Evening the Score

Frank Gianelli, sports editor of Phoenix's biggest daily, the morning Arizona Republic (circ. 148,645), loves his job but can't stand copycats. There was a copycat in town too: Phoenix's youngest daily, the seven-month-old Evening American (26,000). Gianelli noticed that whenever the Republic printed the box score of a game between big-league baseball teams now spring-training in sunny Arizona, so did the American--same box score, same head, same type, same everything.

It was an easy swipe for the American, which prints by the offset process; all the paper had to do was cut out a Republic box score, paste it up on a dummy of its own sports page and then photograph and engrave the whole page. A very useful trick for a small, struggling daily without much money to spend. But the Republic's Gianelli decided to fix the American's wagon. So into one box score he inserted a damning phrase--REPRINTED FROM REPUBLIC. Sure enough, it came out that way in the American that same afternoon.

Was the copycat ashamed to be found out? Not a bit. The American went right on pinching the Republic's box scores, even enlivening them with unrepentant asides to Frank Gianelli, stuffed in just above the pitchers' names: (STILL

HATE BASEBALL, FRANK G.?)

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