Nine Innings

We're trying something here as an exercise in reporting and writing. Last night, eight reporters and a photographer, each assigned to a particular inning of the Rays v. Yankees baseball game, set out to report and write a story about or connected to the game from anywhere but Tropicana Field.

That sounds about as clear as pudding, but in the end we'll have nine short stories set inside individual innings and I think it's bound to be pretty cool.

Anyhow, as part of my reporting, I found myself reading baseball coverage from 1919. So interesting to read that I wanted to give you a taste. Everything is so huge and bold in the writing you can almost see the reporter sweating and hammering away. This comes from an insignificant April training game between the Boston Red Sox and the New York Giants. There's no byline, but it's from the Tampa Tribune:

Wallop stupendous, or punch extraordinary, if one would lapse for an instant into the lingo of the squared circle, is what beat the Gotham Giants yesterday afternoon, for "Babe" Ruth's tremendous hoist to the race track in right center in the second stanza jarred the big town bunch away from any grip they might have had on the game, and though they stuck at their job to the finish they couldn't get up, and Tampa's Boston Red Sox gathered the first game of the series 5 to 3, while the hugest baseball gathering that has ever thronged Plant Field rooted in real style for the world's champions.
A few more than 4,200 people saw the Red Sox nail to the wall any reports that may have gained credence through past performances regarding any lack of offensive power. Perhaps the Hubmen haven't got any battering ram assault, but as long as Collosus kicks around the club and has two feet under him to hobble around the bases on, they have got a punch, and the fighting fan will tell you that it's the punch, when needed, that wins.
The Giants were still marveling last night. Many of them have never seen the Tarzan perform since he annexed his slugging habits, and though they carted Benny Kauff around all last season they haven't seen any such wallops as Babe produced. "I believe it's the longest hit I ever saw," said McGraw, and the Napoleon has seen considerable baseball, even some of the Florida variety in the early nineties when he kicked around his present stamping ground for a few games. It was certainly the longest hit made here, as it struck the far edge of the race track almost in direct center field, and the nearest in that direction was one by Vic Salter, once of the Bruins, that struck in the cement drain on the inside edge of the track a few feet further to right field.

A few more than 4,200 people saw the Red Sox nail to the wall any reports that may have gained credence through past performances regarding any lack of offensive power. Perhaps the Hubmen haven't got any battering ram assault, but as long as Collosus kicks around the club and has two feet under him to hobble around the bases on, they have got a punch, and the fighting fan will tell you that it's the punch, when needed, that wins.

The Giants were still marveling last night. Many of them have never seen the Tarzan perform since he annexed his slugging habits, and though they carted Benny Kauff around all last season they haven't seen any such wallops as Babe produced. "I believe it's the longest hit I ever saw," said McGraw, and the Napoleon has seen considerable baseball, even some of the Florida variety in the early nineties when he kicked around his present stamping ground for a few games. It was certainly the longest hit made here, as it struck the far edge of the race track almost in direct center field, and the nearest in that direction was one by Vic Salter, once of the Bruins, that struck in the cement drain on the inside edge of the track a few feet further to right field.