th the Chicago players and the visitors at their park was
very light. The White Sox's hitting was weak anywhere, so that the poor
background was an advantage to them.

Injuries have often upset the "inside" play of a club. Usually a team's
style revolves around one or two men, and the taking of them out of the
game destroys the whole machine. The substitute does not think as quickly;
neither does he see and grasp the opportunities as readily. This was true
of the Cubs last season. Chance and Evers used to be the "inside" game of
the team. Evers was out of the game most of the summer and Chance was
struck in the head with a pitched ball and had to quit. The playing of the
Chicago team fell down greatly as a result.

Chance is the sort of athlete who is likely to get injured. When he was a
catcher he was always banged up because he never got out of the way of
anything. He is that kind of player. If he has to choose between accepting
a pair of spikes in a vital part of his anatomy and getting a put-out, or
dodging the spikes and losing the put-out, he always takes the put-out and
usually the spikes. He never dodges away from a ball when at bat that may
possibly break over the plate and cost him a strike. That is why he was
hit in the head. He lingered too long to ascertain whether the ball was
going to curve and found out that it was not, which put him out of the
game, the Cubs practically out of the pennant race, and broke up their
"inside" play.

Roger Bresnahan is the same kind of a man. He thinks quickly, and is a
brilliant player, but he never dodges anything. He is often hurt as a
result. Once, when he was with the Giants, he was hit in the face with a
pitched ball, and McGraw worried while he was laid up, for fear that it
would make him bat shy. After he came back, he was just as friendly with
the plate as ever. The injury of men like Chance and Bresnahan, whose
services are of such vital importance to the "inside" play of a team,
destroys the effectiveness of the club.

Once, in 1908, when we were fighting the Cubs for the pennant at every
step, McGraw planned a bunting game against Overall, who is big and not
very fast in covering the little rollers. Bresnahan and O'Day had been
having a serial argument through two games, and Roger, whose nerves were
worn to a frazzle, like those of the rest of us at that time, thought
"Hank" had been shading his judgment slightly toward the Cubs. In another
story I have pointe