McGraw's Book*

He Has Written A Piercing Satire, More Brilliant Than Mr. Edison's

If the average sporting scrivener should step out of the press box at the Polo Grounds and exchange his ordinary raiment for a Giant baseball uniform there might be a riot. Certainly the sight of a writer's calves in the Old-Glory barber-pole sox of the Giants would arouse something more than comment. If the fans remained in their seats, content to hurl epithets and hot dogs, the outbreak would be postponed only until the scribe scuttled savagely in from third to field a bunt. In other words, the scrivener, be he ever so brilliant as a baseball writer, would probably make a cumbersome third baseman.

On the other hand, John J. Mc-Graw has written a book.* Not only written a book, but had it published, rather smartly too, by Boni and Liveright. As may be expected, the content is fairly instructive, but the " form " is terrible. As Mr. McGraw comes plunging in for a tricky simile, he falls on his face. He marches confidently to bat and takes a prodigious clout at literary emphasis with his infinitive. The infinitive splits and the emphasis falls badly foul over by the water cooler. As a writer Mr. McGraw will remain in the shaggiest bush league.

With these drawbacks firmly in the reader's mind, the book will probably prove decidedly interesting to a follower of professional baseball. Who, for example, knows that Hans Wagner made the longest throw on record ? That Bugs Raymond once took the Keely cure? That McGraw raised Fred Snodgrass' salary $1,000 after the fielder muffed the fly which cost the Giants a World's Series.

McGraw is naively convinced that college training is ideal for the professional ball player. In fact, this idea is almost the central theme of his book. He dwells on it so fondly that the uninitiated might suspect the colleges existed solely for the purpose of producing intelligent ball players. Unconsciously Mr. McGraw has thus produced a piercing satire, far more brilliant than Mr. Edison's, against our reverent institutions of the so-called higher learning.

The Author. John J. McGraw is too well known to the world of ball to require extended biography. Even those who are uncertain of the difference between a single and a signal have read McGraw's name in the headlines. He has figured in one or two street brawls. Has played in " vodvil," is not unknown to horse racing. He was a member of the famous Baltimore Oriole team of 1894 and has been a forceful figure in the game ever since. He has seven

National League pennants to his credit and four world's championships. His is generally considered to be the shrewdest mind in baseball.

* MY THIBTY TEARS IN BASEBALL-- Jotsn J. McGraw--Boni ($2.00).