Battery (baseball)

Henry Chadwick

Charles Ives (pitcher) and unnamed catcher; the battery of Hopkins Grammar School in 1894

In baseball, the term battery refers collectively to the pitcher and the catcher, who may also be called batterymen or batterymates of one another.

History

The use of the word 'battery' in baseball was first coined by Henry Chadwick in the 1860s in reference to the firepower of a team's pitching staff and inspired by the artillery batteries then in use in the American Civil War. Later, the term evolved to indicate the combined effectiveness of pitcher and catcher.