Clipping:Brunell on the history of the reserve
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| Date | Wednesday, December 4, 1889 |
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| Text | [from a letter by Frank Brunell] I want to say something right here, and modestly, about the reserve rule. It has since 1883 or so been used by the operators of the older clubs to keep down salaries to the point that suckers could be attracted into the League, to make large yearly profits for them. T he history of the League backs me up. Troy, Worcester, Cleveland, Kansas City, etc., have been in the League and made little or no money, while the Chicago, Boston, New York and Philadelphia clubs have. And, of course, after getting as much as they could stand, the suckers dropped out. The reserve rule was the tongs by which the prize was drawn out of the bag by the big clubs. If they had more equitably divided the gate receipts with the clubs in the small cities a reserve rule wouldn't have been necessary, general prosperity would have been certain and $100,000 a season profits impossible. Had the salary market been open and the profits equitably divided the reserve rule and a salary limit would have been needed. Now the big operators are pushed in fairness and agree to give the weaker clubs 40 per cent. of small profits, d'you see, and only that until the trouble is over, when enough votes will be secured to reduce the percentage to 25 or less. It has been done before. Remember Detroit, 1887, and Boston's hog policy. History paints the big operators very black. |
| Source | Sporting Life |
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| Submitted by | Richard Hershberger |
| Origin | Initial Hershberger Clippings |
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