"You can't sit on a lead and run a few plays into the line and just kill the clock. You've got to throw the ball over the damn plate and give the other man his chance. That's why baseball is the greatest game of them all."

Earl Sidney Weaver (born August 14, 1930 in St. Louis, Missouri) spent his entire managerial career with the Baltimore Orioles, skippering the club from 1968-1982 and 1985-1986.

During his tenure as manager, the Orioles won six Eastern Division titles, four American League pennants, and a World Series championship. Weaver's managerial record is 1,480-1,060 (.583), including 100+ win seasons in 1969(109), 1970(108), 1971(101), 1979(102), and 1980(100). His only major league team with a winning percentage of less than .500 was the 1986 Orioles.

Weaver holds the dubious distinction of being ejected from more games than anyone in American League history, with 98 ejections to his credit. He was also notorious for giving profanity-laced interviews.

Between his stints as manager Weaver served as a color commentator for ABC television, calling the 1983 World Series (which included the Orioles) along with Al Michaels and Howard Cosell. He also wrote a book called Weaver on Strategy.

Weaver was inducted into the Baseball Hall of Fame in 1996.

Weaver's managerial philosophy, outlined in Weaver on Strategy, is oft-quoted as "Pitching, Defense, and the Three Run Homer." Weaver eschewed the use of so-called "inside baseball" tactics such as the stolen base, the hit-and-run, or the sacrifice bunt, preferring a patient approach saying, "If you play for one run, that's all you'll get" and "On offense, your most precious possessions are your 27 outs."

Weaver made extensive use of statistics to create matchups that were favorable either for his batter or his pitcher. He had various notebooks with splits and head-to-head numbers for his batters and against his pitchers.

Weaver made expert use of the bench. In the Oriole teams of the late 1970s and early 1980s, Weaver made frequent use of platoons. He also exploited a loophole in the Designated Hitter rule by listing a starting pitcher as a DH so as not to lose a hitter should the opposing pitcher be ineffective or get injured before it was the DH's turn in the batting order. A rule was created to stop the use this tactic, allegedly (by Weaver) because it was distorting pinch-hitting statistics.

Weaver pioneered the use of radar guns to track the velocity of pitches during the 1972 spring training season.

Weaver the player was a right-handed hitting and throwing second baseman in the farm system of the St. Louis Cardinals. He never played an inning of Major League Baseball. His Hall of Fame pitcher Jim Palmer, who battled with Weaver on a regular basis, once noted: "The only thing that Earl knows about pitching is he couldn't hit it." After Palmer's skills began to decline and he was no longer a regular starter, Weaver defended his actions by claiming he'd given Palmer "more chances than his ex-wife."

Weaver joined the Orioles in 1957 as skipper of their Fitzgerald club in the Class D Georgia-Florida League, where his team finished nine games under .500; he would never again have a losing season as a minor league pilot. He was promoted to the Orioles as their first-base coach in 1968, and spent a half-season in that role before taking the managerial reins in July.

Achievements and Honors

• 2-time ML Manager of the Year Award (1977 & 1979)
• Division Championships: 6 (1969-1971, 1973, 1974 & 1979)
• AL Pennants: 4 (1969-1971 & 1979)
• Managed one World Series Champion with the Baltimore Orioles in 1970
• 100 Wins Seasons as Manager: 5 (1969-1971, 1979 & 1980)
• Baseball Hall of Fame: Class of 1996

Career Statistics

Contact Information

Direct emails for Earl Sidney Weaver to: eweaver@hofmag.com