Outline of the Work Remaining for the Two Chicago Clubs—Both Teams Play Here Today, Both Are Out of Town Tomorrow—Spuds Have Only a Few More Contests at Home, Whereas Sox Are Scheduled Here Most of the Time Until the Finish.
[BY SY.] With five weeks of the major league baseball season left the National league pennant race has been decided, barring everything but an unheard of fluke, and the American league battle is beginning to give Chicago rooters stronger hope every day. Chance’s warriors are holding their consistent, unbeatable gait, with every prospect of setting a new mark to shoot at in the number of games won in a season, while Jones’ men promise to start their final stand on the home grounds with a lead that will be sufficient to the end.
Both leaders will be entertaining company at home today, the Spuds finishing their long stay on the west side with the final game of the local series against St. Louis, and the Sox returning from Cleveland in continuation of the series which commenced in Ohio on Friday. Tonight both Chicago clubs will leave to play out of town on Labor day, the Sox going back to Cleveland and the Spuds paying their last visit to Cincinnati. Two games will be played by both clubs tomorrow.
Schedule of the Spuds.
On Tuesday Chance’s men will work off a postponed game with the reds, and on the open date, Wednesday, they are billed for an exhibition in Dixon, Ill. Next Thursday they will return to the west side for a series of four games with Pittsburg, their nearest competitor in the race now. That will end on Sunday next and the Spuds will spend the following week working off four games with the cardinals in St. Louis. Two weeks from today they will return to Chicago for their final game in this section with Pittsburg as an opponent, then start their final invasion of the east.
With thirty more games to play, Chance’s men have an unbeatable lead despite twenty-four of those games are to be played on foreign territory. By winning half their games they can keep out of all possible reach, and no one expects Chance’s men to lose half their games the rest of the season, especially as only eight of the thirty are with New York, and Pittsburg.
Sox’s Long Series at Home.
The White Sox will have an open date after tomorrow, then go to Detroit on Wednesday for three games, returning here a week from today with practically all the rest of their games scheduled for the south side grounds. Jones’ men have a possible thirty-six more games to play this season, all but eight of which are on home grounds. There are two yet to play in Cleveland and three each in St. Louis and Detroit. One game never may be played off and that is the final one of the rainy weather series in Philadelphia.
The National league’s constitution makes it compulsory to play the full number of scheduled games if possible, and to transfer games which cannot be played off in one city to the grounds of the other competing club if necessary after all the scheduled dates in the former city have expired.
The American league leaves it optional with the club owners or manager to transfer such unplayed games.
The Sox and Athletics were able to play only ten of the eleven games scheduled for tehm in Philadelphia, and the Sox do not go to Philadlephia again this year. It needs the consent of both clubs and of the league to transfer that left over game to Chicago and play it off here when the Athletics make Chicago their final visit. If the Phillies had been unable to complete their eleven games with the Spuds on the west side, National league law would make it compulsory for those two clubs to play off the remaining game or games on the Phillies’ grounds the latter part of this month.
Fault in American’s Rules.
The National league’s system is the better of the two, as it insures practically completing the schedule and making all clubs play as nearly as possible the same number of games. That awful spell of weather which the western American league clubs struck in the east during the trip just closed has left a large bunch of games which cannot be played unless transferred to western diamonds. The White Sox were able to play every game scheduled for the east this year except one in Philadelphia. St. Louis was unable to play two of its eleven games in Philadelphia. Cleveland is shy one game scheduled in New York, but the Detroit clubs got the worst deal. The Tigers played only eight out of eleven games in Washington, leaving three unplayed, and missed one of the eleven in Philadelphia.
That means four games scheduled in Philadelphia will not have to be played off unless Manager Mack wishes to play them, and, with his crippled pitching staff, he is not likely to. Washington need not complete its schedule by three games, and New York has one left over with Cleveland. In a close finish this will mean a considerable advantage for the Athletics, and a small one for Cleveland and New York. It will be possible for the Athletics, for instance, to win a smaller number of games than the Sox and still beat them out in the race on percentages, which are all in favor of the clubs playing the fewest games. There should be some action compelling each team to play its full schedule if possible, through a compulsory transfer of postponed games.
The deal the Sox got from the weather bureau in Philadelphia was something terrific, two of three visits there being broken up by rain. In the spring series at Philadelphia the Sox were able to play only two of their four games, but managed to work off the two left overs on their second trip in midsummer. This last trip there was not a single day fit to play baseball. Two curtailed contests were worked in under conditions which made them unsatisfactory, besides depriving both clubs of large financial returns from the splendid crowds that would have been on hand in fair weather.
Evans’ Crude Work.
The conditions in Philadelphia showed the handicap of having inexperienced umpires assigned to important series. There is no question in the minds of baseball men throughout the country that the Sox received the cold end of a raw deal from Evans in that final attempt to play ball at Philadelphia. The facts admitted on all sides are that the grounds were not fit for baseball anyway, and that it was raining when the first game was started. But both teams agreed to play. That being the case, Evans had no right to suspend play in the middle of any inning simply because the conditions were a little worse than they had been. If it was necessary to stop the game, it should have been done at the end of an even inning. If Evans had declared the conditions unfit to continue play after the fifth inning with the score 4 to 3 in Philadelphia’s favor, he would have had some reason on his side. But, having started the sixth inning, there was no reason why he should not compel the Athletics to complete that inning so long as the rain did not drive the spectators to shelter. All sources of information agree it was possible to play when the game was called off as it had been when the sixth inning started, and that the Athletics carried their policy of delaying the game beyond the limit that would have been tolerated by an experienced umpire.
Evans was green and the Athletics took advantage of it to bulldoze him into giving them a game which they probably would have lost if a man like Sheridan or O’Day had been working behind the plate. Either the sixth would have been finished or the game would have been stopped with the fifth, with a competent man in charge.
