The Wiffle Iron is located at Heritage Park, which is a community park in Taylor, Michigan. The park offers baseball diamonds, soccer fields, swimming pools, historical buildings, and many more events for the public to enjoy. One of those events is the
Junior League World Series, which has been held in Taylor since 1981. Located a stone’s throw away from the main JLWS field is the Wiffle Iron, home of the
Belgian Wiffles. The Belgian Wiffles were without a home field in 2011, but captain David Buhr decided to make Heritage Park his home in 2012. After scouting the park, a tee-ball field stood out to him, and he decided to make it his field.
At the Wiffle Iron, you hit from behind second base toward the backstop. The field is, therefore, laid out symmetrically with dimensions of ~80' down the lines, but progressively more unforgiving depths as you approach center. If the increasing distance does not present enough of a challenge, the height of the fence also increases as you get closer to center field. Pull hitters could possibly have a field day, but defenses should be able to cover the pinched field well and keep in-the-park extra base hits to a minimum. The Wiffle Iron is a popular place for preseason games, and also hosted the inaugural Slow in the Snow Tournament.
| SWOT Report |
| Strengths: |
Convenient Parking, HR fencing already in place, hitter friendly. |
| Weaknesses: |
Tee-ball infield causes unpredictable grounders, often muddy, cheap HRs. |
| Opportunities: |
Pavilion nearby with grills can provide food/fun before or after games, park patrons watching games. |
| Threats: |
Scheduled tee-ball games could be played without us knowing, games can’t be played during the JLWS. |
