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SPAUR HAS 5 HITS & 4 RUNS AS TIGER MAULS ORANGE
VETERAN BACKUP HAS FANTASTIC DAY AS APBL NEWCOMERS WIN BY BAKER’S DOZEN IN PHILLY

PHILADELPHIA, PENN. (July 23, 1878) - 3x champions of baseball Orange B.B.C. are trying everything they can to lift their season out of the deepest of pits, but their nightmarish 1878 continued with a shellacking at Tiger S.C. on Tuesday:

This contest was briefly competitive, with the score tied 1-1 after the end of the 2nd inning. Tiger then scored five times in B3, the rally-starter a two-run Single by C Raynard Steinbach, to take a 6-1 advantage. Orange took a run back in T4, but Tiger then scored five more times – Steinbach capping the rally with a three-run, Inside-the-Park Home Run – to take a commanding 11-2 lead. Additional runs in the 6th-8th by Tiger gave the game its final score of 15-2, which equaled Tiger’s largest victory of their first A.P.B.L. campaign: a 25-12 win at Massachusetts Bay on June 13th.

Steinbach’s two big hits were the crux of an excellent afternoon with the bat…

• TSC C Raynard Steinbach: 3/5 (HR), 1 R, 5 RBI, 6 TB

…but it didn’t earn him the Player of the Game honor. That went to 3B Franklin Spaur, who was standing in for the injured Harold McMichael:

• B2: 1-run Single to CF off B. Svensson
• B3: 1-run Single past 2B off B. Svensson (R)
• B4: 1-run Single to CF off B. Svensson (R)
• B6: Single past 2B off J. Dressman (R)
• B8: Single past SS off J. Dressman (R)
• TOTAL: 5/5 (all 1B), 4 R, 3 RBI, 89 GMSC

Spaur, who was a regular at 3B for Shamrock when he joined the A.P.B.L. in 1872 but has been a backup for four teams since then, was making just his sixth start of the season while regular 3B McMichael heals a sprained thumb. Spaur is known more for his defense than his bat, but on this day he certainly made the most of his chances at the plate.

The win moved Tiger to 25-42, which isn’t all that bad considering they are A.P.B.L. newcomers who went 4-18 during the opening month of the season. That 4-18 May means Tiger is 21-24 since the beginning of June, so the future is looking up.

The same cannot be said of Orange. The loss dropped them to 23-44, which sees the team at last place in the Metropolitan Conference after a last-place finish in 1877. For the second season in a row, everything that can go wrong for Orange has.