The New Orleans Pinchbacks again defeated the West Ends at Sportsman's Park yesterday, though they had a hard tussle to do it, the score being 5 to 4. About 2,000 people witnessed the game, a large number of whom left the Fair Grounds when the sports there were declared off and took in the game. The Pinchbacks put up a game hard to beat, Hopkins, their pitcher, doing very good work. He was well supported by Josephs and Francis, who alternated behind the bat. The feature of the game, outside of Hopkins' pitching, was the coaching of Price, catcher of the West Ends. He has a voice which would do credit to a rasp-saw, and kept up a stream of chin music which would have made an auctioneer sick. Price coached every man on his own side and gave the umpires gratuitous advice as to the performance of their duties, taking a special care to let the spectators hear everything he said. One funny crack to a base-runner caught the crowd: "Whar, dar, you come off dat base. You have no real estate down there. Come, there's beer up here at third base, sah; come now, come a runnin' here." And the runner made a dash for third and slid to the grand stand. He presented a sorry spectacle. The game was thoroughly enjoyed by the spectators. It was a sort of novel treat and kept up a constant stream of laughter and yelling. Rain stopped the game at the end of the first half of the sixth inning, after the Pinchbacks had scored three more runs, making a total of eight. The game ended in the Pinchbacks favor in five innings, the score being 5 to 4 for the West Ends. If the weather clears up the two teams will probably meet to-morrow at Sportsman's Park.
-St. Louis Republic, August 27, 1888
So what happened in the game? I can't tell you. I don't know how the runs were scored or in what inning. We're told that Hopkins pitched well for the Pinchbacks, so I guess that's something. But the emphasis of the article is on Price's coaching and how entertained the spectators were. It's less overtly racist than the account of game one but, again, the game is not treated seriously.
2 comments:
"The New Orleans Pinchbacks again defeated the West Ends at Sportsman's Park yesterday, though they had a hard tussle to do it, the score being 5 to 4...The Pinchbacks put up a game hard to beat, Hopkins, their pitcher, doing very good work. He was well supported by Josephs and Francis, who alternated behind the bat... Rain stopped the game at the end of the first half of the sixth inning, after the Pinchbacks had scored three more runs, making a total of eight. The game ended in the Pinchbacks favor in five innings, the score being 5 to 4 for the West Ends. If the weather clears up the two teams will probably meet to-morrow at Sportsman's Park."
I don't want to minimize the demeaning aspects of the coverage, but at least by Cincinnati standards -- and Cincinnati had very strong and extensive baseball coverage at the time -- the excerpt above would be a lot of space to give an amateur game. You never see anything whatsoever about local black teams in Cincinnati, except that I think I've noticed one or two items scattered in the note columns.
I don't know what to make of this. The Pinchbacks were obviously a good draw, but the treatment they get, the interest in things like their uniforms as well as the more demeaning aspects, gives me the sense that even in a border city like St. Louis black culture still seemed something of an exoticism.
You and James have been bringing up some great stuff that I've been too busy to really respond to. I've been checking my emails at work and seeing the stuff you guys post and thinking what good points you all are bringing up and then getting back to work. Real life intrudes.
But you're correct that the Republic was giving a great deal of column inches to an amateur series and it's even more amazing because it's a series between two black clubs. Dwayne did a great job finding this stuff. I'm not sure why the series got so much coverage but I don't believe that it was because it was an exoticism. You had black clubs in StL dating back to the immediate post war era. You had big series between black StL clubs and national black clubs in the 1870s. So by 1888, this kind of stuff has been going on in the city for twenty years. It wasn't new or unique.
Maybe there was something about the Pinchbacks and their trip that caught the imagination of the press. I'll have to check the database and see if their was more coverage of all of this.
But while I'm stuck at work over the weekend (and you guys are enjoying the Super Bowl), just know that I appreciate all the you and James are adding to this. You guys are keeping me on my toes.
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