Reifert: White Sox legend Billy Pierce, 88, epitomized class
From Scott Reifert at MLBlogs.com on July 31, 2015:
Billy Pierce, the classy, diminutive yet hard-throwing lefty who followed an elite career on the pitching mound with 46 years spent raising money to fight cancer, passed away this morning at 88 after a battle with gall bladder cancer.
“Generations of White Sox fans lost one of their heroes today,” said Sox Chairman Jerry Reinsdorf. “It was an absolute privilege to consider Billy a friend. He epitomized class, not just as a ballplayer on those great Go-Go White Sox teams of the 1950s, but as a gentleman and human being who devoted so much of his life to helping others.”
Pierce spent 13 seasons with the Sox and was a seven-time All-Star. The first Sox pitcher to start an All-Star Game, his number 19 was retired in 1987.
The baseball history books are filled with facts about Pierce’s extraordinary accomplishments. Here are a biography and statistical summary from Baseball-Reference.com, a bio from the Society of American Baseball Research (SABR) and a story from SABR about Billy’s near perfect game in 1958.
Read the full article here: http://whitesoxpride.mlblogs.com/2015/07/31/sox-great-billy-pierce-epitomized-class-not-only-as-a-ballplayer-but-as-a-gentleman-and-human-being/
Originally published: July 31, 2015. Last Updated: July 31, 2015.