In 1887, The St. Louis Post-Dispatch set out to find out “How managers watch their players on the road.”
Gus Schmelz
The paper spoke to Gus Schmelz, manager of the Cincinnati Red Stockings of the American Association; the previous season, Schmelz managed the National League St. Louis Maroons:
“He thinks, of course, that all good ball-players should retire early, and regards plenty of sleep as conducive to good condition. Most managers agree with him on this head and some of them have difficult tasks in seeing that their men are under the cover at the proper hour. This is particularly true when the club is on the road and when the aggregation is anxious to have a good time with their friends in the city.”
The paper said Jim Mutrie of the New York Giants had what he thought was a great plan to ensure his players were in bed early:
“(H)e keeps a book which he leaves with the hotel clerk who checks off the players’ names with the hour of their application for the key and late comers may expect free lectures the morning following. This plan is an excellent one, but it may be news to Mutrie to know that some of his pets return as early as 10 o’clock for their keys, are checked off in regular order and after ascending in the elevator to their rooms, as it were, return by the stairway when all is quiet, and come back in the small hours.”
As for John “Kick” Kelly, the new manager of the Louisville Colonels:
“Kelly says his plan is to wait up for the boys, and hammer at their doors until the whole club is housed, but even this plan is easily circumvented by the ingenious players who rack their brains for schemes to outwit their keepers.”
Kick Kelly
The only manager who had a plan that was working well, according to the paper, was:
“One of the most prominent and best-known managers in the country, whose name it is unnecessary to mention, has recently adopted a new plan for keeping track of his men, and from which there seems no loop-hole of escape. His orders to his men are that everyone should be asleep by 11 o’clock, thus giving them ample time for repose. When traveling, this rigorous manager waits at the hotel desk until the hands of the clock point to 10:30, and then every key in the rack which opens his rooms is turned over to him. These he carries with him to his own, and the tardy player must rouse him up and obtain his key or else stay away during the whole night. In either case, the unfortunate man has a sure guarantee of a sound tongue-threshing, if not a comfortable fine. The plan has operated with immense success thus far, but whether it will continue to do so remains to be seen.”
Baseball History Daily 
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