An Adieu to Whitey Herzog

Fate carries some aloft like seeds to the wind dropping them amidst a sea of trees and saplings to compete for the sunlight. Those same winds carried Whitey Herzog both near and far until he finally settled near his place of origin.

Dorrel Norman Elvert “Whitey” Herzog was born on November 9, 1931, in New Athens, Illinois, a mere 30 miles as the crow flies from St. Louis.  But his was a meandering flight, much like the erratic flight of a Cardinal that he ultimately became himself.  His father worked at the Mound City brewery; his mother labored in a shoe factory; their son delivered newspapers and dug graves for a local funeral parlor when he was not playing sandlot baseball or shooting baskets in the winter.

Herzog possessed enough physical talent to play professional baseball, first spending six years in the minor leagues before earning a promotion to the American League where he amassed 414 hits spread out over eight years with four different teams.   Baseball ‘retired him’ at a time when journeymen players could look forward to the anonymity of an everyday job for the next 30 years.  Herzog initially tried that route but u-turned back to Baseball, which as he quipped was good to him when he quit trying to play it.

The former ballplayer started at the bottom rung, first as scout and then as a coach for the lowly Kansas City Athletics.   He moved on to New York where he was a third base coach, and later appointed the director of player development where his keen eye for talent helped stock the team that turned the inept Mets to baseball champions in 1969 and National League champs in 1973.  Perseverance was rewarded—or punished—when he accepted a job as big-league manager with the cellar dweller Texas Rangers.  The Ranger skipper went down with a sinking ship overloaded with losses, which underscored the adage that ‘ya gotta have the horses’ to win.

Whitey secured a second chance with the Kansas City Royals, another losing team but with emerging young talent that included a kid named George Brett.  There, he built a team with speed and defense that dominated play in spacious Royal Stadium.  The following season, his club began a string of three straight division crowns only to lose to the hated Yankees in the playoffs, a team with deep pockets and a deeper bullpen that the Royals could not match.  Due to a personality conflict with the owner’s wife, Herzog was sent packing after finishing second in 1979.  Kansas City’s loss proved St. Louis’ gain.

The proud Cardinal franchise was moribund in the 1970s, due in large measure to team owner August Busch who fumed over his ballplayers’ perceived intransigence when they solidified their union and held out for more money.  His answer was to ship off talented ‘malcontents’, and to hire Vern Rapp as manager, a martinet who thought the ways to win required the elimination of his ballplayers’ facial hair and an uncompromising enforcement of petty rules. 

To right the ship, Herzog needed to loosen the owner’s grip on the helm.   He accomplished that goal by gaining the Beer Baron’s confidence over the course of many of their card games, and imbibing more than a few of Gussie’s brews.  Mr. Busch ceded power over the team’s operations to his newly anointed General Manager and Field Boss.

In the span of 12 months, the Red Birds’ restructured the team via eight transactions that featured 31 players, which included trading away fan favorite Ted Simmons.  In 1981, the club’s best player Gary Templeton was booed for not running out a play at first base who in turn demonstratively flipped the bird at Cardinal fans.  Herzog endeared himself with the faithful when he physically yanked the offender off the field.  In what proved a masterful trade, the talented Templeton was shipped to San Diego for Ozzie Smith, a defensive magician who glued the infield.

The new field boss proved a players’ manager if they played baseball his way—running the bases aggressively, playing solid defense and faithfully executing baseball fundamentals.    His players in turn grew to appreciate his uncanny and innovative tactics, referring to him as the ‘White Rat’.   Knowledgeable Hall of Fame broadcaster Jack Buck who called literally thousands of ball games both for the local team and on the national level for 50 years said that Herzog was the best at managing the game within the game.

Soon, the St. Louis ball club returned to the top of the National League, doubling attendance, while winning pennants in 1982, 1985 and 1987. The Cardinals were crowned world champions in 1982, and absent ill-fortune could have won all three of those world series contests.

Pennants engender fan favor, but Herzog found a higher place with St. Louisans than by merely winning.  With Budweiser in hand, he held court with sportswriters after games, his homespun witticisms and shared baseball acumen made good copy.  His interviews proved both edifying and entertaining.  The dean of baseball statisticians Bill James expressed how much he enjoyed and learned from listening to Whitey’s pregame interviews, and oft quoted him in his treatises on baseball.  In short, Whitey Herzog was both a field tactician and motivator of men, who also entertained us.

The White Rat ran his ballclub through the decade of the 1980’s, but team’s ownership usurped his authority and pinched the team’s pocketbook.  The players and their meddlesome agents seemed more intent on padding stats; to them, running the bases, defense and playing small ball counted less in contract negotiations.   The team’s losses multiplied.  Whitey resigned midway through the 1990 season, departing with one of his trademark quips: “I came here in last place, and I leave here in last place.”  Yet, a third of a century later, the Red Bird faithful still held a soft spot for their erstwhile manager.

Tony La Russa who later managed the Cardinals to success that also included three pennants, was liked by Cardinal fans, but never loved.  The wine sipping, taciturn La Russa was a prickly pear compared to his gregarious, beer drinking counterpart.  Unlike La Russa, who believed that his obligation to the fans was strictly limited to wins and losses, Herzog recognized that baseball was part of the St. Louis fabric for whom something more was owed.  What Whitey said of Mike Shannon could just as easily been paraphrased about himself:  “…he’s a fit here in St. Louis.  He speaks the language of the people in this area.” 

Indeed, Herzog was one of us.  He remained married to his wife Mary Lou for 71 years.  He fished with friends, and never forgot his roots.  He boasted that he could drive by his hometown tavern and tell you who was sitting where and what he was drinking.  The former Red Bird skipper remained a constant at the Cardinals’ opening day—even appearing here a mere 11 days before his death.  He remained available and entertaining us with his baseball insights and wit until the end.  

When he spoke at his induction ceremony, Herzog noted that being selected to Baseball’s Hall of Fame was like going to heaven before you die.  We hope to see Whitey there someday; his winsome spirit will certainly keep us entertained.