Literature was one of the chief means by which Mathewson promulgated his belief that baseball required equal parts brawn and brains. “Pitching in a Pinch,” which was recently reissued by Penguin Classics, is his most celebrated work, and for good reason. Mathewson called attention to the inner workings of the sport—the strategies and signals that teams developed to outmaneuver their opponents: bunts, stolen bases, defensive shifts. These proved particularly crucial during the dead-ball era in which Mathewson pitched, when deep fences and soft baseballs made game-altering home runs rare and pitchers’ duels the norm. A theme that Mathewson returns to throughout is the pinch—a pivotal, pressure-filled moment when the contest hangs in the balance. “It is in a pinch that the pitcher shows whether or not he is a Big Leaguer,” Mathewson writes. “He must have something besides curves then. He needs a head, and he has to use it.”

Christy Mathewson and the Thinking Man’s Game (via wonderisms)