Introduction Essays (1794 words) - Ty Cobb, Cobb, Bill Armour

Introduction: Ty Cobb was the greatest baseball player that has ever lived, he also was the most influential on other baseball players. Who was Ty Cobb and what was his impact throughout the 20's? I propose to show his importance to baseball by giving examples of his determination to get to where he got to as a baseball player. Through the lessons and morals of hard work that his father had taught Ty as a boy, he was able to become a great hard-working baseball player. Although his personal life may not have been good at all, the way he played baseball earned himself a 24 season playing career in the American league, a batting record for runs scored of 2,245, runs batted in of 1,937, a record of 892 stolen bases, and his record of a batting average of .366 has still not been beaten. His record of 96 stolen bases in one season in 1915 was not beaten until 1962. Most people say Ty Cobb was a jerk, which is partially true, I even agree somewhat, but there was a soft side to Ty, "I was called a radical, a despot, a bad loser, a dirty player, and worse. Some of these words still hurt." (Cobb, 280) However, no one can deny his ability to play baseball. He took it one step further than anyone else did at that time. He showed that it was not a sport for people who were not rough, or did not want to be hit, or that there was any chance to be hurt somehow. He saw baseball as a great game of intelligence and athleticism. When I played baseball I didn't play for fun. To me it wasn't Parcheesi played under parchesi rules. Baseball is a red-blooded sport for red-blooded men. It's no pink tea, and mollycoddles had better stay out. It's a contest and everything implies, a struggle for supremacy, a survival of the fittest. Every man in the game from the minors on up, is not only fighting against the other side, but he's trying to hold onto his own job against those on his own bench who'd love to take it away. Why deny this? Why minimize it? Why not boldly admit it? (Cobb, 280) Body: Tyrus Raymond Cobb was born on December 18, 1886 in Royston, Georgia to a fifteen-year-old mother named Amanda Chitwood. Ty's father, William Herschel Cobb, was 23. They were married in 1883. William bought a 100-acre farm to supplement what he got for teaching school. This is where Ty grew up and where his father taught him the values of hard work and intensity. When Ty's father saw that Ty was good at farming and did not mind working, the two grew closer. Baseball was played very different then, from the way it is played now. "It was as gentlemanly as a kick in the crotch" (Cobb, 42) Ty spent a lot of his time playing baseball although his father disapproved. He says he started playing because he loved the competition, the battle of muscle and wits. When Ty was younger, he used to wind yarn around a small ball and make himself a baseball, then for the price of a few errands would find a leather maker that would make a cover for the ball. He played cow pasture baseball when he was 11 and 12 but had no ambition to make a career out of playing baseball. "...The new kid in town who owned a hittable ball could overcome social obstacles faster than a boy who didn't." (Cobb, 17) When Ty was not working on the farm with his father, he was playing baseball. William didn't like Ty playing baseball; he thought that Ty would become an alcoholic and a womanizer like the stereotype of baseball Stevenson, 4 players back then. When Ty was 17, he went to his father for permission to go try out for the South Atlantic League team in Augusta. William hesitated, but let Ty go so he could find that he didn't really want to be a baseball player, and would come back to be a doctor, lawyer, or military man. This is what he said to Ty, "You've chosen. So be it, son. Get it