Evening Republican, Volume 19, Number 304, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 24 December 1915 — SUMMER BASEBALL TAKES TOO MUCH TIME [ARTICLE+ILLUSTRATION]

SUMMER BASEBALL TAKES TOO MUCH TIME

That summer baseball is undesirable, not because of the “taint” of professionalism but because it would mean that the players would devote too much time to the game, is the argument against summer ball in the current number of the Harvard Alumni Bulletin. Boyd says that the baseball squad now puts in the entire afternoon during the greater part of the college year. With summer baseball permitted, he contends, prospective candidates for the team will be encouraged to play summer ball by way of improving their chances of making the team. This he considers too great an expenditure of time that might well be devoted to other objects. Boyd writes, in part: The endless discussion of “summer baseball” is rendered all the more tiresome because the real point at issue is usually missed. It is not a matter of social distinction, nor is it even a question of tearing down the fence between the amateur and professional paddocks. The real danger is that if “summer baseball” or any form of it

should be allowed, it would soon be considered desirable. Under the pressure of intercollegiate competition, members of the baseball squad would soon come to feel an implied obligation to deVote their summers to the game in order to insure victorious teams. This situation would be a scandal in itself, and the cause of endless dissatisfaction. Even now baseball requires more time from its devotees than any other university sport. It is true, track and crew athletes are in training as long as baseball men, but their work requires only a few minutes at the end of the afternoon, which is merely what the busiest undergraduate should set aside every day for physical exercise. Baseball demands most of the afternoons for half the college year, not counting time given to fall practice. To encourage students to prolong their baseball service several months further each year would be unpardonable. They might better attend Plattsburg, to learn that they have a country.

Harry LeGore, Star Football Player, Who, Together With Four Other Members of Yale Team, Got Into Trouble This Fall on Account of Summer Baseball.