Sundays with Matty

Bob Palazzo interviews Christy Mathewson with the help of Eddie Frierson

Well - we got our scoop! As promised, through the efforts of his good friend Eddie Frierson, I was able to interview Christy Mathewson. Matty has a lot to say and he says it well. From opponents, to personal triumphs and failures, he shares with us his approach to the game of baseball and philosophy of life. 

Eddie Frierson as Matty

The questions and answers have been grouped into six big (or "big six") segments, in homage to his world famous nickname. The sections are: "In Matty's Opinion", "Matty's Take on Others", "Pitching - The Art", "Pitching - Of a Different Variety", " The Early Years and Nicknames", "It's Personal". A different section will appear each Sunday until all have been posted. In addition, there will be a special feature that will be posted after week six. There has been no editing, other than grammar.  

This is a once in a lifetime opportunity to sit back, let your mind travel, and imagine yourself with this baseball giant as he shares his innermost thoughts on baseball with you.  

Segment One: In Matty's Opinion

Palazzo: 
Who was the best player, overall, you ever played against and why? 

Matty: 
I regard Hans Wagner as the really best hitter that I ever faced. To me he was always a threat, but in that respect I was no different from other pitchers. If that big, gangly Dutchman had a definite weakness no pitcher was ever able to prove it. Often the rumor went around that somebody had discovered a weak spot in Wagner's armor, only to lead a pitcher into trouble. Hans was fundamentally a free swinger. And let me say here that in all baseball there were never more than 10 or 12 successful free swingers. To be a successful free swinger a man must possess that natural gift of a great eye and the ability to take a full swing without losing his sense of sight or balance.

Sherwood Magee was a free swinger. So were Cap Anson, Dan Brouthers, Ed Delehanty, and so is Babe Ruth. These fellows could take a big, heavy bat and swing it as freely as a tooth pick. But they also had the eye. 

Wagner was different from the others. While the Delehantys and the Ruths tended to "pull" most balls pitched to them, regardless of location over the plate, with great force, "Hans" was the type that could hold his huge club down on the end of the handle and hit with equal force, consistently, to all fields. Hans would never try to pull a ball away unless he saw the outfielders positioned in a manner that would make that approach to hitting advantageous for him. None of the others I mentioned were batters who could hold the bat that way (down on the end) and still swing freely, whenever they wished, to all fields. 

Wagner stood in a far corner of the box and would walk into the ball, polling it to the far corners. I tried every device within my knowledge or ingenuity and it was rare that I ever found anything that would fool him twice. On one occasion I tried to pitch out --- waste a ball --- on Wagner, so as to give the catcher a free throw to catch a base stealer. I got the ball a half inch too close and Wagner, reaching far out, caught the ball on the end of his bat for a two-base hit. 

Only one pitcher --- Bugs Raymond --- ever had Wagner's number. In some way, that we other pitchers never could understand, he had a way of "kidding" Wagner that seemed to get his goat. By these tactics Raymond could make Honus swing at bad balls, especially the spitball, a thing no other pitcher was ever able to do. Of course Honus swung at a bad one when he wanted to and would often kill it, but that was no credit to the pitcher. The only thing we could do with Wagner was try to mix him up by using curves, fast balls and slow balls and trust to luck. He was an instinctive ball-player, seeming to foresee just what was in the minds of his opponents.

The game has never turned out a greater ball-player then Hans Wagner. 

Palazzo:
Who was the toughest batter for you to get out?

Matty: 
If you were to ask any ten baseball fans to name the toughest batter that I ever faced --- the man who always "had his number" --- at least nine of them, and possibly all ten, would immediately answer: "Joe Tinker." That is not exactly true but it comes pretty close. I know that when I get into a conversation about great hitters the question almost invariably asked me is: "Why is it that Joe Tinker is always able to hit you?" 

The story of Tinker being my Nemesis has been repeated so often that it has come to be a sort of tradition. On account of this, very few fans remember that during his first two years in the big league Joe was a very weak batter against my pitching. During that time we never regarded him as dangerous. In fact, he often has told me that his failure to get a hit off me was one of his greatest worries. 

At that time Joe was what we call a chop hitter. That is, he choked his bat up close and punched at the ball. Most of the pitchers were quick to find his weak spot. I discovered that his groove against me was a slow curve on the outside corner of the plate --- away from him. With a choked bat he could not reach it. For two years I fed him nothing else but that. 

All this time Tinker had been studying me as closely as I had studied him. Suddenly his style changed completely. I heard about it afterward --- his decision to make a change. 

In an important game between the Giants and the Cubs, Joe had struck out three times against me. That caused him to do something desperate. He knew quite well that I had been feeding him that slow curve ball on the outside and he had wondered at his inability to hit it. Instead of getting disgusted he decided to look for the antidote. 

After that game Tinker went to his clubhouse with his head down. He was not quitting, but thinking. Sitting on the dressing-room bench near Johnny Evers, he suddenly stopped in the act of pulling off his stockings. 

"Say, Johnny," he spoke up, just as if they had been talking about what he was thinking, "I've got it. Nothing to it. I've got the answer." "The answer to what?" asked the surprised Evers. "What's troubling you?" "I've thought of a way to hit that Mathewson. He made me look like a sucker today, but I've got him now. Just watch and see." "I wish you had thought of it sooner."

"Well, just wait till he pitches again. I'll show you." 

I'll never forget the next time I pitched to Tinker. It was during that four-game series in Chicago. Since I won the first game --- the one in which I struck out Tinker three times --- McGraw decided that I should pitch the last one. I was going pretty good, too, until Tinker came to bat with two out and two men on the bases. As usual, the outfielders moved in a little closer, Joe being known as a short hitter. I noticed something unusual in Tinker's style, but for a minute I couldn't decide what it was. Then I saw that he was standing far back in the box and had a long bat. Instead of choking the bat he had his hands gripped right over the small end of the handle, much like the way Schulte held a bat. Still, I saw no reason to change my pitching prescription. 

I nodded my head when Bresnahan, who was catching, gave me the regular sign for a low curve ball outside. I felt absolutely confident when I turned the ball loose and it went exactly where I had aimed it. I mean it started there. Tinker must have been expecting the ball just where I placed it. With that long bat he took a full swing, catching the ball squarely on the nose. It whistled over George Brown's head for two bases. The two runs scored and that pair of runs eventually won the game. 

"Hey, Matty," he yelled at me from second base, "I've got your number now." 

He didn't know how true that remark was going to be in the future. He had solved the problem with exactness. That long bat had enabled him to reach the ball on the outside and the big swing had given it a real ride. 

The reader will say immediately, I imagine: "Well, why didn't you shift on him as soon as you found that out?" The fact is, it took me a long time to find out all the things that I have put down here so quickly. It took as long to solve Joe's new style as it had taken him to solve my old prescription. The fan may also ask: "Why didn't Tinker discover that earlier?" I don't know, but the fact is he didn't. 

That was the beginning of my tilts with Tinker. He didn't always get the best of them, as many believe, but he did often enough to keep me worried every time I faced him. Instead of a short chop hitter, Tinker had become a long, hard full free swinger. I did my best to adjust, accordingly. Those things are not done in a minute. 

The main thing, though, is that long hit by Tinker gave him the confidence against my pitching. That meant everything. After he had made two or three long hits off me he felt absolutely sure of being able to do it any time. He became aggressive instead of defensive. Often Joe has told me that he felt sure of getting a hit off me. He could take his time and wait, he said, because he knew I wasn't going to hit him. He thought I had too much control. 

For several years Joe kept me studying. He is a mighty hard man to best in a battle of wits. When I would shift he would shift. He seemed able to call the turn. That old low curve became his favorite. He broke the heart of many pitchers by polling it for long hits. I found by degree that the only thing to do was to keep the ball in close to him and put a lot of speed on it --- in other words, try to outguess him. Outguessing Tinker was never any easy job.  

Though Tinker had that uncanny knack of hitting me in the pinches, there were other batters even more dangerous. Among these I list Fred Clarke, Hans Wagner, Claude Ritchey and Frank Baker. Sherwood Magee was also a dangerous man with whom to take liberties. 

Clarke was one of the few batters I ever have seen who could not be fooled by a change of pace. By that, I mean a slowly thrown ball following one of great speed without giving any indication of it in the swing. Clarke was unique as a batter. Though a left handed hitter, he was what we call a natural left-field hitter. The left-handed batter, you know, ordinarily hits to right field. Clarke's tendency to hit in the other direction was due to his hitting late at the ball. It was more habit than design. Naturally, his favorite ball to hit was a curve on the outside, away from him. When a pitcher finds that a change of pace is not effective his only resort is the free use of curves. But, if a pitcher threw a slow ball of any kind close to Clarke he would rap it with terrific force into right field. So he had us going and coming. It is an accepted rule in the game that when a left handed batter hits late at a ball it is suicidal to change the pace on him because he will pull it all the harder in the other direction. My only defense against Clarke was to use curves, varying them as to height and keeping them in close. No matter what the pitchers did, though, Clarke was always dangerous.