BENNY THE GOOD MAN

May 7, 1924

So for a change I got to the ballpark before Benny today. He ran up to me out of the crowd maybe a minute before the first pitch and was excited and all out of breath and said he'd meet me in the bleachers later or if not, wait for him over at Bookbinder's Restaurant on Walnut Street. I looked at him like he'd popped a cork, and he just said see you later and ran off again.

Gee. As if that wasn't enough to distract me, we had the Giants to deal with again and tough Hugh McQuillan on the mound. Frisch walked to start the game and Youngs doubled him in right away and I said oh boy, here we go again. But Bill Hubbell pitched for us and bore down, Harper tied the game with a sacrifice pop, and in the 4th Russ Wrightstone cracked a first-pitch homer over the wall in right. There wasn't many of us in the bleachers, but we jumped up and made a pretty big ruckus anyway.

And it just got better. Wrightstone singled in a third run n the 5th and in the 6th Youngs dropped his second fly in two days to score Sand and make it 4-1. But these Giants never quit because McGraw would chew out their ears if they did. Travis Jackson homered over my head in the 7th, Youngs made up for his error by doubling in Frisch again in the 8th, and Huck Betts came on to save us.

And did he ever! With Irish Meusel on second, he got the next three guys, then threw a scoreless ninth. Benny showed up in time to watch Hack Wilson whiff to end the game and join us in throwing our hats, the big losing streak was over and we were out of last place!

Then it was mystery time. Benny was even more excited than he was before the game, but all the way down to Walnut on the streetcar he wouldn't say a word. Bookbinder's is a big famous fish restaurant that's been around since the 1880s, but it was way too fancy to get us in the door in our stinky rags. Benny just smiled at the guy, reached in his pocket and took out a brand new twenty-dollar bill. The door man's eyes nearly fell out and he got us inside and gave us a small corner table away from the stuffy crowd.

We ordered fresh pasta with giant shrimps and Benny finally spilled the beans. Seems that he had a rich uncle up in Boston who just died and left him over ten thousand dollars, and now he was going to buy himself an automobile, put me in the front seat with him and drive us out west to follow the Phillies on their entire 16 game road trip! I almost fell off my leather chair. It's actually 19 games if you count the three they have to play the Braves at the end, but that would mean us getting from Chicago to Boston in two days, which might be a struggle.

A bigger struggle is what the heck do I tell Mama this time? And how can I miss school? How do we get to these places, and does Benny even know how to drive??

On the other side of my hand, how can I even THINK about passing this chance up? I've never been west of Scranton!

There's one more game with the Giants tomorrow, which I'll try to enjoy while Benny is out shopping for an auto and hopefully some lessons. The Phils then take Friday off to head for Cincinnati, and if everything goes miracle-good tomorrow, we'll be motoring right behind them.

Good night, reader-people!
—Vinny

NYG 100 000 110 - 3 12 1
PHL 001 111 00x -4 9 0

Other National league games today:

at PIRATES 10-15-2, CUBS 3-8-2
This one is 3-3 as late as the 6th inning, when the Bucs put four singles and a walk together off Pete Alexander for three runs, then smash him for four more in the next inning, finished off by a bases-clearing triple by Earl Smith.

at ROBINS 4-7-1, BRAVES 3-6-0
Boy, it's high time Brooklyn played a better team. With Zack Wheat and Andy High both hurt, they come back from 3-0 anyway and win it on a Johnston double in the 8th off Johnny Cooney. Grimes gets his fourth win, making him a scary duo with Vance.

at CARDINALS 3-4-1, REDS 2-5-2
A real strange game. Cincy goes up 2-0 in the 2nd, the Cards get three back right away with the help of awful errors by Pinelli and Roush, before Eppa Rixey and Bill Sherdel settle down and throw nothing but outs the rest of the way. Roush also gets injured and will miss the first game against us on Saturday. Yay!

NATIONAL LEAGUE through Wednesday, May 7
Brooklyn Robins	15	7	.682	—
Pittsburgh Pirates	13	8	.619	1.5
Cincinnati Reds	12	10	.545	3
New York Giants	12	10	.545	3
St. Louis Cardinals	11	11	.500	4
Philadelphia Phillies	8	14	.364	7
Boston Braves	8	14	.364	7
Chicago Cubs	8	15	.348	7.5