Betty Foss

Betty "Fossey" Weaver-Foss (May 10, 1929 – February 8, 1998) was an infielder and outfielder who played from 1950 through 1954 in the All-American Girls Professional Baseball League.

Listed at 5ft 10in, 180 lb., she was a switch-hitter and threw right-handed.

She started her career as Betty Weaver but changed her last name to Foss after marrying.

Her younger sisters, Jean and Joanne, also played in the league.

Foss enjoyed an outstanding career during the final five years of the All-American Girls Professional Baseball League.

She won batting titles in back-to-back seasons in 1950 and 1951 and consistently ranked among the top 10 sluggers and best base stealers.

Fossie, as friends and fans often called her, was a steady and productive hitter, a solid and speedy outfielder, and a skilled defender at first base.

Gifted with a keen eye and a quick swing, she posted a .342 batting average in 498 games, being surpassed only by her younger sister Joanne, who set an all-time record with a .359 mark.

Besides scoring 401 runs and driving in another 312 runs, Foss topped the league in doubles three times.

She holds the single-season records for hits, doubles and triples, and also set a record for career doubles (117).

She collected 294 stolen bases and is only one of six players to have hit 30 or more career home runs (32).

Her career .963 fielding average as an infielder would have been higher except for her rookie season at third base, when she committed 47 errors in 374 chances.

Her fielding average at first base and in the outfield never dropped below .964.

A two-time All-Star, she won the Rookie of the Year (1950) and Player of the Year (1952) awards, combining with her sister Joanne to capture the final five batting championships of the league.

In 1950, a Chicago White Sox scout wanted to sign Betty to a minor league contract, but at the same time she received a proposal from the All-American Girls Professional Baseball League to play for the Fort Wayne Daisies.

She opted to stay in the women's league and joined the Fort Wayne team at the start of the 1950 season.

The next season, Jean and Joanne would join the Daisies' roster.

As a rookie in 1950 Foss had a significant and immediate impact in the league.

She won the batting title with a .346 average, and led all hitters with 24 doubles and a robust .471 slugging percentage, 35 points ahead of Sophie Kurys.

Foss also finished second with 125 hits (five behind Kurys), tied for third in home runs (five), finished fourth in total bases (162) and runs batted in (61), while tying for sixth in stolen bases (64) and for eighth in runs scored (64).

She won the Rookie of the Year honors, but missed the All-Star Team in favor of Fern Shollenberger, an outstanding defender at third base who constantly paced the league in fielding percentage and number of double plays turned.

Foss had increased success in her second season.

She also finished fifth in RBI (78), seventh in stolen bases (60) and tied for fourth in runs (77), but again was denied an All-Star spot, this time to Kamenshek, a batting average runner-up in 1950 (.334) and 1951 (.335).

Her 34 doubles in a season are the league record.

After moving to first base in 1951, she won her second consecutive batting title with a .368 average, to become the first repeat batting champion in the league since Dorothy Kamenshek, who did it both in 1946 and 1947.

Foss also led the league with 34 doubles and 176 total bases, and tied for first place in home runs (four) with Eleanor Callow and Alice Pollitt.

The All-Star team faced the South Bend Blue Sox, the league's 1951 playoff champions.

The All-Stars prevailed, 7–6, when Foss scored the eventual winning run on an RBI-single by Doris Sams in the top of the 9th inning.

Her playing accomplishments helped her club to make the playoffs in these years and win three straight AAGPBL pennants beginning in 1952.

A native of Metropolis, Illinois, Betty began playing sandlot ball with her younger sisters at a very early age.

Their father, former minor league ballplayer Lloyd Weaver, tried to get them to play in a boys' baseball team without success.

The sisters finally started to play fast-pitch softball on a regular basis.

Determined to stay together, the trio played for the Magnavox softball team of the Chicago industrial league before joining the All-American Girls Professional Baseball League.

In 1952, Foss received the highest honor of the league when she earned the Player of the Year Award.

She led all batters in runs (81), hits (137), doubles (26), triples (17) and RBI (74), and was second in stolen bases (80), while hitting a solid .331 in 106 games to finish second in the batting race behind her sister Joanne (.344).

Her 17 triples (more than the next two players combined) is a single-season record.

Finally, she gained her first All-Star selection at first base.

Foss made her second straight All-Star appearance in 1953, and for the third consecutive year set a single-season mark after collecting 144 hits.

She also led the league in stolen bases (80), in runs (99) for the second consecutive year, and in total bases (195) for the third year in a row.

Besides this, she ended third in triples (seven), fifth in RBI (65) and sixth in home runs (five).