1903 Sporting Life Cabinets - Now with player stats on back

[hharm3]

Someone wrote stats for this player on the back of his SL cabinet. The batting (B) average appears to match those on baseball-reference.com but can anyone explain the F stat? I would have assume fielding percentage but those numbers do not match and also would be expressed as .9xx rather than 9.xx. Can anyone explain the F column on these hand-written stats?

[GrewUpWithJunkWax]

It must be Fielding %, but appears the decimal was written in the wrong spot. I wonder if it used to be expressed differently? But, the written Batting Avg stats also don't have any decimals, calling into question the writer's formatting.

The 1905 stat matches the Fielding % on Baseball Reference, while the 1907 stat is very close and could just be a rounding difference, but the 1908 stat just doesn't match. The "Below" note suggests to me that the writer knew they had incomplete or bad data to make that calculation, though odd since the Batting Avg was correct that year.

I enjoy seeing writing like this on old card backs.

[hharm3]

Originally Posted by GrewUpWithJunkWax

It must be Fielding %, but appears the decimal was written in the wrong spot. I wonder if it used to be expressed differently? But, the written Batting Avg stats also don't have any decimals, calling into question the writer's formatting.

The 1905 stat matches the Fielding % on Baseball Reference, while the 1907 stat is very close and could just be a rounding difference, but the 1908 stat just doesn't match. The "Below" note suggests to me that the writer knew they had incomplete or bad data to make that calculation, though odd since the Batting Avg was correct that year.

I enjoy seeing writing like this on old card backs.

Good call. I was looking at the league fielding percentage. That's why I thought nothing was matching.

If you look above the darker writing you can just make out where they started writing in a lighter blue pen and the presumably switched to a darker ink. I also wonder when the stats were added. I assume all at once and in 1907 (since he did play for Washington in 1908 and 1909). I also wonder why they didn't include stats from his years prior to 1905.

[FrankWakefield]

It's what Junk Wax said...

And maybe the 1908 season wasn't yet over... I envision an anxious kid fan who couldn't wait until the end of the season. Kahoe played in 17 games in 1908. He was in 4 games with Washington in 1909, his final year. So, I'm guessing a kid wrote that in 1908. If a card has to have stuff written on it that isn't an autograph, then that's the kind of stuff with which I'd be ok.

[hharm3]

Originally Posted by FrankWakefield

It's what Junk Wax said...

And maybe the 1908 season wasn't yet over... I envision an anxious kid fan who couldn't wait until the end of the season. Kahoe played in 17 games in 1908. He was in 4 games with Washington in 1909, his final year. So, I'm guessing a kid wrote that in 1908. If a card has to have stuff written on it that isn't an autograph, then that's the kind of stuff with which I'd be ok.

I like that story and I thought it was very cool.