You gotta know the territory

The world of sport is full of slang terms, promulgated primarily by the media, especially radio and TV announcers.

Slang is particularly prevalent with baseball, maybe because of the game’s blue-collar history. Slang terms color every aspect of the game.

For instance, there are descriptors for various types of batted balls.

Most baseball fans know that a “Texas Leaguer” is a short fly that drops between an infielder and an outfielder. If it’s high enough, a speedy batter can stretch a Texas Leaguer into a double. The Texas League no longer exists — 60 years ago, it was an AA league with most of its teams located in Texas.

The area into which a Texas Leaguer drops is “no-man’s land,” since no man is there to catch it.

Then there’s the “can of corn,” an easy fly ball that drops into a fielder’s glove.

Authorities trace the origin of the term to the grocery store of yore, when canned vegetables were kept on a top shelf and a clerk would use a long stick to tip the can off into his spread apron.

A term not heard much today is the “Baltimore chop.” That’s a batted ball that bounces so high off home plate into fair territory that the batter has a good chance of making it to first base before it can be fielded.

The reason such a batted ball can bounce that high might be because the ball is a “rabbit ball.” That’s the term used to describe a baseball whose core is wound very tightly, and therefore is particularly lively when hit.

There’s chronic debate among baseball junkies about whether today’s ball is more lively than those of yesteryear, and if so, how much more.

Such debate, if it turns hot and heavy, becomes a “rhubarb,” a general term that describes nose-to-nose arguments between, for instance, a manager and an umpire, or a dugout-clearing brawl between teams.

The term probably derives from rhubarb’s somewhat sour taste.

A pitcher who throws an assortment of curve balls, drop balls, sliders, slurves, even fast balls that have some movement on them, is said to be “filthy.” A pitch that drops or curves significantly, particularly just before it reaches the plate, goes by the same adjective.

Filthy pitches are especially useful to a “LOOGY,” an acronym for a Left-handed One-Out Guy.

That’s a specialty pitcher brought in usually in a late inning to throw to a left-handed batter, especially one that has trouble with filthy pitches. The loogy’s job is to get out just that particular batter, after which he is replaced on the mound by another reliever.

Not all curve balls are filthy.

A garden variety curve is sometimes called just “Old Uncle Charlie,” a term whose origin is uncertain.

A pitched ball thrown inside and high, close to the batter’s head, is  “chin music.”

Pitchers, before they enter the game, warm up in the “bullpen.”

One explanation of the term’s origin is that the Bull Durham chewing tobacco company used to insist that its advertising signs on the outfield wall be located near the pitchers’ warm-up area because that’s a spot where fans often looked.

Other locations at specific ballparks also have nicknames.

“McCovey Cove” at the San Francisco Giants stadium is the area of San Francisco Bay just over the stadium seats in the outfield, where Giants great Willie McCovey would occasionally park a home run.

“Big Mac Land” in St. Louis beyond the left center field wall is similarly named for Mark McGuire, former Cardinal slugger.

If a player is called up to the big leagues but fails to perform and is sent quickly back down to the minors, his stint in the Bigs is called a “cup of coffee,” as in, “He was here long enough to have a cup of coffee.”

A batter who hits only singles is a “banjo player,” while a power hitter who hits to all fields is a “rake.”

Then there are nicknames of players. Dozens of those have come down through the years.

Particularly notable are Mordecai “Three-finger” Brown; Wilmer “Vinegar Bend” Mizell (dubbed for his hometown in Alabama); Phil “Scooter” Rizzuto, nicknamed for his quickness; and Ozzie Smith, “The Wizard,” who earned his title through his near-magical shortstop play.

Brown lost parts of two fingers on his right hand, including the index finger, in a farm accident. As a right-handed pitcher, he gripped the baseball using his stubby index finger in such a way as to put tremendous spin on the ball, earning him a reputation as a fine ground-ball hurler. (It was very difficult for a batter to hit a fly ball from a Brown pitch.)

Baseball fans reading this column will know many more such terms.

A foreigner hearing a baseball broadcast for the first time will be perfectly bewildered by the vocabulary. The baseball term for such bewilderment, incidentally, is “handcuffed,” which describes a batter unable to get a hit off a particular pitcher.

It’s a rich and descriptive glossary, one compiled over many decades. Some announcers, like Red Barber, Mel Allen and Jack Buck, contributed generously to it. And it’s not finished yet.