Breaking News: Babe Ruth Update
The Arizona Republic is reporting that Herman "Babe" Ruth will play for a Nevada-Utah Baseball Association team in 1915.
Commissioner
Doc Victory cringed when he picked up his morning copy of
The Arizona Republic. The top headline hit him like a punch in the stomach:
Babe Ruth to join Nevada-Utah Baseball Association
Well, that answered the question of why
Herman "Babe" Ruth wasn't around on draft day. The story went on to flush out the details of how NUBA leaders had wooed the Babe into joining their fledging league. They basically promised him the moon, letting him pick what team he wanted to play for and some of his new teammates, promising him a giant wad of cash, even stake in a couple of silver and salt mines league officials said they owned.
Victory had battled the Nevada-Utah league before over players before. He had fended off franchise takeover or league merger attempts by their weasaly leaders. But this was one of the few times he had lost. And this was a big loss.
He worried about the future of the Arizona League if Babe made it big playing across the border. Would other top young players flee Arizona in the future? Would current players walk away to join "the next big thing"? Would teams jump ship? NUBA officials had approached Victory more than a few times about consolidation into a bigger three-state league. Victory had always shunned the requests, but maybe he would have no choice but to join up with them if the AZL suddenly found itself losing all the top players.
Victory also worried about Ruth the player. He knew the Nevada-Utah league was nothing like the Arizona League in terms of talent, support and overall baseball experience. Some years they don't even finish out the season because of a lack of funding. He remembers hearing about one team that just up and folded over night. The entire ownership group fled town with tons of cash, leaving the players high and dry. Another player got shot during a game after a dispute with a fan, who was mad that he hadn't hit a home run in weeks.
Victory worried about Ruth getting mixed up in all that, and as a result the baseball world could miss out on such an amazing talent...
He vowed to do whatever it took to win Ruth to the Arizona League — and maybe put the Nevada-Utah folks out of business for good...