Herbert Edward Perry Jr. (born September 15, 1969) is an American former college and professional

baseball Baseball is a bat-and-ball sport played between two teams of nine players each, taking turns batting and fielding. The game occurs over the course of several plays, with each play generally beginning when a player on the fielding tea ...

player who was an

infielder An infielder is a baseball player stationed at one of four defensive "infield" positions on the baseball field. Standard arrangement of positions In a game of baseball, two teams of nine players take turns playing offensive and defensive roles. ...

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 all or parts of nine season during the 1990s and 2000s. Perry played

college baseball College baseball is baseball that is played on the intercollegiate level at institutions of higher education. In comparison to football and basketball, college competition in the United States plays a smaller role in developing professional pl ...

for the

University of Florida The University of Florida (Florida or UF) is a public land-grant research university in Gainesville, Florida. It is a senior member of the State University System of Florida, traces its origins to 1853, and has operated continuously on its ...

, and thereafter, he played professionally for the

Cleveland Indians The Cleveland Guardians are an American professional baseball team based in Cleveland. The Guardians compete in Major League Baseball (MLB) as a member club of the American League (AL) Central division. Since , they have played at Progressive F ...

Tampa Bay Devil Rays The Tampa Bay Rays are an American professional baseball team based in St. Petersburg, Florida. The Rays compete in Major League Baseball (MLB) as a member club of the American League (AL) East division. Since its inception, the team's home venu ...

Chicago White Sox The Chicago White Sox are an American professional baseball team based in Chicago. The White Sox compete in Major League Baseball (MLB) as a member club of the American League (AL) Central division. The team is owned by Jerry Reinsdorf, and p ...

and Texas Rangers of MLB.

Early years

Perry was born in

Live Oak, Florida Live Oak is a city in northern Florida and it is the county seat of Suwannee County, Florida, United States. The city is the county seat of Suwannee County and is located east of Tallahassee. As of 2010, the population recorded by the U.S. Census ...

in 1969. He attended Lafayette High School in

Mayo, Florida Mayo, Florida is a town and the only municipality in Lafayette County, Florida, United States. The population was 1,237 at the 2010 census. It is the county seat of Lafayette County. In August 2018, Mayo temporarily changed its name to Miracle W ...

, and played high school football and baseball for the Lafayette Hornets

College career

Perry accepted an athletic scholarship to attend the

in Gainesville, Florida, where he played for coach

Joe Arnold Joseph A. Arnold (born February 26, 1947) is a former American college and professional baseball coach. During his twenty-four seasons as a head coach, Arnold led the college baseball teams at Florida Southern College, the University of Florida, ...

Florida Gators baseball The Florida Gators baseball team represents the University of Florida in the sport of baseball. Florida competes in Division I of the National Collegiate Athletics Association (NCAA), and the Eastern Division of the Southeastern Conference (S ...

team from 1988 to 1991, and was also a

quarterback The quarterback (commonly abbreviated "QB"), colloquially known as the "signal caller", is a position in gridiron football. Quarterbacks are members of the offensive platoon and mostly line up directly behind the offensive line. In modern Ame ...

for coach

Galen Hall Galen Samuel Hall (born August 14, 1940) is a retired American college and professional football coach and player. He is a native of Pennsylvania, and an alumnus of Penn State University, where he played college football. Hall was previously t ...

's Gators football team in

1987 File:1987 Events Collage.png, From top left, clockwise: The MS Herald of Free Enterprise capsizes after leaving the Port of Zeebrugge in Belgium, killing 193; Northwest Airlines Flight 255 crashes after takeoff from Detroit Metropolitan Airport, k ...

and

1988 File:1988 Events Collage.png, From left, clockwise: The oil platform Piper Alpha explodes and collapses in the North Sea, killing 165 workers; The USS Vincennes (CG-49) mistakenly shoots down Iran Air Flight 655; Australia celebrates its Australian ...

.
2011 Florida Gators Football Media Guide
'', University Athletic Association, Gainesville, Florida, pp. 85, 99, 185 (2011). Retrieved August 31, 2011. Perry was a key member of the Gators' first-ever

College World Series The College World Series (CWS), officially the NCAA Men's College World Series (MCWS), is an annual baseball tournament held in June in Omaha, Nebraska. The MCWS is the culmination of the National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA) Divisi ...

teams in

and

1991 File:1991 Events Collage.png, From left, clockwise: Boris Yeltsin, elected as Russia's first president, waves the new flag of Russia after the 1991 Soviet coup d'état attempt, orchestrated by Soviet hardliners; Mount Pinatubo erupts in the Phil ...

. He led the team with a .370 batting average in 1989. He graduated from the University of Florida with a bachelor's degree in agricultural operations management in 1991.

Professional career

Perry hit twenty-two

home run In baseball, a home run (abbreviated HR) is scored when the ball is hit in such a way that the batter is able to circle the bases and reach home plate safely in one play without any errors being committed by the defensive team. A home run i ...

s in for the Texas Rangers; he only hit twenty-eight previous home runs in seven years total, though on limited playing time. Twelve of those came in with the

. Perry was affectionately known as Herbert "The Milkman" Perry by

announcer Ken Harrelson. Injuries shortened his major league career to only nine seasons. He retired from baseball with a career

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 ...

of .272.

Life after the Major Leagues

Perry currently resides in the town of

and manages a pre cast septic tank business, He has two sons, 2 daughters- one of which is adopted: Ethan, Drew, Gabrielle and Olivia. Perry and his wife, Sheila, adopted daughter Olivia from Ukraine in 2009. He is the older brother of MLB utility player

Chan Perry Chan Everett Perry (born September 13, 1972) is a former American college and professional baseball player who was a utility infielder and outfielder in Major League Baseball (MLB) for parts of two seasons during the early 2000s. He played colle ...

References

External links

{{DEFAULTSORT:Perry, Herbert 1969 births Living people American football quarterbacks Baseball players from Florida Canton-Akron Indians players Chicago White Sox players Cleveland Indians players Florida Gators baseball players Florida Gators football players Kinston Indians players Major League Baseball third basemen People from Live Oak, Florida Tampa Bay Devil Rays players Texas Rangers players People from Mayo, Florida Buffalo Bisons (minor league) players Charlotte Knights players Durham Bulls players Frisco RoughRiders players Gulf Coast Devil Rays players St. Petersburg Devil Rays players Watertown Indians players