Evening Republican, Volume 19, Number 87, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 13 April 1915 — ERRORS HAVE HELPED FEDS [ARTICLE+ILLUSTRATION]

ERRORS HAVE HELPED FEDS

First Bon* Play Wa• Perpetrated When Cincinnati Club Released Shortstop Joe Tinker.

For the defensive situation into which organized baseball has been forced by the Federal league’s attack wf the foundation of the nation’s pastime the forces of organized baseball have only themselves to blame. Then could have been no Federal league of sufficient dimensions or pretensions to worry anybody but for the mistakes of the “old Hne” magnates. They are constantly talking aboufr the “bone plays” pulled off by thick skulled athletes and ridiculing the players for lack of gray matter and Inability to thtnk quickly. 'But no ball player or team of ball players ever performed in as slow thinking a manner as did the men who are indirectly responsible for the existence of the Federal league. The first of these bone plays was pulled" by the directors of the Cincinnati club when they released Joe Tinker rather than give him the complete responsibility which, as manager of the Reds, he demanded. The Reds not only lost a swell manager, as Tinker has since proved himself to be, but they furnished the Federal league with the first real ammunition for its battle to wreck the sport. With the Federal league making herculean efforts to tempt Tinker away from organized baseball, while the player-manager was disgusted over his ill treatment in Cincinnati, Brooklyn went right along treating Tinker like a dog. Instead of realizing the danger of the situation, Brooklyn tried to bluff Tinker into accepting a lower salary than he demanded to manage the Dodgers, in spite of the fact he was willing to stick in organized baseball

for less coin than the outlaws offered him. Ebbetts fairly compelled Tinker to jump to the Federal league to maintain his self-respect, and since then he has proved the most effective toe of the old league which abused him. The situation looked so tough to the Federal league promoters even as late as a year ago that the established forces easily could have sidetracked the outlaw movement by mollifying Owner Weeghman of the Chicago “outlaws,” with the American association franchise in Chicago, thereby occupying the vacant territory on the North side of the big city. At the time it would have looked better to North slders than the doubtful proposition of financing an outlaw circuit, for the Federals had not then Interested the Wards and their big bank roll in the venture.

Manager Joe Tinker of Chicago Federate.