
have the advantage in these games, in
that they will be played on home
grounds.
If we stop to see what effect figur
ing in nnn-S. I. A. A. games would
have on the records of the teams vve
find that it will not help matters
much for Georgia to have recourse to
this expedient, for while it is true
It w On some additional four games
from such teams, it also lost . three
fc-.apie'i to such teams. Alabama, on
cne other hand, has. played four non -
*4. i. a A. college games and won
them all. (Of course, games with
professionals and prep school teams
are not being considered at ail in this
connection.)
I have'gone at some length into a
comparison of the work cf these
teams, not merely -because they seem
to have had, on the whole, the best
records for rhe season, but also to il-i
’ hist rath* to the reader what the coni-j
l-ihatlons are in the way of a sensible
OH ocy- IT SMS HFfcE THAT A
Real Hawaiian prwmcfs^
IS IM TtnvN ArsP TKat
■ \<£\\C <aOE~£ THROUGH THE
RtsRK EVEP-Y NIORrsiMGi
f-OR A TTColL "
i born To hobnob
with The blue bloods-
I LL. JUST DOLL up
AND WHEN THAT l-AOY
THLN'RE LAI F V W
MUSIC.. I JUi~) tfcotiAlVT **<//. •y/
THfc OLD GuiiyvK along 1
HARH ! 1 HfAR HER. 1 "
conning and shes _ , „
.Sinaing omi: of I
AATivE DIT‘1
SILK HAT HARRY’S DIVORCE SUIT
Curiosity Once Killed a Female of the Species
• •
• •
Copyright. 1913, International Newa Service.
:: By Tad
Oft GEE vjd.KO CAM THAT BE V'
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OH YOU RE AWAKE."
SA~f THE HALL BOV
GaME ME THIS- GAlD
ranking; and not alone for these two
teams, but for others in the associa
tion, for the difficulties for all are
similar in character in all respects.
* * *
Dl’T while a view of the unclothed
percentages of Georgia and Ala
bama seem to show them up in the
most favorable light of all the S. I. A.
A. teams, there are not lacking those
who claim places for other teams
alongside these two. Thus some Au-
bumites claimed'before the Clemson-
Auburn • series that those battles
would settle second place.
If they did, then Clemson is entitled
to second filace and either Georgia or
Alabama would have to step down off
the pedestal and let the Tigers jump
up. But just to show you how dif
ferently the same things can look to
different people, here is Coach Dob
son/who says, that if Tech took the
series from Georgia then the Yellow
Jackets were entitled to the pennant.
So where are we at, and where do
we all get off?
As for the Techites. they are not
splitting anybody’s ears with any
kind*of claims in particular. And yet,
in justice, what deserts they have
should be spread out for public in
spection as well as those of other
ted ms.
Now, Tech has won nine and lost
seven, all S. J. A. A. games. This will
not met so high a percentage as sev
eral other teams can boa?st of; but
wait a minute. In the first place, an
even half of these games were played
away from home, and that is much
more along this line than any other
of the prominent teams can say.
Again, of the seven defeats en
countered, four were by one run only,
one was by two runs only, and two
were by three runs only. In other
words, no team has run plumb away
from t<he Yellow Jackets in a single
encounter, as did Georgia from Ala
bama. Also, Tech suffered two of its
one-run defeats directly thi’ough the
vile luck of having both its catchers
knocked out, one in each game at Au.
burn, by having their light hands se
verely injured ddring the course of the
two games. Hat} these accidents not
happened, or* not happened on the
road where their other catchers were
not available, it might have made
all the difference in the world with
their season’s record.
And yet another thing or two: Tech
was the only team in or out of the
association that could take the series
from Clemson, and the only one that
could take a series from Georgia. She
was the only team that could win
more than one from the Georgians on
their own campus; and it was the
only one that fairly decimated Sewa
nee this season.
Likewise, it is worth pointing out
that Tech’s schedule showed no weak
teams on it like Birmingham College,
Florida, Tennessee, Tulane, S. W. I*.
1*:. Southwestern Texas, Washington
and Lee, etc. No, theiys were all stiff
opponent*;.
Yet against them all Tech scored
fiO runs to opponents’ 45, which is
pr-'tfy good.
So when you come to think it a!l ;
over, it becomes apparent that Coach
Dobson had some slight ground, to
say the least, for ranking Tech first.
* * *
A UBURN’S record is* excellent—so
far as it goes. The trouble is it
doesn’t go far enough; for the only
teams it encountered worth talking
much about were Georgia, Mercer,
Tech and Clemson. Now, to two of
these four it lost ; so that a good-look
ing percentage built up largely from
the other small-fry on their 1913
schedule doesn’t spell much, after all.
No one can deny that the team
looked good; but of the two series it
won out of the four named above, oi/'
was played entirely on home grounds,
the other entirely on neutral grounds,
and even of the two loK one was
played entirely on home grounds.
* # *
A ND right here let us analyze Clem-
son’s status on the season’s work:
Xo one can think more highly than do
1 of what the South Carolinians ac
complished this spring. Not only did
they win their State pennant with a
clean percentage of 1,000, but they
took the series from Auburn on for
eign grounds, beat North Carolina and
tied Trinity. They also broke even
with Georgia, though this was on
home grounds.
. The. discounts come in when we note
that neither North Carolina nor Trin
ity had teams of usual caliber this
year, apd that none of the South Car
olina teams, outside of Clemson, are
in a baseball class with the usual run
of S. I. A. A. teams. And, of course,
Clemson dropped two straight to
Tech.
But the main difficulty in assigning
any given place to Clemson lies in the
fact that all told they only played
seven gardes in the S. I. A. A. Of
these it won three and lost four. Its
outside opponents, being of unknown
caliber, offer as little basis for a criti
cal estimate within the S. h A. A. fold
as would a consideration of the prep
and professional games that oth*r S
'I. A. A. teams have played.
And so it goes.
* * *
N OW, if anyone can make bead or
tail, fins or feet qut of this
thrice-jumbled situation they have
everybody’s permission to “go to it.”
For me, the job is ■strictly “taboo.”
1 do not mind saying that in my
opinion, considering records generally,
as well as wha\ I saw of the actual
play of the various teams, that Ala
bama and Georgia deh«erve to rank a
shade higher than any other of the
S. I. A. A. teams.
One further step—taken with some
hesitation—and I find myself putting
Auburn, Clemson and Tech in ('lass
B, just below the other two. Beyond
this the path appears to me. to be
blocked up solidly.
* * *
M ERCER'S chief claim to distinc
tion lies in the fact that it took
two out of three from Tech. But as it
won only six college games, while los
ing eleven—if my records have it right
—it seems plain that the Baptists will
n«ot demJirid a ranking above the five
already considered.
* * *
\TAXDERBIT.T has thus far won five
* and lost eight, all told. There
yet remain on their schedule three
games with Alabama at Tuscaloosa,
hut even if they take two out of the
three, which is unlikely, their record*
will still keep them in the.'“second di
vision.”
• * *
CO far as 1 am familiar with it,
^ Sevvanee’s record for the season
is just about on a par with Vander
bilt’s. The latter won their series
with Tennessee, while Sewanee lost
to the Volunteers in the one game that
was played. Vanderbilt and Sewanee
are yet to come together, and if tlie
Commodores win from Sewanee they
will be champions of Tennessee; but
if they lope to the Tigers 1 suppose
there will be nothing about that
championship either.
* * *
'"TENNESSEE has a brand new team
1 and not much was to be expected
from it. They appear to have been
very weak, losing to Michigan, Van
derbilt, Georgia and others, with little
to chalk up on th> credit side.
1Y/T ISS1SS1PF1 A. A: M. had a fair
team, but it also ranks below
the A and tlie B classifications, as I
have styled them. True, they won
two out of three to Vanderbilt, and
took the series from Tulane. hut they
lost five straight to Alabama.
* • *
p I.OR1DA, Birmingham. Tulane and
J Louisiana all had teams rather
below par.
...
IF you should ask my opinion of the
1 the strength of the teams as they
were playing at the very end of the
season it would not take me long to
say that no team was going stronger
than Tech, to say the least. I do not
believe that Georgia was falling off
any in its play; there was no reason
why it should fall off. The men
were all in good condition, still full
of ambition, better backed and key
ed than they had been for any other
preceding game, and I think played
the best ball they were able to play
against Tech.
Vet they went down before the
Technicals in no uncertain manner.
This might have been a "flash in the
pan” for Tech had only one game
been played and won by them from
Georgia, but when two are played in
Athens and two in Atlanta the re
sult ceases to be an accident. This
conviction is strengthened by a recol
lection of what Tech did to Sewanee
in the two games immediately pre
ceding the series with Georgia.
Alabama does not as yet seem to
have hit the chutes, but Tech would
give a good deal to get another chop
at them on home or neutral grounds
and right now,
Clemson kept to its stride right
to the finish and would make
it warm for any of them.
* * *
THE best, then, that I can possibly
1 do is not to attempt an indi
vidual ranking of the teams. Instead
I must fall back on a funeral classifi
cation, which comes as near as may
be to expressing my opinion of the
strength of the teams as they playe i
the season through—taking into con
sideration whom they played, how
often they played them, where they
played them, how they came out, and
how they looked in actual perform
ance as a mere playing machine.
BIG EASTERN MEET JUNE 14.
NEW YORK May 24.—The New
York Athletic <’lub will hold its nine
tieth athletic meet on Travers Island
on June 14.
Lowry Arnold a True Sportsman
*1* • v -!••►!- -J* • *1* *1* • d* d* • d* *1* • *1*
Could Have Barred R. Steinmehl
By Tick Tichenor
I F it hadn’t been for Lowry Arnold
the Birmingham Invitation Tour
nament would not have been won
by Rollo Steinmehl.
Of course he beat Lowry in his
very first match but this Is not the
point.
On the afternoon before the qual
ifying round Billy Ward, who was a
member of the Tournament Commit
tee, was in doubt about allowing the
Junior members of the Club to enter
the tournament.
“Lowry,” said he,” we have three
or four Junior members who want to
play in thtv tournament. “They are
boys fourteen, fifteen and sixteen
years old. What do you think about
letting them enter;'
Now if Lowry Arnold had raised
any objection all Junior members
would have been barred from enter
ing. Bui being a big broad-gauge
sportsman Lowry replied. “By all
means,” Billie, "let them enter. If
they are not good enough they will
he beaten. If they are good enough
they ought to win.”
So the matter was settled and the
Junior members entered and Hollo
Steinmehl established a record of
winning the first tournament in w’hich
he ever played.
• * *
H IS victory was the greatest sur
prise, which has ever taken place
in any tournament in the South. It
was a surprise because he was truly
a dark horse. None of the members
of the club knew how well this fif
teen-year-old boy could play. They
knew him because they had often
seen him playing with his father or
had seen him putting on or playing
shots to the tentli and fifteenth
greens, which are almost in his back
yard but none of them ever played
with him. He had turned in no
scores and so wasn’t even on the hand
icap list. When he turned in a score
of seventy-eight it was thought that
he had outplayed himself in the qual
ifying round. When he played his
first match with Lowry Arnold and
won on the fifteenth green most
everybody was surprised but no one
considered that he had a chance of
winning the tournament. The gen
eral Impression was that he was too
young to stand the strain and would
blow up sooner or later. But those
who entertained this idea didn’t know
the kid. In his second round he was
pitted against Billy Ward, a veteran
of many tournaments and who knows
even* break and slope and blade of
grass on the entire course. At the
sixteenth tee Ward was two up with
only three holes to play. Ward had
tlie match almost as good as won but
Steinmehl couldn’t se* it that way ami
by winning the eighteenth managed
to square the match on the eighteenth
green. The nineteenth, twentieth,
twenty-first holes were halved but
he won the twenty-second hole and
the match.
» * •
I N his next match the next morning
1 with H. (’. Wood he had a ding-
dong match all the way round as
neither was ever more than one up
at any time. Wood was one up at
the eighteenth but missed his drive
and lost the hole and the match was
all square. Both got away well from
the tee at the nineteenth but neither
quite reached tho green. Wood’s
second was about ten feet short of
the cup, while Steinmehl was about
four feet beyond the flag. Wood
putted and barely missed his three
but was dead for a four. Steinmehl
put liis ball qftuarc into the back of
the cup but it hopped out and the
hole was halved in four. I was stand
ing where 1 could see his face plain
ly when the putt hopped out and he
didn't change his expression. He
didn’t make a move or say a word.
The putt was just a little too hard
and he knew it. The next hole was
halved. Both drove badly at the
twenty-first but the kid made th»*
better recovery and got his four and
won the hole.
This was the second time he had
been forced to go’extra holes to win
and he had done so w ithout a flicker.
He had proven to all that he knew,
his clubs of W’hich he only carried
four—a driver, a mashte, a mid-iron
and a putter—but would the strain
of tiie gallery, which would follow' the
final have its effect on him. Those
who thought that, it w’ould didn’t
know him. He didn't know that
they were there. He played better
than ever. At the thirteenth he had
bis opponent, J. H. Doughty, four
down with only five holes to play. At
this point Doughty by playing mag
nificent golf succeeded in winning
three of the next four holes and halv
ing the other one and so came to the
eighteenth tee one down witii one to
play.
• • •
T HE ninth and eighteenth fair-
greens are parallel and the green
is a double green—the ninth being to
the right. On his drive Doughty
sliced but his ball just reached the
edge of the ninth green, leaving him
a long run-up shot across the ninth
green to the cup.
Steinmehl sliced badly his ball fi
nally reaching th«- rough to the right
of the ninth' fairgreen. When tfie
ball was found in the rough it was
about fifty yards from the hole. Just
short of the green and about ten
yards from the flag was a large
mound fully ten feet high, which was
in a direct line to the flag and which
had to be carried if the green was
to be reached. In addition to all of
this the ball was lying under a tree
the limbs of which were so low that
the ball had to be kept low in order
to keep from hitting them and yet
the mound had to be carried and the
ball held on a small green.
Picture yourself In such a position
and figure out the shot.
• * •
I WAS standing at the back of the
* ninth green with George Oliver
and we discussed the shot we would
attempt under the same circum
stances. Mr. Oliver was of the opin
ion that he would take an approach
ing cleek and attempt to run the ball
over the mound and take a long
chance of pulling oft* the shot and
getting the green. On the other
hand I was of tlie opinion that it
would be best to play the ball onto
the ninth green and trust to laying
a long approach putt dead and get
ting a half in four. But young
Steinmehl did neither. Using a
mashie, after carefully studying the
shot, he hit the ball awful firmly. It
Just grazed the leaves of the tree,
cleared the mound easily, struck the
green and came to rest about three
feet from the hole. So great was the
amount of cut put upon the ball In
making the shot that it ran less than
three feet after striking the green.
It was a grand shot and one which
Willie Anderson in his day would
have been proud to have pulled off.
It was the best shot, which has
ever been my pleasure to witness.
Girl Magnate Is Now
Forming Ball Club
Miss Ida Schnall Sends Out Call for
Athletically Inclined Girls to
Join Team.
NEW YORK, May 24.—Flock
around, girls, and listen to this.
How often have you envied the
snappy playing of the Giants? How
often have you longed to play ball
yourself, and bewailed the fact that
the girl ball players are about as un
common as a snowy day in July?
Well, here’s a chance for athletically
inclined girls to develop into female
Wagners. Matties and Marquarde.
And don’t forget that “the female of
the specie.s is more deadly.” etc.
Miss Ida Schnall is the boss of the
New York Female Gianta. Back in
1908 she started the team, played ex
hibition games—with male teams—
for charity. Now’ comes Miss Ida
with a new scheme. She will be a
magnate Just like Charley Ebbets and
will spend money. Another nine is to
be formed, and the two teams will
play exhibition games, mostly for
charity’s sake; but of course Ida ad
mits that she doesn’t expect to lose
mor.ey.
Ida Is supposed to be the champion
all-round athlete in these parts. Re
cently she did a diving stunt at the
Winter Garden, but she decided to get
back into the baseball game again.
She has sent out a call for ten girls
who know something of baseball, and
w’ho are there with the muscle and
nerve. So if you’d shine in this com
pany drop a postal to Ida, and Ida will
tell you when to report for duty at
the Bronx oval, where her cohorts are
getting back into trim by practicing
on Sundays.
MARATHON RUNNING IS
SEVERE STRAIN ON BODY
"Football, baseball, rowing, boxing
and some of the other sports all are
a great Mrain on the body/* says Ar<*
thur Du/fey, the former champion am
ateur sprinter.
“They call for the strictest train
ing When 1 was an athlete som4
years ago I was credited with run
ning 100 yards in 9 3-5 seconds. Al
the time it was said such a perform
ance was a terrific strain on the heart
and the muscles of the body, but how
can such a performance be compared
with a Marathon race?
“A Mamthon runner must go
through the most arduous siege od
training. He must be prepared to
stand the gaff for over two and a half
hours of the most nerve-racking ex
perience. He must have, untold nerve.
strength and endurance. There is no
chance for the quitter in this gam*
Yes, no matter what may be said, a
Marathon champion is a champion of
champions.”
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