Cole’s 20-4 record with the pennant-winning Cubs in 1910 gave him a league-leading .883 winning percentage. Ring Lardner gave King Cole literary immortality by writing about him in articles for The Sporting News which later emerged as the Alibi Ike stories. According to Lardner, Cole was a slow-thinking poker player who was threatened with a $50 fine by manager Frank Chance unless he quit spoiling poker games on train trips with his erratic playing.
