and get his throat into shape for the big league music circuit. But
I will give any orchestra leader who faces Sam a tip. If he doesn't want
him to come in strong where the music is marked "rest," don't put one in
the "groove," because Strang just naturally can't help swinging at it. He
is a poor waiter.

The Boston club lost eighteen straight games in the season of 1910, and as
the team was leaving the Polo Grounds after having dropped four in a row,
making the eighteen, I said to Tenney:

"How does it seem, Fred, to be on a club that has lost eighteen straight?"

"It's what General Sherman said war is," replied Tenney, who seldom
swears. "But for all-around entertainment I would like to see John McGraw
on a team which had dropped fifteen or sixteen in a row."

As if Tenney had put the curse on us, the Giants hit a losing streak the
next day that totalled six games straight. Everything that we tried broke
against us. McGraw would attempt the double steal, and both throws would
be accurate, and the runner caught at the plate. A hit and a run sign
would be given, and the batter would run up against a pitch-out.

McGraw was slowly going crazy. All his pet "inside" tricks were worthless.
He, the king of baseball clairvoyants, could not guess right. It began to
look to me as if Tenney would get his entertainment. After the sixth one
had gone against us and McGraw had not spoken a friendly word to any one
for a week, he called the players around him in the clubhouse.

"I ought to let you all out and get a gang of high-school boys in here to
defend the civic honor of this great and growing city whose municipal
pride rests on your shoulders," he said. "But I'm not going to do it.
Hereafter we will cut out all 'inside' stuff and play straight baseball.
Every man will go up there and hit the ball just as you see it done on the
lots."

Into this oration was mixed a judicious amount of sulphur. The Cubs had
just taken the first three of a four-game series from us without any
trouble at all. The next day we went out and resorted to the wallop,
plain, untrimmed slugging tactics, and beat Chicago 17 to 1. Later we
returned to the hand-raised, cultivated hot-house form of baseball, but
for a week we played the old-fashioned game with a great deal of success.
It changed our luck.

Another method which has upset the "inside" game of many visiting teams
is "doping" the grounds.

The first time in my baseball career that I ever e