He played in Major League Baseball (MLB) for the New York / San Francisco Giants, St. Louis Cardinals, and Philadelphia Phillies.

He was an eight-time All-Star and seven-time Gold Glove winner who earned a championship as a top contributor in the 1964 World Series.

White became a full-time sportscaster after his playing career ended in 1969 and was the play-by-play man and color analyst for New York Yankees television and radio broadcasts for 18 years.

In 1989, White was elected President of the National League to replace Bart Giamatti, who succeeded Peter Ueberroth as Commissioner.

[7] However, the league's fans subjected White to a level of racial abuse and invective than he had never experienced before, and he called it the worst year of his life.

[10][5] On March 25, 1959, White was traded with Ray Jablonski to St. Louis Cardinals for Sam Jones and Don Choate.

[17][18] On October 27, 1965, the Cardinals traded White, Dick Groat and Bob Uecker to Philadelphia Phillies for Pat Corrales, Art Mahaffey and Alex Johnson.

[2][3] The Phillies traded White back to the Cardinals for Jim Hutto and Jerry Buchek in April 1969, his final season.

Nationally, White helped call several World Series for CBS Radio (1976, 1977, 1978, 1987, and 1988)[20] and did sports reports for the network.

[citation needed] The most famous highlight with White on play-by-play was the Bucky Dent three-run home run during the one-game playoff between the Yankees and Red Sox in 1978 on WPIX.

White was elected to replace Giamatti as National League president in 1989 in a unanimous vote, becoming the first black executive to hold such a high position in sports.

[20] In his autobiography, he later expressed the concern that he had about having been more of a figurehead while NL president, but he also said that he managed to accomplish some of the goals that he originally had when he took the job.

[23] For several years, beginning just after his retirement from the NL, White was a member of the Veterans Committee of the Baseball Hall of Fame.

White, along with fellow newcomers to the committee Yogi Berra (a longtime Phil Rizzuto teammate), and Rizzuto's top rival and stand-out shortstop for the perennial pennant-winning NL Brooklyn Dodgers, Pee Wee Reese, were noted for having helped swing the vote in favor of the Yankee shortstop's candidacy during their first year on the committee.

[27][28][29][30] On May 22, 2020, White was elected to the St. Louis Cardinals Hall of Fame along with Tom Herr and John Tudor.

[31] Before White was inducted into the US Army, he married his high school sweetheart, Mildred Hightower, on November 20, 1956.