A BASEBALL TOUR.

New Zealand Herald, Volume XXV, Issue 9186, 16 October 1888, Page 5

A BASEBALL TOUR.

Is* a few weeks there will start from Chicago one of the most extensive athletic ventures that has emanated from Ameriea. It is a tour of two teams of baseball players arranged by Messrs. Leigh S. Lynch and A. G. Spalding, president of the Chicago Bnseball Club, ami it is intended that exhibition matches will be played in New Zealand and Australia. The teams will be accompanied by about 100 excursionists, including about a dozen correspondents from leading American journals. The teams are the very pick of the champions at the American national and include the whole of the Chicago Club, and aiso prominent players from the New York, Philadelphia, lioston, Washington, Detroit, Pittsburg, St. Louis, Indianapolis, and Brooklyn Clubs, while Mr. J. H. Rogers, a. noted cricketer of the Peninsular C.C., Detroit, and Dr. Ogdeu, who captained the Canadian Team in England will also form members of the party. The names of the players are :—A. C. Anaon. Fred. Pfefier. Edward C. William Anson, Thomas Burns, .Martin Sullivan, Thomas Ryan, Mark Baldwin, John K. Tener. Hugh Duifey, Frank Flint, J. H. Farrell, Barnes, Pettit and Van Haultren, all of the Chicago Club; J. M. Ward and J. H. Tiernan, of New York ; Edward Hanlon, of Detroit: .). H. Pogarty and C. L. Wood, of Philadelphia -. C. li. Carroll, of Pittsburg: M. J. Kelly, of Boston; F. L. Comisky, of St. Louis; Robert Carruthers, of Brooklyn: Hanlon, of Detroit; Healley, of _ Indianapolis. The party is to leave Chicago on October "JO, playing at variou. cities en route to San Francisco. They leave by the Alameda on November 15, playing a game in Honolulu and at Auckland, and proceeding rigjit on to Sydney, whenco Queensland and Victoria and Hobart will be visited in turn, ami then the players will travel to Dunedin, and play at the various cities up the coast, finally returning to America by the February mail steamer. Although the of baseball is quite strange to New Zealanders, and indeed to all Britishers, the projectors of the tour are quite sanguine that the scientific display of skill, pluck, and endurance shown by the " cracks" they are bringing over will make a favourable impression in colonial athletic circles, while it is also proposed to play several cricket matches during the trip. Tile men chosen have been very carefully selected, and are said to be splendid specimens of athletic manhood, while each one is a specialist hi some particular branches of the game, winch is one tiiat requires quite as much as its British congener cricket, the qualities of quick judgment, unerring aim, defensive and offensive batting, fearless catching, and swiftness of foot. In America it has an immense popularity, and champion professional players are paid high salaries and bound down under stringent contracts to play only for their special clubs. Mr. Leigh ,S. Lynch came through yesterday by the mail steamer Alameda lor the purpose of making the preliminary arrangements for the matches. Although "his stay in our city was nece'ss.irilv brief, ho found time to confer with several notable local cricketers upon the prospects of the tour, and inspected the Domain cricket ground and the Tramway Company's ground at Epsom. Mr. Lynch favours the idea of playing the matches at the latter place, owing to the superior accommodation. Hβ left by the Mariposa- this morning for Sydney in order to prepare the cunistalkers for the visit of their American cousins. Though the game is quite different in its method of scoring, yet its main features arc siifiiciently .similar to cricket to make it. interesting to all our local knights of the willow, and doubtless when the teams arrive in November they will be heartily welcomed by the officers and members of our Cricket and Football Associations.