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Baseball: 1907 Season Starts To-Day

The twentieth programme of the Baseball League will commence to-day. This is a momentous occasion that should provide great satisfaction to the founders of the League, particularly to William McGregor and Sir Francis Ley who, while they have frequently been on opposite sides of any business discussion that has arisen regarding the League's operation, they have also served as “linchpins” upon which the strength and stability of the League has been built.

This is not a small point, as Messrs. McGregor and Ley have been largely responsible for establishing firm fixture lists, helping secure funding for baseball grounds some of which hold tens of thousands, holding fast baseballers’ wages, and implementing the system of promotion and relegation that provides hopes to thousands of club supporters that their favoured team might too make it to the top tier, making September a very exciting proposition for more than just the two clubs heading for the EOI Cup series.

As attention moves towards the pitch on this cold, cloudy May Monday, expectations are that the Sunderland club will prevail as First Division champions, and likely Cup winners as well, strengthened as they are by the winter acquisition of pitcher William Graham from the faltering Leeds City club. Current Cup holders Newcastle United and Jesse Morgan can never be counted out, but ascendant are Alistair Bolton’s Liverpool Reds, long a struggling club who have had some success in past two seasons and who have signed the Kingdom’s top amateur baseballer in Armstrong (“Klondike”) Smith; Blackburn Rovers, led by the amazing Bobby Arscott; the newly renamed Port Vale Valiants led by Harold Hind; and the surprising Bristol City Robins.

In the lower level, Chelsea look to make a bid to be the latest London club to make its escape from the nether regions into the light of the top level. That would leave Woolwich Arsenal as the only one of the six London leagues clubs in the Second Division, as they are freshly promoted from non-League ball and not expected to make any headway towards the top. Other top clubs to watch include Birmingham; Bolton (just relegated); Manchester City; Chesterfield Town; and new League side South Shields.

Despite lengthy discussions taking place at the League meeting in Stoke-On-Trent January last, as well as expectations to the contrary, no significant rules changes have been made for 1907.