Hot Rod Beck's blog

Wiffle ball goes big time—well, not so big

by Lee Green
The Wiffle Effect

If the phrase "organized adult Wiffle ball" has a slightly ludicrous ring to it, that's because we invariably associate the white plastic sphere with childhood, backyard fields, and quirky ground rules. A one-hopper off the tool shed was a double, a shot over the boxwood hedge was a home run, and a foul ball into the fenced province of the neighbors' dog meant the game was over.

That version of the sport still exists, fostering, as one enthusiast's Web site puts it, "the ruining of America's backyards." But in the mid-1990s isolated groups of adult players—usually in their twenties or thirties—discovered on the Internet that plenty of others out there shared their passion. Adult tournaments have been around for years, particularly in the Northeast, where the Wiffle tradition runs long and deep, but competitive adult Wiffle ball has now grown into a thriving subculture of self-described "touring pros," structured competitions, cash prizes, and slick playing fields. Forget the boxwood hedges; these guys swing for low, Fenway-green outfield fences eighty to 110 feet from home plate. And forget those plastic Wiffle bats, too. "That little yellow bat just doesn't cut it today, especially against the pitchers you're facing," says Mike Palinczar, the organizer of two annual tournaments in Trenton, New Jersey, and one of the game's premier pitchers. "If you're up there with a yellow bat, you might as well give up." Today's players wield sturdier plastic or aluminum bats (including one manufactured by Palinczar) with names like Ledge Sledge, King Stick, and Wiffle Pro. A carbon-graphite model, the Moonshot, sells for $120.

The sport reached a milestone in January of 2001, when six players from various parts of the country, frustrated by bitter rivalries and a lack of organization, convened in Baltimore to see if they could invest the game with some semblance of order and uniformity. Two days later they emerged as the United States Perforated Plastic Baseball Association, a governing body that publishes rules, sanctions a series of tournaments on both coasts during baseball season, and conducts post-season playoffs that culminate in a fall national championship. The organization's name may suggest a lack of seriousness, but the players, most of whom played baseball in high school or college, intend nothing of the sort. Billy Owens, of Costa Mesa, California, a thirty-four-year-old electronics distribution manager, is one of the association's founders and the editor of an online Wiffle-ball newsletter called Fast Plastic. Owens bristles at the notion that he is consumed by a child's game. "For ex-baseball players," he told me, "this is the closest thing they can get to playing college-level baseball or even semi-pro."

www.theatlantic.com

About once a year I get the inkling to spend a couple all nighters rebuilding web sites. A month ago I promised to put forth the same effort on the LowBall site. Little progress was made in March, and then the snow melted. Suddenly HST became visible and the memories flooded back. I went to work. After around 48 hours of near continuous work and a few cans of the old good life, the site is live and revived. I hope it gets you as excited as I am for the season.

A brief background, the header/background design was developed out of these source images. When I started working on the site, I really wanted to get the feeling of old time baseball across. To me, that is LowBall, the pure spirit of baseball without all the pretense; just friends and competition. These two images caught my eye and I really worked to make them a part of the theme.

I went through a lot of iterations to reach the end product. Since in my mind, I feel that Lonny was the LowBaller of the Year, I worked him in place of Hank Greenberg. I figure getting the header image for a year is a decent reward for 142 at bats. I like the merging of a modern wiffle photo with an old time baseball photo. That really is the thing, every time you take the mound or step into the batter's box, you step into something bigger and for a brief moment you are part of the big show. If that made no sense to you, you should stop reading and start playing in your company's slow pitch softball league.
I also quietly revised the LowBall Coat of Arms. This ended up being a real chore. I really did not want to use a photo of myself in any of this. However after spending hours cutting and pasting different LowBallers into the crest, it became apparent that this photo worked best. Having built the site and built a lot of baseball cards, I now know what photos I need and what angles work best. Next year should go smoother. I would like to have the LowBaller of the Year (voted by committee) emblazoned on the crest for their reign as LOTY. That's a long ways off.

As a note, I put up some base posts for the individual fields. These should be expanded upon by the appropriate owners.

For now, all this staring at wiffle photos has got me amped up for some wiffle. Now let's wiffle you hosers.

HOT ROD.

Alright lads,

Believe it or not, the long winter is slowly losing its cold grip on the fields of wiffle. Within mere months, the thrill of an epic battle between pitcher and batter will once again be the center piece of lazy weekends and long summer nights. I, for one, am eagerly awaiting a return to greatness and my sophomore season amongst the hallowed ranks of Lincoln's Old School Wiffle league.

In preparation for the fresh season, I will be spending the month of March working on a redesign on our lovely internet home field. With the relaunch in early April will come the much anticipated final 2007 stats. In the interest of this much discussed delay in release, I believe we all agree that we must come up with a better system of keeping and releasing stats. My suggestion is that we start to treat the site as a weekly newspaper, "The LowBall Wiffle Weekly". In this way we would have designated roles and a "semi" set schedule for the release. In the weeks to come, I will expand on my ideas for this and invite you to add your suggestions for the site.

One Wiffle,

If you didn't hear through the grapevine, the Library of Congress has released a gang of photos on Flickr. Definitely worth a look, check them out CLICK HERE

I have felt incomplete for the last few months, as if a significant part of my world just disappeared in one 18 inning game of infamy. Alas the brain trust of the LowBall league has come up with an adequate substitute for months in which the ground (hopefully) is covered in white and the air is at a ball cracking chill.

I would say the indoor experiment was a legitimate success, everyone played exceptionally well (except me) and the added difficulty of balls caroming around the gym added a very interesting aspect.

Great to see all the wiffle fanatics, I thinks this should be done again...soon.

Seth

In case you didn't already know, I like the wiffle quite a bit. There should be no question of the dedication of the LowBall faithful after yesterday's game. In near freezing temperatures, in intermittent drizzle, a host of the old school wifflers showed up and fought through a game of epic proportions. In true LowBall fashion, the teams were randomly drawn at the start of the game, pitting the Loggers (Trot, Ox, The Surgeon, Unit, Wingman, Sharp) against the Lagers (Hot Rod, Lonichiro, J-Mac).

Temperatures at Gapbridge were at just about bone shattering levels. Wiffle balls were cracking in practice and hands were constantly numb. Only the truly brave or insane play in conditions like this, while I would like to say I am mostly the former, I believe most would conclude the latter.

The front nine played out with the Loggers leading 15 to 11. Ox was on fire, knocking 3 balls out of the park and standing strong on the mound. The pitching was on point with a total of eleven one and dones being recorded in the first half of the game. Honestly, it was so cold I don't remember much else, other than me getting thumped for 5 runs.

After a short recess, the back nine continued at Hunter S. Thompson in sunny Bristol. The Loggers quickly added to their lead with 3 runs in the tenth while Wingman only allowed 1. As is often the case in LowBall, things shifted quickly in the eleven with the lagers putting 7 on the board powered by strong doubles from Rod and Ich.

The teams continued to battle and arrived in the 16th with the Lagers trailing the Loggers by one run. J-Mac put three K's on the rack and the Lagers came to bat in the bottom facing the freshly rebuilt arsenal of the Unit. Despite a strong showing earlier in the game, the Lagers now had Unit's number and rallied 5 runs on to the board behind strong drives from all three players. Now down by 4, the Loggers brought a fierce offensive onslaught against LonIchiro on the backs of opposite field dings from Sharp and Unit.

Leading by a mere 1 run, the Lagers looked to pad their lead in the bottom of the inning but faced a focused Unit. After holding strong, the Loggers came into the 18th down by one and down to their last three outs. Hot Rod was on the mound, having recorded 13 K's on the day, but giving up 10 runs. Ox drove a shot to the left field corner that LonIchiro was able to run under and snag for the first out. Unit got walked and the winning run arrived at the plate in newcomer Sharp. Sharp made contact sending a ground ball to right, Beck dove off the mound, snagging the grounder, flipping it to Lon on the mound, who quickly converted it into a game ending double play. A fitting way to end a great communal battle, with the only play in wiffle that actually involves two players. The Lagers retained rights to the trophy 29-28, but everyone won.

Three pillars to the trophy, three players in the field, a truly team game.

Trot had the play of the game, self described as the moon. I would like to clarify this as being the eclipse as the humor factor eclipsed the quality of what was certainly the best defensive play of the game if not the year. Hat's off, there is no shame in a great play, none.




Until next season...

Image inspiration from "The Last Waltz", Original Click Here

not necessarily the last wiffle, only used for the drama

Write-up may actually happen, for now here are some of the best photos to date, in my opinion.