Baseball Joe on the Giants

en it could hardly have c

e room just in time to see the last of the mad d

right to the top of the ladder! I'm going to play with the finest team in the big

sister, throwing her arms around his neck.

is delighted mother, who could never get quite clearl

are men who would almost give their eyes to have my chance. It's getting into the blue-ribbon class. It's like riding in an automobile after you

reached in his enthusiasm was checked at

g that's turning all you sensible

flew t

ppened. Joe is going to be a member of the New York Giants. He'

an the women folks he could understan

oe's hand

rward in your profession and I know you'll make good on your new team. But how

, because they're afraid some other manager may hear about it and try to butt in on his own account. McRae, the manager of the New Yorks, is as foxy as they make them, and he doesn't let the newspapers get hold of an

. "I suppose you'll have to do such a simple thing as eating

about it," replied Joe, as the happ

sed and that was the striking change in Joe's fortu

hink he might like to have you on his team?" asked his

nd the older men in the league rather stand aloof from the raw beginners. They don'

is mother with intere

. "He told me that I was rotten, that I never could pitch, that I ought to go back to the bushes, that I w

d Mrs. Matson, bristling at the though

Joe. "It was all in the game. He was si

goat?" repeated hi

't pitch well and then his team would win the game. But it didn't work," he ended grimly, as he thought of th

ht him eyeing me pretty sharply while I was sitting on the bench. I didn't think anything of it at the time, a

ust whom or what you've been

tails. I don't even know who sent it except that it comes from some official of the club. I'm anxious to know, not only from curiosity,

vely. "It seems to leave your own wishes out of the matter altogether. Of course, in thi

almost as though you were so much merchandise, a sac

er would know what he had to depend on. There's such a tremendous amount of money invested-you couldn't buy out the Giant club at this minute for less than two million dollars-that the men at the head have to take some means to protect themselves. Some of their methods wouldn't stand the test, perhaps, if they w

bigger salary than you had in

three thousand dollars a year to the Cardinals, even before I had made good, I

was so used to the modest figures that prevail in

et as much as that, e

er chance to get into the World's Series on the Giants than I would have on the Cardi

ch better manager than those o

ought he goes after it regardless of price. Then too, New York is the best paying town in the whole league, and it's to the interest of the other clubs to see that the New York team is a good one so as to draw the crowds. So that McRae's attempt to strengthen his team doesn't meet with such stiff opposition as some other manager's might. But the chief thing

o the World's Series, will it mea

nt. of the balance goes to the winning club and forty per cent. to the losers. That makes anything from three to four thousand apiece for every member of the win

start a nice little home with and settle down to housek

ly, and again a flood of color

at deal better chance than I would have had on the Cardinals. Not but what I hate to leave the old bunch," he added a little soberly. "I've had a mighty goo

n. "But leaving out the money end altogether, how do you figure that it's g

player. Instead of being in the doleful dumps, he's feeling as frisky and gay as a two year old. But the most important thing of all is that with a good club he has smart, snappy fielding behind him, and that makes him feel that he'd pitch his head off to win. With the Giants' brilliant infield behind me,

you're any more gigantic than you were before, except that pe

so bright to him. Life was decked out in rainbow colors. To be young, to be he

shed, as he recalled what his sister had