Date: January 31, 1928
Source: San Jose Mercury
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Interest keen in baseball league, says Jack Graham
Interest is exceedingly keen in the coming California State League and especially so, among the San Jose fans. Already talking of forming booster clubs and advertising committees are under way. Many have already promised to buy season tickets and when the committee gets into action, there will be very likely the largest amount of these tickets sold that has ever been put over by a San Jose ball team. Paul Kerner of the specialty shoe store has engaged the first and second tickets that are to be issued. Paul tells the management that he will sell at the very least, 50 of the season tickets. Sam Battaglia, president of the San Jose club is out with display advertising and scorecards and no doubt will have a very comfortable income from the team when the series starts on April 1st. Happy Luke Williams, vice president and manager of the team is going to have a club that needn’t take a backseat from any in the league and just as soon as the details of the league are settled, Luke is going to turn loose his lineup. Fred Kelly, secretary and treasurer of the team is leaving no stone unturned to make the San Jose team the biggest hit in the history of the Garden city.
With Jim Nealon, at the head of the league, there is no cause for any doubt about it being run right. Nealon is now president of the San Francisco Winter League and he has the years of experience as the man at the helm of baseball leagues and clubs. Jim will run the league and run it right. Al Earle will be a great asset as vice president and this coupled with a fine crop of managers that each team has, is bound to make the league a big success.
Grant Meyers, manager of the Stockton club is a fellow who always has a first-class team and he knows the game well. Myers is a fellow who sees that the visiting team gets a square deal and he has umpires that are above reproach. Howard Bartlett of Modesto is another one of those gentlemen fellows who would rather put up a clean fight and lose than to when by hook or crook. The Piggly Wiggly team of Oakland, under the management of Bob Carter, will have one of the fastest teams playing professional ball. Bob has been used to getting hard knocks when playing independent ball, but he will find when he gets acquainted with the various managers in the league that he is dealing with a bunch of gentlemen and good sports. M. E. Daurte, manager of the Alameda team is another fellow who can be depended upon to have a fast bunch of players. Daurte will see that Alameda has big turnouts when visiting teams come there and he will also see that a bunch of rooters accompany the club when they travel.
Patty Shader, manager of the Stock and Bond team of San Francisco, has a leading club in the San Francisco Winter League, and all that bothers him it is that he is afraid his team won’t get hard enough competition. The San Francisco team, like the Oakland club, will be travelers. At Gilroy, the fans of this the city no too well what to expect from Gilroy. That city has not left a stone unturned the past several seasons to have the very best team they could get, and we all know what Harry Wilkenson, George Milias and Bob Hollister, who are the mainstays back of the team, will be up and doing every moment in the State League. Gilroy will have a new ball park. L P Ollason of Monterey will look after the interests of the team from that town. Monterey has had many good ball teams in the past and they are going to try to have better than ever this season. The Seals are going to train on the Monterey new $35,000 ball park. Which has all been planted to a grass in and out field. The Monterey team will have one of the best ball parks in the state. At Santa Cruz there is a fine ball field, which was donated to the club by George Hughes of that city, who manages the ball team. Hughes is one of those square shooters who stands right back of everything he says and wants to see the visiting team get a square deal. The Santa Cruz team will not be able to travel all it should, but for the fact that Santa Cruz is a summer resort and the beach attractive several of the teams have made concessions, and Santa Cruz will have all but four league games at home. Hollister is _____ to _____ in, but because of ______ there was some misunderstanding. Regarding the ones to have the diamond they were unable to organize that the time of the meeting last Saturday night. Should they not decide to come in a fast traveling team from either Oakland or San Francisco will be admitted.
The San Jose fans that visited the winter league games will be more interested than ever now. They will be looking for rising young stars and both the for their favorites to be on the San Jose team. San as they will undoubtedly have all local ballplayers on the club.
