At that time I had some $1,500 invested in club stock and naturally my feelings leaned toward the club of which I was a member, still I realized that they were pretty evenly matched, and I so stated.
He then remarked in sneering tones, "Oh, I don't know.

I guess they play to win or lose as will best suit their own pockets." I informed him that if he meant to insinuate that either one of them would throw a game, he was a liar.
He gave me the lie in return and then I smashed him, and I am not ashamed to say that I would do it again under the same circumstances.
I have heard just such remarks as that made even in this late day, remarks that are as unjust to the players as they are uncalled for by the circumstances.

Lots of men seem 'to forget that the element of luck enters largely into base-ball just as it does into any other business, and that things may happen during a contest that cannot be foreseen either by the club management or by the field captain.
An unlucky stumble on the part of a base runner or a dancing sunbeam that gets into a fielder's eyes at some critical time in the play may cost a game; indeed, it has on more than one occasion, and yet to the man who simply judges the game by the reports that may read in the papers the thing has apparently a "fishy" look, for the reason that neither the sunbeam nor the stumble receives mention.
If every sport and business man in this world were as crooked as some folks would have us to believe, this would indeed be a poor world to live in, and I for one would be perfectly willing to be out of it.
The real truth of the matter is that the crooks in any line are few and far between.

That being the case it's a pretty fair old sort of a world, and I for one am glad that I am still in it, and very much in it at that..