ic had forgotten all about them. Such
is not the case, however. The games in both cases were played after the
regular season was over and after the players had in reality passed out
of my control, and for that reason were not as amenable to the regular
discipline as when the games for the League championship were going on.
The St. Louis Browns was a strong organization, a very strong one, and
when we met them in a series of games for what was styled at the time
the world's championship, in the fall of 1885, they would have been
able, in my estimation, to have given any and all of the League clubs a
race for the money.

In the series of games, one of which was played at Chicago, three in St.
Louis, one at Pittsburg, and two at Cincinnati, we broke even, each
winning three games, the odd one being a tie, and as a result the sum of
$1,000, which had been placed in the office of the "Mirror of American
Sports," of which T. Z. Cowles, of Chicago, was the editor, to be given
to the winning team, was equally divided between the two teams.

At the close of the season of 1886 the St. Louis team, having again won
the championship of the American Association, another series of games
was arranged and a provision was made that the gate money, which
hitherto had been equally divided between the two clubs, should all go
to the winner. The series consisted of six games, three of which were
played in Chicago and three in St. Louis. The first and third of these
games we won by scores of 6 to 0 and 11 to 4, but the second, fourth,
fifth and sixth we lost, the scores standing 12 to 0, 8 to 5, 10 to 3
and 4 to 3 respectively, and as a result we had nothing but our labor
for our pains.

We were beaten, and fairly beaten, but had some of the players taken as
good care of themselves prior to these games as they were in the habit
of doing when the League season was in full swim, I am inclined to
believe that there might have been a different tale to tell.

There was a general shaking up all along the line before the season of
1887 opened. The Kansas City and St. Louis clubs, neither of which had
been able to make any money, dropped out, their places being taken by
Pittsburg and Indianapolis.

The sensation of the year was the sale of Mike Kelly to the Boston Club
by the Chicago management for the sum of $10,000, the largest sum up to
that time that had ever been paid for a ball player, and Mike himself
benefited by the transaction, as he r