Eric Gordon Tipton (April 20, 1915 – August 29, 2001) was an American

professional baseball Professional baseball is organized baseball in which players are selected for their talents and are paid to play for a specific team or club system. It is played in leagues and associated farm teams throughout the world. Modern professional ...

left fielder In baseball, a left fielder, abbreviated LF, is an outfielder who plays defense in left field. Left field is the area of the outfield to the left of a person standing at home plate and facing towards the pitcher's mound. In the numbering system ...

. He played in

Major League Baseball Major League Baseball (MLB) is a professional baseball organization and the oldest major professional sports league in the world. MLB is composed of 30 total teams, divided equally between the National League (NL) and the American League (AL), ...

(MLB) for the Philadelphia Athletics and Cincinnati Reds. Also known as a college football player, Tipton was inducted into the College Football Hall of Fame in 1965.

Early life

Tipton was born in

Petersburg, Virginia Petersburg is an independent city (United States), independent city in the Commonwealth (U.S. state), Commonwealth of Virginia in the United States. As of the 2020 United States Census, 2020 census, the population was 33,458. The Bureau of Econ ...

and attended Petersburg High School.

College football career

Tipton played college football at Duke University as a

running back A running back (RB) is a member of the offensive backfield in gridiron football. The primary roles of a running back are to receive handoffs from the quarterback to rush the ball, to line up as a receiver to catch the ball, and block. Ther ...

and punter. While there, the Blue Devils won 25 games and lost only four, and won the

Southern Conference The Southern Conference (SoCon) is a collegiate athletic conference affiliated with the National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA) Division I. Southern Conference football teams compete in the Football Championship Subdivision (formerly k ...

championship in 1936 and 1938. For his college career, he rushed for 1,633 yards and scored 17 touchdowns. One of his most notable games came against

Pittsburgh Pittsburgh ( ) is a city in the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, United States, and the county seat of Allegheny County. It is the most populous city in both Allegheny County and Western Pennsylvania, the second-most populous city in Pennsylva ...

in 1938. During the game, Tipton had seven punts that stayed within Pitts' own 10-yard line, and another seven stopped inside the 20-yard line, as Duke won 7–0.

Professional baseball career

Tipton was drafted in the thirteenth round of the

1939 NFL Draft The 1939 National Football League Draft was held on December 9, 1938, at the New Yorker Hotel in New York City, New York. With the first overall pick of the draft, the Chicago Cardinals selected center Ki Aldrich. Player selections Round on ...

by the

Washington Redskins The Washington Commanders are a professional American football team based in the Washington metropolitan area. The Commanders compete in the National Football League (NFL) as a member club of the league's National Football Conference (NFC) N ...

, but chose to play

instead. He played

outfield The outfield, in cricket, baseball and softball is the area of the field of play further from the batsman or batter than the infield. In association football, the outfield players are positioned outside the goal area. In cricket, baseball a ...

for the Philadelphia Athletics (1939–1941) and the Cincinnati Reds (1942–1945). His best seasons in the majors were in 1943 and 1944, when he had 142 hits and batted .288 in '43, and had 144 hits and batted .301 in '44. Tipton then played in the

American Association of Independent Professional Baseball The American Association of Professional Baseball is an independent professional baseball league founded in 2005. It operates in the central United States and Canada, mostly in cities not served by Major League Baseball teams or their minor lea ...

with the St. Paul Saints, 1946–1951, and the

Portland Beavers The Portland Beavers was the name of separate minor league baseball teams, which represented Portland, Oregon, in the Pacific Coast League (PCL). The team was established in 1903, the first year of the PCL. Franchise history Many baseball teams ...

, 1952, of the Pacific Coast League. In 501 games in seven seasons, Tipton posted a .270

batting average Batting average is a statistic in cricket, baseball, and softball that measures the performance of batters. The development of the baseball statistic was influenced by the cricket statistic. Cricket In cricket, a player's batting average is ...

(439-for-1626) with 212 runs, 22 home runs, 151 RBI and 223 bases on balls. He finished his career with a .977 fielding percentage as an outfielder.

Coaching career

During his off-season from baseball, Tipton was initially freshman football coach beginning in 1939 and in 1946 became an assistant football coach at

The College of William & Mary The College of William & Mary (officially The College of William and Mary in Virginia, abbreviated as William & Mary, W&M) is a public research university in Williamsburg, Virginia. Founded in 1693 by letters patent issued by King William I ...

. From 1953–57 he served as W&M's baseball prior to moving to West Point in 1957, where he was the lightweight football coach and baseball team head coach at the

United States Military Academy The United States Military Academy (USMA), also known metonymically as West Point or simply as Army, is a United States service academy in West Point, New York. It was originally established as a fort, since it sits on strategic high groun ...

. In 20 seasons at West Point, his baseball teams were 234–201–5 and won three league titles. His lightweight football teams were 104–14–1 for a .878 winning percentage with 13 league titles.

Honors

For his athletic ability as a student Tipton was named to the Duke University Athletic Hall of Fame in 1976 in the second induction year. He joined the William & Mary Athletic Hall of Fame in 1989 after serving as a coach from 1939–1957 and, at the time, was one of few non-William & Mary graduation coaches inducted. Tipton was named to the Army Sports Hall of Fame (at the United States Military Academy) in 2005 in the second induction year; he was the first two-sport head coach honored at West Point. Tipton was inducted into the

Virginia Sports Hall of Fame The Virginia Sports Hall of Fame honors athletes, coaches, administrators, journalists and other contributors to athletics. Many of the more than 350 inductees since 1972 were born in Virginia or enjoyed success in college, professional, amateur or ...

in 1978.

References

External links

* {{DEFAULTSORT:Tipton, Eric 1915 births 2001 deaths American football halfbacks American football punters Major League Baseball outfielders Cincinnati Reds players Philadelphia Athletics players Army Black Knights baseball coaches Duke Blue Devils football players Duke Blue Devils baseball players Kannapolis Towelers players William & Mary Tribe baseball coaches William & Mary Tribe football coaches Baseball players from Virginia College Football Hall of Fame inductees Sportspeople from Petersburg, Virginia Coaches of American football from Virginia Players of American football from Virginia Baseball coaches from Virginia