Whiteyball
Whiteyball is a style of playing baseball that was developed by former Major League Baseball manager Whitey Herzog. The term was invented by the press during the 1982 World Series to describe the style of Herzog's St. Louis Cardinals. The team won the Series without a typical power hitter, instead using speed on the basepaths, excellent defense, and line drive base hits. Whiteyball was well-suited to the fast, hard Astroturf surface at Busch Memorial Stadium, which creating large, unpredictable bounces when the ball hit it at sharp angles. In his book "White Rat", Herzog says the approach was a response to the spacious, artificial surface stadiums of the time. He said of the media's dismay at his teams' success:
They seemed to think there was something wrong with the way we played baseball, with speed and defense and line-drive hitters. They called it "Whitey-ball" and said it couldn't last.—Whitey Herzog[1]
Herzog used this strategy until he left the Cardinals in 1990.
[edit] References
- ^ Herzog, Whitey and Kevin Horrigan. White Rat - A Life in Baseball. New York: Harper & Row, 1987. Page 145.
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