Leslie Mann Baseball Lantern Slide, No. 172

Item Information

Title:
Leslie Mann Baseball Lantern Slide, No. 172
Description:
Jesse Haines, a pitcher for the St. Louis Cardinals, stands on the pitcher's mound while looking forward towards home plate with his feet spread about shoulder width apart.
Creator:
Mann, Leslie
Creator:
Erker Bros. Optical Co., St. Louis Mo.,
Date:
1920–1925
Format:
Photographs
Location:
Springfield College Archives and Special Collections
Collection (local):
Leslie Mann Baseball Lantern Slide Collection
Subjects:
Baseball
Baseball caps
Haines, Jesse Joseph
St. Louis Cardinals
Pitching
Pitching--Follow Through
Link to Item:
https://cdm16122.contentdm.oclc.org/cdm/ref/collection/p16122coll10/id/42
Terms of Use:
Rights status not evaluated.
This work is licensed for use under a Creative Commons Attribution Non-Commercial Share Alike License (CC BY-NC-SA).
CC BY-NC-SA icon
Publisher:
Springfield College
Language:
English
Notes:
This lantern slide follows some of the key pitching follow through techniques that Mann describes in his manual. The major goal of a successful follow through, according to Mann, is to be prepared in case the batter hits the ball. There have been many instances in present baseball today where a batter hits a line drive straight back at the pitcher, and it is important for a pitcher to have an appropriate follow through to be prepared in case this happens. Because of this, it is important for the pitcher to stay focused on the play even after they pitch the ball. Mann explains how a proper follow through involves moving your foot off of the rubber, but not leaving your foot in the air. If a pitcher decided to leave their foot in their air, it would be much difficult to react quickly to a baseball in play. Another important technique involves keeping your feet close enough together. If a pitcher's feet are too spread apart as they follow through, they will feel uncomfortable, and this sense of uncomfortableness could prevent a pitcher from making a play on a baseball a batter hits. Mann also explains how it is very important to keep the eye on the batter at all times, since this is where the action turns to after a pitch is made. In this slide, Haines is looking directly forward at the batter, which allows him to stay involved in the play and be prepared in case the ball is hit back at him. Haines isn't worried about whether his clothing is uncomfortable, and is instead only focused on the batter. Mann explains how some pitchers would attempt to readjust their pants after throwing a baseball, which is a terrible technique since it distracts a pitcher from the batter and the baseball.
Jesse Haines was born on August 7th, 1893, in Clayton, Ohio. He pitched in the Major Leagues for the Cincinnati Reds in 1918, and spent the rest of his career in the Major Leagues pitching for the St. Louis Cardinals from 1920-1937. Haines didn't actually enter the Major Leagues until he was 26 years old, mainly due to many injuries he faced during his first few seasons. He began his career with a couple good seasons as a member of the Cardinals, but after a lackluster season, he realized he needed to add an element to his pitching game to be successful since his fastball was losing value, and he chose to add the knuckleball. However, Haines held the ball with his knuckles, which was different from other baseball players who held the ball with their fingertips. This allowed Haines to throw the ball as hard as he wanted to, but it also caused Haines a great deal of pain, as pitching the knuckleball the way he did often made his knuckles bleed profusely. After a couple seasons, Haines also began to pitch the slow ball since his knuckleball was losing its effectiveness. Overall, Haines had a very inconsistent career. He had seasons where he pitched tremendously well and other seasons where he pitched terrible. In 1924, Haines pitched a no-hitter, but the rest of his season was miserable. Haines was able to pitch until he was 44 years old because of his short delivery, which put less stress on his arm. He won five National League pennants and three World Series titles while playing for the St. Louis Cardinals. Haines was elected to the Baseball Hall of Fame in 1970. However, this decision faces wide criticism today, since Haines didn't really do anything that made him stand out as an exceptional pitcher, and his career statistics are a lot worse than many people who didn't get into the Baseball Hall of Fame. Haines was elected because his former teammate and coach Frankie Frisch was the chair and major voice of the Veterans Committee. Because of this, he convinced people to elect Haines and many of his other former teammates to the Hall of Fame, even when they probably shouldn't have been.
I used facial recognition to identify the player in slide 172 as Jesse Haines.
Fair condition;
There are a couple small cracks located alone the center of the image.
This digital image is made from two separate digital scans; one scan of the lantern slide (reflective); one scan of the image (transparency); the two image were then combined in Photoshop to create the final image.
Lantern slide from the Leslie Mann baseball instruction course, "The Fundamentals of Baseball"
Wolf, Gregory H. "Jesse Haines." Society for American Baseball Research, [ https://sabr.org/bioproj/person/afeb716c ]. Accessed 16 Nov. 2017. ___Internet Archive___. [ http://web.archive.org/web/20171116185710/https://sabr.org/bioproj/person/afeb716c ].
Identifier:
LANT-BSBL-172-03
172