As a native of central Pennsylvania, vintage base ball player and fan of Gangs of New York, this passage from Tom Melville's Early Baseball and the Rise of the National League piques my imagination:
There were certainly many objectionable features with baseball's intensifying focus upon all-out achievement, with "petty jealousies, unmanly criticism and childish bickering" appearing in Philadelphia baseball by 1862. The Athletics themselves, against Altoona, a year later, were running into on-field behavior more "fitted for the 'pug uglies' of Baltimore or the 'dead rabbits' of New York (Brooklyn Clipper)."
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