The (English) Baseball League (est. 1888): A History

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Colley Sets Dubious Season Loss Mark.

Pitcher Will Colley capped a dreadful season on Wednesday. He conceded seven runs in eight and one-third innings to solidly earn his twenty-sixth loss of the season as his Darlington Quakers, the worst club in the Northern Section, dropped a 9 runs to 2 match to Barrow.

With the loss, Colley set a season mark for the Third Division. The previous high mark of twenty-five had been shared by five pitchers previously, most recently by Tony Archer of Newport County last season. Two other League pitchers have lost 26: Evan Gordon of Tottenham Hotspur in the First Division in 1923; and Moriarty Bartram of Derby County in the Second Division in 1924. One man has lost 27 in a season, that being Joshua Lawlor of Darwen in 1898; this was their last season before being voted out.

Colley, as usual, had nothing good to show the fewer than one thousand spectators who filed into the ground at Feethams. In addition to yielding fifteen base hits, seven of which went for extra bases, he walked three as well. After he gave up a 2B in the ninth after having got the first man out, he was replaced on the mound by Ward, and as Colley trudged towards the dugout to begin his close season, many of the few hundred remaining spectators, putatively Darlington supporters, let out a derisive and sarcastic cheer, while the others were simply too apathetic to respond.

Colley was terrible from the start this season. He lost his first eight games and also his final thirteen, winning a mere three matches with a few more losses sprinkled in between. Wednesday’s was the fourteenth match in which he conceded seven or more runs. His win rate of 10.8 per cent. was among the lowest ever recorded in the League. His earned runs average of 6.78 is the second highest ever among pitchers who attained twenty or more decisions in a season. He yielded more base hits per nine innings, 13.27, than any other starting pitcher ever. He walked more batsmen (80) than he struck out (65). We could go on, but there is a technical limitation on how long this news account may run.

Colley may or may not return to the Darlington club for next season to redeem (or reprise) his disastrous performance of this, but Darlington themselves may not return to the League next season, as they will surely be made to stand for re-election after the season, and their prospects for return are not at all promising.

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Baseball League 1930
Third Division Results

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Baseball League 1930
Third Division Northern Section Promoted Club

Middlesbrough Boro

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Baseball League 1930
Third Division Southern Section Promoted Club

Charlton Athletic Addicks

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Baseball League 1930
Third Division Tables

Two non-league sides challenged the three North clubs seeking re-election to Division 3 of the Baseball League. Voting -

40      Rochdale              Re-elected to the League
28	Darlington	      Re-elected to the League
20	Bournemouth	      Elected to the League
4	Wrexham	              Not re-elected to the League
0	Manchester Central    Not elected to the League

Three non-league sides challenged the two South clubs seeking re-election to Division 3 of the Baseball League. Voting -

44      Reading      Re-elected to the League
27	Thames	     Elected to the League
7	Colchester   Not elected to the League
4	Llanelly     Not elected to the League
0	Aldershot    Not re-elected to the League

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Baseball League 1930
Third Division Team Batting and Pitching

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Baseball League 1930
Third Division Northern Section Award Winners



Baseballer of the Year: Fred Bray




Batsman of the Year: Ivor Kingston




Pitcher of the Year: Archie MacArthur




Newcomer of the Year: Lewis Meikle

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Baseball League 1930
Third Division Southern Section Award Winners


Baseballer of the Year: Reggie Stocks




Batsman of the Year: Brad Morrison




Pitcher of the Year: Fred Kerr




Newcomer of the Year: Paul MacQuarrie

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Baseball League 1930
Third Division League Leaders

Northern Section

Batting Leaders

Pitching Leaders

Southern Section

Batting Leaders

Pitching Leaders

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Baseball League 1930
Third Division Top Game Performances

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Baseball League 1930
Third Division Top 20 Batsmen and Pitchers

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Baseball League 1930
Third Division Top Systems

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Baseball League 1930
Third Division Financial Report

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Antram Quits League Baseball.

After a long and fruitful career of playing League baseball, one of the greatest pitchers of any era is quitting the professional game.

Percy Antram was the first of the great line of pitchers who have graced the mound at Portland Park for the Burton United club. He first took to the pitch in 1909 as a callow youngster of twenty, and he worked his way into the rotation the following season for good, albeit as the loser of nineteen matches, yet still demonstrating himself to be an above average hurler. He came into his own in 1912 as he won twenty to lead United into the First Division, where they have resided ever since.

Antram also won 21 games in 1914 before the League suspended for the war, during which he worked in the Home Office as a close aide of the Under Secretary of State Sir Edward Troup, responsible for routing German spies from the homeland. Upon the return of League baseball, Antram also returned to his winning ways, fashioning a consistent string of seven seasons in which he won between sixteen and nineteen matches during each. Antram finished his tenure with 211 victories, which places him 27th on the League’s list.

But the two main things Antram was known for were the strike out and run prevention. He was one of the first great strike out artists, leading his division in four different seasons, finishing second in four more and finishing third twice. He retires with the second highest strike out total among all pitchers in the annals of the League with 2,208, behind only the great Jesse Morgan. In this era of higher strike out rates, several pitchers stand at the ready to pass by Antram, but that will hardly dim his accomplishment in this particular area of endeavour.

As for preventing runs, no other pitcher with a similarly long career comes close. Antram finished with a 2.19 earned runs average during his seventeen seasons. The closest competitor to this mark is Ernie Watson who has delivered a 2.29 ERA during his eighteen seasons, but who has also worked strictly as a reliever for the past ten seasons and thus has pitched more than 1,000 fewer innings. Antram had the second best ever season for earned runs average in 1912 with 1.26 and delivered the fourth best ever season two years later, 1.29. In both seasons, he won his division’s Pitcher of the Year honours. He also had three additional seasons with earned runs averages of less than two, the most of any starting pitcher ever.

While Antram spent his final five seasons in various states of injury, which cost him his 1929 season before coming back for a mere seven innings in this, his last season, he will always be remembered as the most dominant of pitchers in the years both preceding and following the war, and the four seasons lost to the conflict serve as a bitter reminder of being deprived of what surely would have been the best seasons of his career.

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League Meeting at Connaught Rooms.

A meeting of the Baseball League was held at the Connaught Rooms, in London, on Monday morning. Mr. J. McKenna, the president of the League, was in the chair.

In the main, the discussion centred on the drastic reduction of gate for League games, which had been occurring slowly over the course of the prior four seasons, but which landed with a resounding thud this past season. The grim presentation of the facts were delivered by the secretary of the League, Mr. B. Beeston, general manager of the Chelsea baseball club, and they can be recounted here, exclusively for Times readers.

During the period 1923 through 1926, the League drew over 30 millions of spectators to the games, peaking at the high mark of over 34 millions in 1925. This could have been attributed to an exuberance of post-war feeling, coupled with great numbers of men employed in the rebuilding of the country. Flush with good wages and more hours for leisure with the spread of the eight-hour workday throughout the industries, spectator sports such as baseball, Association football, rugby football and cricket all saw substantial increases in their gates. The attendances inched down in 1927, 1928, and 1929, the likely result of a naturally occurring decline from a zenith, although on balance the League continued to prosper.

However, during this past season, with the advent of the “great slump”, precipitated by “crash” of the trading markets in the United States, the total attendance for the 88 clubs of the League had fallen by 41 per cent., to just over 20 million. The news in gate revenue was even worse, having fallen by 49 per cent., and league turnover, which heretofore had been a closely guarded secret, has been cut by an astounding 63 per cent. The business of baseball has scarcely been worse from the very beginnings of the League as a concern in the 1880’s.

But the most astonishing fact relayed by Mr. Beeston is that the wages of the baseballers themselves have only gone up, by 14 per cent. from 1926, the final year of the League’s salad days. Mr. Beeston thundered that such state of affairs is a travesty and cannot continue, as the very existence of the League hangs in the balance, a conclusion that engendered much forceful approbation among his colleagues in the room.

As such, the League has moved to replace the current contracts in place with baseballers with amended contracts leading to reduced wages that take the dire situation of the League fully into account, and the amount of which was presently left unspecified as it will be determined in committee, and in fairness to the smaller and less prosperous clubs of the League as well as of non-League conferences such as the Britannia.

No other business of substance was conducted during the League meeting.

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Players and Proposed Wage Reductions.

Baseball players from the First and Second Divisions of the League held a protest meeting at Manchester on Sunday evening. W. Hunt, the Everton short stop, presided.

The proposal of the Baseball League is that during the playing season of 27 weeks, the weekly wage should be reduced to £6, the present maximum wage being £9. This represents a reduction of 33 per cent., or exactly one-third, the current maximum wage.

The meeting, which was deliberated for about two hours, passed a resolution unanimously condemning the new wages scheme as unsatisfactory to both players and clubs, and decided to request the Baseball League to receive a deputation from the union at the earliest possible date, if possible within seven days. There is no indication that Third Division representatives will be present in the deputation ; however, as their wages have also been cut from their £8 maximum by one-third as well, their interests are assumed to be represented by the union contingent as well.

In the meantime it was resolved to advise members of the union not to renew engagements with their clubs until advised by the executive, and, pending a conference to be asked for, a resolution was passed—to be forwarded to the League Management Committee—pointing out the brief consideration that was possible for the clubs to give to the new proposals and of the likelihood that the clubs themselves would welcome warmly an opportunity to reconsider the whole matter. It was further decided that, immediately following the conference with the League, another special general meeting of the union should be called.

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BASEBALLERS’ WAGES.

Protest by the Players’ Union.

William Hunt (Everton) presided over a meeting of the Players’ Union in Manchester on Sunday. The meeting was called to discuss the result of the recent Baseball League meeting in connexion with the reduced wages scheme. The discussion lasted nearly three hours. It was decided to instruct players to sign on under protest, with the proviso that any alteration which might take place should be retrospective to the date of signing on. A comprehensive resolution was passed regretting the Baseball League’s decision to adhere to the new wages scheme and the League’s advice to clubs to cancel contracts honourably entered into between clubs and players prior to the date of the new scheme.

It was further resolved to circularize League clubs, requesting them to raise the whole matter at the annual meeting of the League, scheduled for February 17th. The meeting registered a strong protest against the action of the Baseball League in springing the reduction immediately after the Signing Period following the end of the season, and decided to request clubs to insert the following clause in agreements: — Provided there should be an increase of wages that said player to participate in the same as and from the date of this agreement.

It was further decided that any union members who have signed a contract previous to the new scheme should not sign any new agreement and that the first case of wage reduction under any agreement signed before the new scheme should be tested in law.

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Foreign Player Ban now in Effect.

The Baseball League has ruled that all players of foreign birth will henceforth be ineligible to play in the League from the 1931 season, excepting foreign players currently registered, and further excepting baseballers born in the Irish Free State. The desire to preserve precious playing spots for British subjects is paramount during the current great slump.

Subjects born anywhere in the British Empire, regardless of location in the world, will continue to be welcome as players in the League. Outside of Great Britain, there are more than fifty League players from the dominions of Ireland, South Africa, Canada, New Zealand, Australia, and India, as well as Southern Rhodesia.

As of to-day there are four foreign nationals registered to the League: two from the United States (Dotson of Barnsley; Schultz of Leicester City); and one each from the Netherlands (Vliegenthat of Manchester United) and the Empire of Japan (Iwamoto of Preston North End).

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Baseballer’s Wage Suit.

The first case testing the Baseball League’s reduced wages scheme will be taken up in court in Liverpool. William Hunt, the fine batting short stop for the Everton club who has been on the £9 maximum wage for several seasons, and who signed on for same during the Signing Period for the 1931 season, has refused to accept the amended contract offered by the club for the reduced maximum of £6. Hunt had led several meetings with the players as well as serving as the president of the deputation appointed to meet with the League to persuade them to reconsider their wage reduction action, for the good of not only the players, but also of the Everton Club, the Baseball League, and the supporters, the “fans”, as well.

Hunt will likely contend the Everton Baseball Club and the Baseball League acted in bad faith by tearing up the existing contracts, signed on by players in good faith during the Signing Period following the close of the 1930 season, and enacting across the board wage reductions without consulting the players or their duly elected union representatives. The club will likely counter with a defence of the action as good business practice, given the precipitous decline in gate revenue and turnover as provided to the League in their meeting this past November, as reported exclusively in the Times.

The suit was filed with the Liverpool County Court.

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The Start of the Baseball Season.

The Baseball League season starts again to-morrow, which matches being played by all 88 clubs of the League at 44 different grounds, all commencing at precisely two o’clock in the afternoon and this beginning the long 126-game trek that will end in one club hoisting the EOI Cup, four clubs moving up to the next competition, and four more dropping down a level, notwithstanding the result of election among the worst of the bad.

There have been few notable changes in the personnel of the various teams. Bad times and decreased revenues at the gates have prevented most of the teams from making large outlays for the transfer of famous players, as well as of the bright young talents coming to the League for their first time and vying for spots on the better teams. Still the prospects may be studied from another point of view. The effect of the acquisition of a number of great players cannot be noticed straight away. They take some time to settle down in their new surroundings and fit in together as a compact and unified whole. That consideration may lead to great expectations of Manchester United. Last season a combination of mishaps, and absences for reasons other than injury, together with a long uncertainty as to choice of the best side in any given match, made the team quite ineffective at times and led to their worst showing of ninth place since the year following the war. With a clear, straight run free of all misadventure or trouble United may well become one of the great sides of the year, though it may be necessary to introduce more of the vigour of youth in some places, which they are attempting to do with the signing of young catcher Freddy Young. A lumbering young behemoth of six feet three inches and 16 stone, he won’t be able to sneak up on anyone from behind, or perhaps even to swipe a single base, but he can crush a baseball with alarming force and should evolve into one of the better home run hitters in the league during the next decade.

The new clubs in the First Division are the Clapton Orient and Sheffield Wednesday. Both had long stretches of residency in the First Division many years ago, and both have also suffered a long stretch on the second level as well. This is Orient’s first year back in the top tier since 1919 ; the Wednesday have been on the outs since 1903. Each will be trying to make their case for inclusion in the Championship competition for many years to come. Orient’s great MacAlpine, who is the greatest player in the history of the Second Division, will make his return to the top for the first time since his maiden season and will attempt to prove that he rates mention among the all time greats. McLaughlin, the young O's centre fielder, will try to “make his bones” among the elite, but all eyes will be trained on the nineteen-year-old Davies, the reigning Pitcher/Newcomer/Baseballer of the Year, trying to repeat his feats against the monsters of the First Division.

Among the First Division clubs, besides the aforementioned United of Manchester, the EOI Cup holders Sunderland and champions Crewe Alexandra will make things interesting, as usual, and we expect Walsall, Fulham, Port Vale and Everton to be among the contenders for the Cup series. In the Second Division, to which the Gateshead and the Newcastle United clubs fell, the best clubs appear to be: Gillingham, Stockport County, Coventry City and Sheffield United. Middlesbrough, who pummelled the Northern Section of the Third Division last season, may have enough to surprise the other clubs and sneak into the promotion zone.

In the Third Division, the relegated Birmingham club may be among the leaders of the Southern Section and seek a truncated stay, although they will have to battle good Northampton, Crystal Palace, Bristol City and Merthyr Town clubs for the lone promotion spot. In the Northern Section, any of eleven clubs could be considered favourites to go up, but the punters best like Stoke City and Leeds United to emerge from among that logjam.

Thames, a club of a few years’ standing, with a splendid ground at Customs House capable of holding 25,000 spectators, come into the Southern Section by election. The election of Thames makes 12 London clubs in the Baseball League. Fulham, West Ham United and Clapton Orient should do well in the first rank ; Chelsea, Charlton Athletic and Watford need to show improvement on last season’s form in the Second Division, while in the third class all the London clubs should be in the running for prominent places, with hope even for the Arsenal.

The League is making a big wave with the players and their union with a unilateral decrease in wages, which in their defence has a solid business purpose. With lower gates come the need to control expenses, and wages can not rise unabated while clubs risk winding up for the inability to pay players. The union is squawking, of course, but it simply can not be helped. Attendances have fallen by nearly half in the past few years, and many clubs announced that ticket prices will be reduced for the first time in many years, in an attempt to keep any people coming to watch the games at all. In an era during which men are losing their livelihoods hither and yon throughout the kingdom, we can scarcely be expected to cry real tears for well-paid baseballers’ inability to maintain their high levels of remuneration unimpeded by the situation swirling about them. The baseballers will be fine in the end, and if they do not like their state of affairs, they are invited to seek work in hot and dirty environs instead … if they can find any.