Whitey Herzog, the Corridor of Fame supervisor who led the St. Louis Cardinals to a few pennants and a World Collection championship within the Eighties, died on Monday in St. Louis. He was 92 and had been the second-oldest Corridor of Famer after Willie Mays.
His loss of life was introduced by the Cardinals.
“Baseball has been good to me since I stop attempting to play it,” Herzog preferred to say.
Signed by the Yankees in 1949, he by no means made it out of their minor league system, although he picked up a lifetime of baseball information from Supervisor Casey Stengel at spring coaching camps. He performed the outfield for 4 American League groups over eight seasons with solely modest success.
However Herzog discovered his area of interest as a supervisor with what got here to be referred to as Whiteyball, molding groups with velocity, protection and pitching to reap the benefits of ballparks with quick synthetic turf and spacious outfields, first at Royals Stadium in Kansas Metropolis after which at Busch Stadium in St. Louis.
Herzog managed the Kansas Metropolis Royals to a few consecutive American League division championships within the Nineteen Seventies, then took the Cardinals to the 1982 World Collection title with a workforce he had constructed whereas normal supervisor as nicely. And he managed the Cardinals to pennants in 1985 and 1987.
He was elected to the Baseball Corridor of Fame by the Veterans Committee in 2009.
“The basic points of the sport had been a number of the issues he all the time highlighted,” the Cardinals’ Corridor of Fame shortstop Ozzie Smith as soon as stated. “It merely got here all the way down to the best way he ready us to play the sport.”
However for all his baseball savvy, Herzog seemed past Whiteyball in growing a rapport along with his gamers.
As Bruce Sutter, the Cardinal reliever and in addition a Corridor of Famer, as soon as informed The St. Louis Submit-Dispatch, “What number of managers are you able to blow a sport for and exit fishing with him the subsequent morning?
Dorrel Norman Elvert Herzog was born on Nov. 9, 1931, in New Athens, In poor health., about 30 miles southeast of St. Louis, to Edgar and Lietta Herzog. His father was a brewery employee. (The nickname Whitey got here from his mild blond hair.)
As a boy, Whitey typically minimize college to go to Sportsman’s Park in St. Louis and watch the Yankees play the St. Louis Browns (the workforce later turned the Baltimore Orioles).
Herzog was signed by the Yankees out of highschool, however they gave up on him after an extended apprenticeship within the minors and traded him to the Washington Senators in 1956. He additionally performed for the Kansas Metropolis Athletics, the Orioles and the Detroit Tigers. He appeared in 634 main league video games with a profession batting common of .257.
After two seasons with the Athletics, as a scout after which a coach, Herzog joined the Mets as their third-base coach in 1966, scouted for them in 1967, then spent 5 years overseeing their farm system.
Herzog was named supervisor of the Texas Rangers in 1973, taking on a younger ball membership, however was fired in early September with the workforce in final place within the American League West. He turned a coach for the California Angels in 1974, filling in for 4 video games as interim supervisor throughout a managerial change.
He changed Jack McKeon because the Royals’ supervisor in the midst of the 1975 season, then led them to A.L. West titles the next three seasons, dropping to the Yankees every time within the League Championship Collection.
He regarded his 1977 workforce as the perfect he ever managed. It completed the common season at 102-60, that includes speedy gamers like Fred Patek, Frank White and Amos Otis, the hitting of George Brett and the pitching of Dennis Leonard.
Herzog was fired after the Royals completed second of their division in 1979 and was named the Cardinals’ supervisor in June 1980. He was given the final supervisor’s job as nicely in late August, when he turned the managing over to Pink Schoendienst.
He reclaimed the managing job in 1981, remaining as normal supervisor till early within the 1982 season, when the workforce he had assembled in a flurry of offers went on to seize the Cardinals’ first pennant since 1968.
That ball membership, that includes Smith at shortstop, Keith Hernandez at first base, Willie McGee, Lonnie Smith and George Hendrick within the outfield, Darrell Porter at catcher and the reduction pitching of Sutter, went on to defeat the Milwaukee Brewers in a seven-game World Collection.
After managing the Cardinals to 2 extra pennants, Herzog resigned on July 6, 1990, when his workforce was in final place within the Nationwide League East. He labored after that as an govt with the Angels.
He’s survived by his spouse of 71 years, Mary Lou Herzog; their three youngsters; Debra, David and Jim; 9 grandchildren; and 10 great-grandchildren, the Cardinals stated.
Herzog by no means forgot his baseball roots, most notably the knowledge imparted by Stengel when Herzog was a Yankee hopeful.
“Casey broke it down into the hundred little issues that may make the distinction,” Herzog recalled in “You’re Missin’ a Nice Sport,” written with Jonathan Pitts. “As soon as I started teaching and managing, I saved passing them alongside to my very own gamers, to everyone from the youngest rookie-league bushwhackers to the George Bretts, Ozzie Smiths and Vince Colemans of the world. In Casey, I had an Einstein.”
Stengel may discourse on each aspect of baseball, however Herzog recalled how one piece of recommendation Stengel imparted had nothing to do with technique.
As Herzog as soon as associated it to The New York Occasions, “Casey informed me, ‘Let ’em ask you one query and you retain speaking so that they received’t ask you one other one.”
Victor Mather contributed reporting.
