the inventor of T-ball dies...

From Stephen Miller in the WSJ...

Despite evidence to the contrary, including a tribute from a U.S. congressman who commended him from the floor of the House, Jerry Sacharski insisted he didn't invent T-ball.

A kind of baseball lite in which the ball is teed-up at home plate rather than pitched, T-ball is played by about two million kids nationwide, according to the T-Ball USA Association, an informal sanctioning body that tries to keep the rules straight....

His Pee Wee Baseball league for players six to eight years old had its first season in 1956....in the early days, the point was less about reinventing the game than simply giving the small fry a chance to play....

He eliminated the pitcher by placing the ball on an adjustable-height tee he fashioned out of metal pipe, a garden hose and rubber. But more significant, in his view, was a remapping of the diamond that shrank the size of fair territory, which forced batters to hit the ball harder and straighter to put it in play than a standard field would require.

The pitcher's absence reduced the degree of difficulty -- and the potential for marathon contests -- and let youngsters focus on developing the basics. "It was a game designed to teach the pure fundamentals of baseball -- throwing, catching, swinging a bat and running the bases," Mr. Sacharski wrote recently....