Leslie Mann Baseball Lantern Slide, No.11

Item Information

Title:
Leslie Mann Baseball Lantern Slide, No.11
Description:
Ray Blades, an outfielder for the St. Louis Cardinals, stands at home plate while holding a bat. Blades is holding the bat out horizontally across but behind the plate while standing in the batter's box directly to the right side of home plate.
Creator:
Mann, Leslie
Creator:
Erker Bros. Optical Co., St. Louis Mo.,
Date:
1923
Format:
Photographs
Location:
Springfield College Archives and Special Collections
Collection (local):
Leslie Mann Baseball Lantern Slide Collection
Subjects:
Baseball
Baseball caps
Baseball fields
Blades, Francis Raymond
St. Louis Cardinals
Bunting
Bunting Stance
Link to Item:
https://cdm16122.contentdm.oclc.org/cdm/ref/collection/p16122coll10/id/282
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:
Blades is demonstrating the incorrect bunting stance that batters should follow when attempting to bunt. Blades does a good job at keeping the bat on a horizontal line, which is essential to completing a proper bunt. However, Blades does not bring the bat in front of his body or in front of the plate and instead holds it behind the plate and his body, which is incorrect. From here, the baseball would hit the bat without there being any momentum, and the ball would most likely just plop straight in front of home plate after Blades made contact with the baseball, which would allow the catcher to quickly and easily make a throw to first base and would cause the bunt to be unsuccessful. However, if Blades decided to bring the bat in front of his body and in front of the plate, Blades would be able to have a much more successful bunt. He would be able to control where the bunt is placed more easily than if he stood like he does here, and he would also probably be able to get more power behind the bunt, which could allow him to place the bunt in the best spot possible in order to ensure he reaches first base successfully.
Ray Blades was born August 6, 1896 in Mount Vernon, Illinois. In 1919, Blades was playing for a semipro team in Vernon, Illinois. The team played against the St. Louis Cardinals, defeating them 2-1, and after the game, the Cardinals manager decided to sign three players to the team, including Blades. In 1922, he was called up to the Cardinals team after playing in the Minor Leagues. Blades was originally a second baseman, but upon joining the Cardinals, he had to compete against Rogers Hornsby for the position. In 1922, Austin McHenry died tragically from a brain tumor, opening up a spot in the outfield, and this plus the fact that he was poor infielder who had made 137 errors over the course of three seasons in the Minor Leagues as a second baseman allowed Blades to transition to being an outfielder for the Cardinals. Blades worked very hard to improve his fielding and eventually became one of the best outfielders for the Cardinals. His success was short lived, however, as in 1926, Blades badly bruised his kneecap after getting a spike stuck in a chicken wire fence along the wall of the outfield. Blades climbed it in an attempt to catch a fly ball. An interesting note about this story is why was there a chicken wire fence located in the outfield at all, as that would seem to be an unnecessary increased cause of injury. It was eventually revealed that this incident caused Blades to tear ligaments in his knee, requiring surgery. Blades never was the same player after his surgery, losing his speed and power, and moved to the Minor Leagues in 1929. Blades was known for constantly being thrown out of games and being given fines because of his abusive language towards umpires.
In 1923, the Cardinals wore experimental jerseys with numbers on them. This year, Ray Blades wore number 3 for the Cardinals. Because of this, this image was taken during the 1923 St. Louis Cardinals season.
I used the number on the jersey to identify the player in the image above as Ray Blades from the St. Louis Cardinals.
Good condition;
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 were then combined in Photoshop to create the final image.
Lantern slide from the Leslie Mann baseball instruction course, "The Fundamentals of Baseball"
Wolinsky, Russell. "Ray Blades." Society for American Baseball Research, [ https://sabr.org/bioproj/person/92a8ae6f ]. Accessed 27 Feb. 2018. ___Internet Archive___. [ http://web.archive.org/web/20180227153746/https://sabr.org/bioproj/person/92a8ae6f ].
Identifier:
LANT-BSBL-011-03
011