Looking for a fun backyard game for the summer? Look no further than the great pastime of Wiffle Ball.
I was pleased to learn that the history of Wiffle ball began in the year of my birth, 1953. From a very young age and up until my teenage years, I played Wiffle ball in my backyard or on the sandlots of my suburban town in northern New Jersey. It was also great on vacations, as you could set up for a game of Wiffle ball wherever you went, even on the beach.
The beauty of the game was that the ball wouldn’t travel very far, which was ideal for backyards and enclosed areas. When our boys were young, they enjoyed playing Wiffle ball in our rather small backyard. They could be home run hitters by smashing the ball over our not-too-distant fences (a lot of trips for me to the neighbor’s yard).
How did the sport get started?
It was practical considerations that led David N. Mullany of Fairfield, Conn., to design the Wiffle ball for his 12-year-old son, David, to use in their backyard. The younger David and his friends had begun to play a game in the Mullany yard with a perforated plastic golf ball and a broomstick handle. They had given up on baseball and softball because they couldn’t find enough players, there was no field available, and they had broken too many backyard windows.
Young David tried to throw curves and sliders with the tiny golf ball, but he told his dad it was killing his arm. His father had been a semi-pro pitcher and knew that throwing curveballs was harmful to young arms. So, he obtained some ball-shaped plastic parts from a nearby factory and, on his kitchen table, cut various designs into them, then sent his son out to test them.
Father, son, and wiffle ball (photo courtesy Where I Live in CT)
The design with eight oblong perforations on one half of the ball worked the best. Young David and his friends could throw curveballs, sliders, screwballs, sinkers, and rise balls. That led to a lot of strikeouts, which the kids called “whiffs.” Hence, the name Wiffle ball was adopted.
Not long after that summer, Mullany produced and sold the first Wiffle perforated plastic balls. The game gained popularity quickly, and now the balls are available across the U.S. and in many countries worldwide.
The Wiffle Ball is about the same size as a regulation baseball, but is hollow, lightweight, of resilient plastic, and no more than 1/8 inch (3 mm) thick. The ball manufactured today is nearly identical to the original ball.
The rules are based on those that young David and his pals used in the backyard.
The field is laid out with foul lines and markers for single, double, triple, and home-run areas. The recommended size of the playing field is a minimum dimension of 20 feet wide (approximately eight paces) at the home run markers by about 60 feet long (about 23 paces) from home plate to each home run marker on the foul lines.
Single markers are placed approximately 24 feet from home plate on the foul line. Double markers are placed approximately 20 feet behind the single markers on the foul line. Triple markers are placed on foul lines 20 feet behind the double markers.
You can play the game with only two players, but you can comfortably include up to five players per team — pitcher, catcher, and a fielder in each of the hit areas — single, double, and triple. There is no base running.
Courtesy National Baseball Hall of Fame Online Store
A batter can make an out in three ways: 1) They swing at a pitched ball and do not foul tip the third strike. A foul tip caught by the catcher does not count as an out with two strikes. 2) The batter hits a fly ball that is caught in fair or foul territory. 3) The batter hits a ground ball that is caught while the ball is still in motion in the single area.
If, for example, the batter lines a ball that lands in the air in the double area, it counts as a double even if the fielder retrieves the ball while it is still rolling. The fielder must catch the ball in the air. The same applies in the triple area. Fielders cannot go beyond the triple area to attempt to see a home run.
Bunting is not allowed, and the batter cannot obtain a base on balls.
Say what? Wiffle ball is one of the safest sports around, so the Wiffle Ball company was shocked when in 2011, the State of New York proclaimed that Wiffle ball, kickball, freeze tag, and dodgeball were “unsafe” and a “significant risk of injury” for children. The state declared that any summer camp program that included two or more of such activities would be subject to government regulation.
Wiffle Ball executives initially thought the order was a joke, and the story became a frequent source of ridicule and amusement. People from across the nation successfully pressured the New York legislature to remove Wiffle ball and other tame entries from the list of high-risk activities.
After the reversal, State Sen. Patricia Ritchie of Watertown, N.Y., said, “At a time when our nation’s No. 1 health concern is childhood obesity, I am very happy to see that someone in state government saw we should not be adding new burdensome regulations by classifying tag, Red Rover, and Wiffle ball as dangerous activities. I am glad New York’s children can continue to steal the bacon and play flag football and enjoy other traditional rites of summer.”
When our nation’s No. 1 health concern became the coronavirus, I was happy to see that the game of Wiffle ball, invented over 70 years ago, was still a safe backyard sport that all can enjoy.
_______________
This article first appeared in The Vacaville Reporter on July 13, 2020.
