The ongoing rivalry
between Toronto and Hamilton became particularly pronounced when sports teams
from each city were scheduled to face each other.
Such was the case in
June 1886 when two professional baseball teams, representing each city met in
Toronto, on Saturday June 12, 1886. Toronto and Hamilton were members of the
eight team International League – other six teams representing the following
communities in New York State; Syracuse, Rochester, Utica, Buffalo, Binghamton and
Oswego.
It was the fourth
meeting of the season between the Hamiltons and the Torontos (as they were
called). Hamilton had won two of the first three. In the same way that Hamilton
had outclassed on the diamond, so too did it far outdistance Toronto as regards
the manner the game was described in the newspapers of the respective cities.
The Toronto Globe had
a relatively brief account of the game, while the Hamilton Spectator’s coverage
was not only much more lengthy, it also contained a lot of color and humour.
The Toronto Baseball
grounds were near the Don Valley and some distance from the Grand Trunk Railway
station, the train being the means by which a contingent of 350 ‘baseball
cranks’ from Hamilton would use to support their team.
When the game started,
the Hamilton fans had yet to get to the grounds, although the Spectator
reporter was there, and he opened his coverage of the game with a description
of the Torontos baseball facility :
“The Toronto grounds are easy of access. The
conveniences are all here, and everything is on an elaborate scale. The
grandstand is very large; but on this occasion, there is little space room. The
field is broad and level. The north sod, upon which play is made is sodded, and
is still a little rough, but will be a magnificent ball ground in time. The
south end is unfinished, and has a rubbish shot here appearance. It will be
levelled and sodded when the batters get strong enough to make it useful.”1
1 “The World
of Sport : The Game at Toronto”
Hamilton
Spectator. June 14, 1886.
The umpire, and there
was only one, was a man whose assertiveness and manner of calling a game drew
special attention from the Spectator reporter:
“The umpire is
Hoover. He is small and is apparently principally composed of lungs. His
pronunciation has been sadly neglected; but the audience soon learn that ‘wah
boo’ means one ball, and ‘stk taw’ is intended for two strikes. He is a working
umpire, too, and is always where he is wanted. His judgment on balls and
strikes is perfect, and his whole work is sharp, decisive and satisfactory. He
is a vast improvement on all umpires that have been here before this season”1
The teams traded runs
in the first inning and at the end of that inning, the Spec man noted that “the
telegraph machine rattles away as it tells the waiting world that the game
stands one to one.”1
As the second inning
began, the crowd of about 2500 Toronto fans was augmented by the arrival of the
Hamiltonians:
“The Hamilton
delegation – 350 strong – arrive just in time to see the Hamiltons make a
blinder, and they find seats silently and somewhat sadly. The Torontos make a
run – one of the bitter fruits of error, and the Toronto cheer is heard away
back in the southern counties of the field.”1
The score stood at
1-1 when the Hamiltons came to bat at the top of the third, and that half
inning was when all the significant action of the game took place and the
Spectator man covered it in detail:
“Now comes the fun. Obliging
Mr. Smith, the gentlemanly third baseman of the Torontos fumbles a ball, and
lets Rev. Mr. Rainey get his first. Artistic Mr. Kellogg takes a bat and poses.
The umpire says things which, being interpreted, signify that Mr. Veach, the
able and accomplished Toronto pitcher is pitching one, two, three, four, five
bad balls. It is Mr. Kellogg’s desire that Mr. Veach shall pitch another of the
same; but Mr. Veach sends one over the plate. Kellogg calmly adjusts his bat so
that a foul tip shall result. It results. The Toronto audience laughs.
“Veach sends another
over the plate. Again, the adjustment, and again the foul tip. And again the
laughter – only louder. Again the ball over the plate, and again the foul tip.
; and the laughter is very loud.
“The fourth ball
comes. Another artistic foul tip. The audience is silent. They think its gets
monotonous. Another foul tip and the audience loses patience and shouts ‘Play
ball,’ ‘no monkeying,’ and things like that.
“The sixth foul tip
ensues. Kellogg is calm, smiling, confident. Veach looks warm, worried, wrathy.
The audience hisses.
“The seventh ball
comes squarely over the plate. But the foul tip spoils the strike. The audience
shrieks wrathful things, and the hissing is tremendous.
“Another ball comes
over the plate. Kellogg puts his bat in tipping position, but the ball misses it,
and the little umpire tears his throat as he yells his peculiar synonym for
‘strike.’ The audience bursts into a prolonged and vigorous cheer, and artistic
Mr. Kellogg is derided. But he remains cool, and the next ball being over the
plate, he gracefully executes his eighth foul tip. And he immediately follows
it with his ninth.
“The audience is
wild. They do not understand this thing. They do not know that they are looking
at the finest exhibition of artistic and strategic ball playing ever seen at
Toronto. They think it’s child’s play, and their disappropriation is made
loudly manifest.
“Pitcher Veach is
also wild. That is what cool Mr. Kellogg is after. Veach fails to control the
next ball and it goes by, wide of the plate. Strategist Kellogg carefully lays
down his bat, and trots contently and smilingly to first.”1
After that prolonged
at bat, there were two Hamiltons on base and soon the bases were full after
centerfielder Wright gets a single. The bases are loaded with none out when
Hamilton’s ‘Chub’ Collins makes a hit, scoring two of the runners.
Wright, being a very
fast runner, although he did not score on the play, did make it as far as third
base. Hamilton left fielder McGunkin, the next batter, hit a hot shot to the
Toronto second baseman who intended to force Collins out at second and then
throw to first in time to get the second out. Unfortunately, in his anxiety to
make a double play, he dropped the ball and no one got out:
“The Hamilton
delegation, during this time, is vigorously demonstrating its lung power. “1
The Toronto pitcher
loses his composure and started yelling at his own second baseman for his poor
fielding:
“Collins sees his
chance, and makes a plunge for third. He is almost there when Veach is waked
up. Veach turns and throws the ball at third, after the manner of a rifle ball.
It is a little wild and the third baseman misses it, and the ball goes to the
fence. Collins rushes home, and McGunkin legs it around the bases and adds the
fifth run.
“Toronto people’s
faces grow very long. Hamilton’s delegation is wild with excitement. Hats are
waved and flung about, and grown men do and say things that they would never do
or say again if they could but cooly sit and watch and listen to themselves.”1
The Toronto scorekeeper
charged with keeping the current score posted in chalk on a blackboard,
according to the Spectator man tried “to make the 5 look like a three.”
The Torontos gets a
run back in their half of the third inning, and another in the fourth. The
score was 5 – 3 Hamilton when the Torontos came to bat in the bottom of the
fifth. It seemed like the Torontos had tied the game on a particular hit that
seemed to be a fair ball to the batter and the Toronto crowd, but umpire Hoover
called it foul :
“(The batter) kicks quite
vigorously, but the little umpire looks up at him and shakes his head. The
Toronto partisans are sure it is a fair ball. The Hamilton partisans are
willing to accept the umpire’s decision. He is in the best place to see. A
Toronto reporter gets up in the box and shouts naughty names at the umpire.”1
Nevertheless, the
Torontos did manage to push two runners across the plate:
“And the big, hearty
cheer echoes all along the valley of the Don, and scares the mudcats and
tadpoles. The telegrapher works his key vigorously, and it is suspected that
the ‘I-told-you-sos’ in Hamilton are swelling with self-esteem.”1
To kill the Toronto
rally, the Hamilton’s manager, and second baseman, Chub Collins, had seen
enough of his starting pitcher:
“A pitching change by
Chub Collins – “what is this? Can six thousand eyes be deceived ? Mickey Jones
walks into the pitcher’s box, and picks up the ball. He passes a few practice
balls to Jack Morrison, and the game is resumed. Jones doesn’t open up well.
The umpire begins to call balls on him. The counts, one, two, three, four,
five, six, and batter takes his first.
“The Toronto
partisans laugh. They jeer Mr. Pitcher Jones, and say to one another, ‘We’ve
got ‘em now,’ ‘What a pie!’ But they don’t have ‘em now, and there’s no
appearance of the pie.
“ Jones’ good left
hand begins to know what is expected of it, and his sharp curves and
double-twisters follow each other over the plate in procession style. In the
four innings, the newly-discovered southpaw pitcher pitches out such sluggers
as Faatz, and Albert, and none of the Torontos make a hit. In the eighth
inning, the Hamiltons score one and break the tie. The Hamilton delegation
whoops it up with much sustained power.
“The ninth inning
results in two blinders.
“ The Hamilton
delegation elbow their way to the street, and are so happy that they don’t know
to this day whether they rode up town in a K. of . L. street car, or a Frank
Smith bus, or walked.”1
The final score was 7
to 6.
The hero of the game
was a first baseman turned pitcher, Mickey Jones. The Spectator reporter just
had to laud the left-handed Hamilton player and conclude his account of the
exciting game with the following poem :
MICKEY OF CORK
Though bounded
between us the billows of ocean –
Though fate’s fickle fancy had pulled us
apart –
Thy name wouldst
still cause me the sweetest emotion,
And though wouldst reign ever the king of my
heart.
Oh Mickey ! of pitchers boss pitcher thou
art;
And though dost come
from the precincts of Cork,
Thou canst strike out
the sluggers in poor little York.
Yes, poor little York
– let the mud go forever –
Its pride, like a drunken man, sleeps in the
dust;
Though the sluggers
may slug, they can hit Mickey never.
While their bats will corrupt with the
ravenous rust
Of comfort, old fellow, don’t give ‘em a
crust –
You may give ‘em a
crumb on the end of a fork,*
But see that it stops
there, of Mickey of Cork.
We boast of our bay,
and our towering mountain,
Of our cedar-blocked streets and our
Thirteenth Batt. Band,
We brag of our Gore
and its elegant fountain,
Of our Beach with its willows and pillows of
sand,
But great above all these, great, yes, and
grand,
Is he with long legs
like the stalks of a stork,
But king among
pitchers – our Mickey of Cork.”
*pitchfork 1
