The Sporting Chronicles, Vol. I. No. 6, Monday, November 3, 1919: Dartmouth and Colgate Tie 7 to 7

The Mays case, which Justice Wagner’s injunction against Ban Johnson brought to a head last week, has now reached the world’s series money. The National Commission has held up the third-place share. Chairman Herrmann and President Heydler, signing for the Commission at Cincinnati on Wednesday, ruled on the protest of the Detroit club against payment of it to the New York Americans, and decided to withhold the money until the courts hand down a decision in the dispute. The Sun prints their notice as a short box. The decision, the Commission says, does not conflict with the restraining orders issued against Johnson and the Detroit club. The dispute grew out of the Mays case.

Colonels Ruppert and Huston issued a statement on the same day. They will immediately demand that the Commission pay their players their share, and Underwood, in a column and a half in the Sun, says the demand will avail little until a court rules. Justice Wagner’s decision, they say, establishes the position they were forced to take when they left Johnson at the Holland House. Their fight, they write, has not been for Mays alone but for the property rights of the club owner against encroachment by the league president. They answer a paper they call Johnson’s organ, which says the game could not go on without him, and they cite Wagner that the president has no authority over the clubs. We have seen no word from Johnson in reply.

THE SPITBALL

Ban Johnson has recommended to the National Commission that the spitball and all freak deliveries be abolished, and Underwood reports in Saturday’s Sun that quick and favorable action is likely. We do not know where or when Johnson made the recommendation. Heydler says the National League declared itself against the spitter long ago, and that Johnson’s step indicates the American League has come around to the National’s way of thinking. The Joint Rules Committee’s rule, he says, must be a drastic one, forbidding a pitcher to moisten his hand or glove, or to rub the ball on his person, uniform or the dirt.

Ebbets is strongly for abolition of the spitball, emery ball, talcum ball and shine ball, but would let the veteran spitball pitchers continue for one season so that they may learn something else, and bar the newcomers at once. McGraw says a good pitcher needs no spitter. John Foster, the Giants’ secretary, calls it unsanitary, and Wilbert Robinson wires that anything will suit him. Colonel Huston and Harry Sparrow of the Yankees would say only that they would follow Huggins.

THE TALK ABOUT THE SERIES

Collyer’s Eye, the Chicago betting weekly, kept its promise of last week and on Saturday named the White Sox it says are cleared: Eddie Collins, Weaver, Kerr, John Collins, Liebold and Schalk, who, its correspondent Frank O. Klein writes, came out of the series “clean as a hound’s tooth.” He says Comiskey, through his secretary, has repeated that he means to sift the matter to the bottom and that his offer of $10,000 is made in good faith, and that he himself believes the Sox owner knew nothing of any plot. The paper refuses the reward for itself, and Klein offers, if Comiskey will deposit the money with the Foreman Brothers Banking Company of Chicago, to lay the evidence he has gathered before a committee of three, of which Comiskey is to be one. He mentions rumors that Federal authorities have taken an interest. We have not seen any other paper take the story up.

RUTH TO PLAY FIRST BASE ON THE COAST

Last week we printed Ruth’s demand for $20,000 and his statement that he would not play for Boston without it, with the Los Angeles moving pictures to go with it. President Frazee tells Underwood, in Friday’s Sun, that he is worried about Ruth but that it is not about salary; he says Ruth will live up to his contract, and any difficulty over money will be settled. The Sun reports that Ruth has signed with the Vernon club of the Southern California winter league to play first base, and will not appear in the moving pictures; Frazee says that if Ruth tries to deal with the picture people he will have court proceedings to face. Frazee thinks the position hazardous, since the infield work risks an injury to the club’s biggest drawing card. The Sun says the contract has two years to run. We have seen no report on the sale of the Red Sox.

FROM THE CLUBS

Jimmy Ring of the Reds expects a substantial increase, and says Manager Moran told him to meet him at the National League’s annual meeting, in December, to sign his contract for next year. Dunn of Cleveland says his club would have won the pennant with two more weeks, and that he has no changes and no one to sell or trade; Speaker is looking for a left-hander. Heydler says the National League averages will be ready for the printer within ten days, but that because of the strike they may not appear for several weeks. The Giants will probably not go to Gainesville in the spring, a club official says, and McGraw will announce the place. Connie Mack is likely to take the Athletics to Texas.

Lieb, in the Sun yesterday, writes that .300 hitters are becoming rare: Cobb heads the list with fourteen such seasons, Speaker and Jackson with ten.

NEW YORK, Nov. 2.—The Lincoln Giants and Guy Empey’s Treat ’Em Roughs divided a double-header at Dyckman Oval last Sunday, before what the Sun calls the record crowd of the season. The Lincolns won the first game, 8 to 5, and hit Barnes and Tesreau for fifteen hits; Williams, who pitched for them, struck out ten. The second was called after five innings for darkness, with Empey’s the winners, 6 to 0. The same teams were to play again to-day for what the papers call the semi-professional championship of Manhattan, and the Lincolns were billed with the Springfields at Recreation Park, Long Island City, on Saturday.

At Ebbets Field last Sunday the Bacharach Giants met the International Stars in the Stars’ series, and the Sun says the pitchers’ duel between Enzmann, of the Cleveland Americans, and Wickware was a sterling one. We have not found the scores. They were to meet again to-day, with the same pitchers named. We have still no report of Hilldale’s game with Summers’s All-Americans on October 18, nor of Rube Foster’s games at Kansas City.

The Negro weeklies that have come to hand this week, the Kansas City Sun and the Cleveland Gazette of Saturday, print no sport; the Sun has one school score, Lincoln Institute of Jefferson City, 13, Lincoln High School of East St. Louis, 3. We have no football score from Howard, Hampton, Lincoln or Wilberforce.

Dempsey still has no match, but he has a proposal. Dave MacKay of Newark has two dates in view, New Year’s afternoon and Washington’s Birthday, and he leans to Fred Fulton, the Plasterer, the Sun says: he is in cable communication with Tom O’Rourke, and has made Fulton an offer and awaits a reply. The Sun’s ring column says that he would pay Fulton more than he would pay Meehan or Levinsky, and its writer doubts the fighting spirit of Fulton, who was knocked out in eighteen seconds at Harrison. Willie Meehan, who had announced a match with Dempsey for December 8, was the subject of a misunderstanding, the Sun writes; MacKay had only asked his terms. Kearns left for Chicago with the opponent open, and told MacKay to pick one and make a concrete proposal.

The Sun of Tuesday had Dempsey’s circus tour proving less profitable than expected, and Kearns in town to arrange a fight or two; Kearns would like Beckett for New Orleans at Mardi Gras in March, which Beckett is not likely to accept, and Dempsey and Kearns say Beckett must come here, while Beckett says the American must go to London. Beckett and Carpentier will meet at the Holborn Stadium in London on Thursday, December 4, Cochran says, as Olympia is not free until May.

MILWAUKEE, Nov. 1.—Johnny Dundee and Willie Jackson boxed ten rounds on Friday night, with no decision allowed, and the Sun says Dundee got the popular decision. Jackson had the early rounds, and Dundee shook him up several times in the last four. On the same card Tommy Perry of Chicago, a bantam, was knocked out in the last round of a ten-round bout by Sammy Marino of New York, and his skull was fractured. He recovered consciousness on Saturday afternoon and the chances of his recovery are said to be good. Marino was held at the Central station and then released, to hold himself at the disposal of the police. We have seen no report that the Hartford bout between Leonard and Dundee was held: Dundee boxed at Milwaukee on Friday and is to box Tuohey at Newark on election night, and Leonard is billed with Soldier Bartfield at the Arena in Jersey City on November 10.

TULSA, Okla., Nov. 1.—Sam Langford and Harry Wills are to meet at Convention Hall on Wednesday night, November 5, fifteen rounds to a decision, for what the Tulsa World calls the world’s Negro championship. The match is staged by the Tulsa Athletic Club under George Plummer, who is named as promoter in the advertisement; the belt was presented to Langford on October 21 by Walker Machen. The advance sale opened on Saturday, and the World reports a heavy demand for seats. Wills left New York with his manager on Friday and was to reach Tulsa to-day. Langford was to box at Sioux City on Monday night before coming. The same paper reports that the lightweight champion, Benny Leonard, has signed to meet Jimmy Duffy of Lockport at Tulsa on November 17.

The Sun returns to the fight at Denver on October 21 between Tendler and Noye, in which Tendler was disqualified for a foul in the third round. The majority of the ringsiders disagreed with the referee, the Sun says; the blow seemed to land in the pit of the stomach, the club physician found no marks, and the crowd nearly rioted. The Sun clears Tendler. The Jersey City card of November 10 has Dundee against Mel Coogan as well as Leonard against Bartfield. Wilde was to sail on the Baltic on Wednesday, the Sun’s London despatch says, and says he will meet the best men of his weight and then retire. In London, Joe Conn, the featherweight champion, and Rossi were stopped in the seventeenth round by the referee, who called it no contest, and the board will try them both.

BALTIMORE, Nov. 1.—Pimlico opened on Saturday before what the Sun calls a record-breaking crowd, with Washington officials present, and rain made the track slow. Billy Kelly won the Serial No. 1, six furlongs, for the Ross stable, with his stable-mate Constancy second, with Flags third and Lucullite, the favourite, fourth. Boniface, Ross’s, won the Arlington Handicap, a mile and a sixteenth, and made a double for the Commander. Hildreth started three horses and won only with Dominique. Sir Barton’s place in the Autumn Handicap is not mentioned in the despatch; the Racing Form had put the race on Wednesday, November 5, and the Washington Herald on Thursday, the 6th.

At Louisville, Midway, with Thurber up, won the Louisville Cup on Saturday on a heavy track, from Stockwell and Regalo, and only four horses started, though more than a score had been named. Racing in Kentucky is over for the year. On Friday Sway had won the Jefferson Town Purse, a mile and an eighth.

The Sun’s racing writer awards the year’s divisions. Man o’ War is the two-year-old champion without a close second. Sir Barton is the champion three-year-old, although he lost the Dwyer to Purchase, a fact the Sun says was not printed before: he threw a shoe. Lucullite takes the handicap division, despite his erratic running and his dislike of mud. Man o’ War stands first on the money list with $83,325, and Sir Barton is close behind.

Joe Stecher and Strangler Lewis meet at the Madison Square Garden to-night, a wrestling match limited to two hours and a half; if neither gets a fall, Referee Bothner is to give the decision to the more aggressive man. Curley calls it a championship bout, since Caddock, he says, has retired. The Sun answers that no one has the right to wrestle for the title until Caddock speaks. Zbyszko is to challenge the winner from the ring.

Gardiner W. White of Nassau beat Sam Graham of Greenwich, 1 up, in the final at Cherry Valley, and it is the fourth tournament in a row in which Graham has finished second. The national three-cushion billiard championship opens at Cleveland on Thursday, with ten entries, among them Bob Cannefax, the former champion; the winner is to be champion for a year. Five colleges, Harvard, Yale, Princeton, Pennsylvania and Cornell, propose an intercollegiate tennis league, after Harvard and Yale each failed to give a major letter for tennis; Yale’s athletic board is said to be overwhelmingly against the letter. Harvard beat the Springfield Y. M. C. A. at soccer, 1 to 0, and Pennsylvania beat Princeton, 5 to 1; the City College has given up the game for the season. The first round of the national Cup is played to-day in the Southern New York district. Princeton beat Yale at cross-country, 19 to 41, over a five-and-a-half-mile course.

FOR THE PRINCETON GAME AND THE COLD STANDS. Ulsters of heavy Scotch cloth, $30 to $50. Box coats for town, $35 to $45. BRANDT & ROWE, Clothiers, 1284 Broadway.

THE GRIDIRON BY WIRE. Every Saturday the principal college games, play by play as the operator receives them, on the big board. Harmon Hall, 43d Street near Broadway. Doors open at 2 o’clock. Admission 25 cents, plus war tax.

A HAT FOR THE BIG GAMES. Soft felts in the fall shades, $4 and $5. Derbies, $5. Tweed caps for the open stand, $1.50. KELLER’S, 210 Nassau Street.

BACK NUMBERS. Nos. 1 to 5 of this paper, with the whole of the world’s series, may still be had at this office. Five cents each; by mail, seven.

THE SPORTING CHRONICLES is published every Monday. Subscription, $2.50 a year; single copies five cents. Correspondence on matters of sport is invited, and will be answered in these columns.