July 1, 1976: Tim Murtaugh wins father-son battle with manager Danny as Charleston beats parent Pirates

Father and son managers Danny and Tim Murtaugh both had challenging seasons in 1976. But their difficulties faded for one night at the start of July, when the Murtaughs faced off in a two-generation manager matchup during an exhibition game.

In what was reported to be their first head-to-head battle, Danny’s Pittsburgh Pirates took the field on July 1 against Tim’s Charleston Charlies, the Pirates’ Triple-A affiliate in the International League.1 The fans at Charleston’s Watt Powell Park got to see a close game with a tense finish, featuring a future Hall of Famer and numerous present or future big-leaguers. The victory went to Tim and the Charlies, 4-2.

By the start of the 1976 season, 58-year-old Danny Murtaugh was a Pittsburgh legend. The former Pirates infielder had managed the Buccos to World Series championships in 1960 and 1971, as well as National League East Division titles in four of the previous six seasons.2

But in 1976 he had a new competitor. The Philadelphia Phillies, the NL’s worst team just four seasons earlier, had gradually improved each year, and they started the Bicentennial season by rocketing to a major league-best 50-20 record through the end of June.3 Despite playing at a solid 41-29 clip, Danny and the Pirates were already nine games back.

Tim, 33,  was in his sixth season as a minor-league manager, having also played parts of nine minor-league seasons as a catcher.4 He’d skippered the 1974 Thetford Mines Pirates to the playoff championship of the Double-A Eastern League,5 then followed up with a 76-52 season and second-place divisional finish with the 1975 Shreveport Captains of the Double-A Texas League.6 He was tabbed in some quarters as a potential replacement for his father.7 The younger Murtaugh was finding the going tough at Triple-A, though: The Charlies entered the day in seventh place in the eight-team IL with a 32-38 record, nine games behind first-place Rochester.8

Pregame stories in West Virginia suggested that several Charlies might be evaluated by Pittsburgh as potential second-half help. With Pirates third baseman Richie Hebner hitting poorly and reportedly interested in returning to his hometown of Boston,9  21-year-old speedster Miguel Diloné—usually an outfielder, hitting .338—started at third for Charleston to evaluate his possible use there in the majors.10 Dave Augustine, who’d had cups of coffee with the 1973 and ’74 Pirates, was also rumored as a call-up. He’d played only outfield as a major-leaguer and started in right field in the exhibition, but had minor-league experience at third base, shortstop, and second base.11

Tim Murtaugh stayed with his scheduled pitching rotation, which meant that 22-year-old righty Timothy Jones got the start.12 The 6-foot-5 Jones had been the Pirates’ fourth-round choice in the June 1972 draft out of high school in California. The 1976 season was Jones’ fifth as a pro, and he closed the year with a 7-10 record and a 3.63 ERA in 24 games, all starts. He made it to Pittsburgh for three games in September and October 1977, his only experience in the majors.

It was common in major-minor exhibitions for the big-league team to bolster its pitching staff with minor-league ringers, and the Pirates summoned an up-and-comer from Salem of the Class A Carolina League to start on the mound. Right-hander Ed Whitson, 21, had been drafted by Pittsburgh in the sixth round of the June 1974 draft out of high school in Tennessee. Whitson was in the midst of a breakout season that saw him go 15-9 with a 2.53 ERA for Salem.13 The following year, he pitched in Triple A and got a late-season call-up to Pittsburgh, beginning a 15-season major-league career. (By happenstance, Whitson and Jones made their big-league debuts in the same game, an 8-2 loss to the Los Angeles Dodgers on September 4, 1977.14)

Danny Murtaugh started most of his regulars except for first baseman Willie Stargell, who was nursing injured hands, and catcher Manny Sanguillén.15 The Pirates’ outfield was particularly potent, featuring future Hall of Famer Dave Parker in right field; center fielder Al Oliver, leading the NL with a .357 batting average; and left fielder Richie Zisk, the NL’s doubles leader with 20.

Charleston fans also got a glimpse of a Pittsburgh fan favorite who hadn’t pitched since June 7. Right-hander Dave Giusti, a bulwark of the Pirates’ bullpen since 1970, was on the injured list with a pinched nerve in his right leg. Danny Murtaugh told reporters he expected to give Giusti an inning of work, though the pitcher was ordered to take it easy on fielding plays. “He’s just going to throw the ball,” the manager said.16

About 4,380 fans turned out on a Thursday night to watch the Pirates and Charlies do battle for the seventh time in six seasons.17 The first three innings passed without runs. The Charleston Daily Mail reported that Whitson “rolled” through these early frames, while Jones “was steadily putting the Pirates down.”18

The home team opened the scoring in the fourth, thanks to another player who made his big-league debut the following year. Lefty-swinging first baseman Mitchell Page crashed a two-run, opposite-field homer off Whitson to give the Charlies a 2-0 lead.19 Page’s team-leading 22 regular-season homers and 83 RBIs weren’t enough to get him a chance with the 1976 Pirates, but a March 1977 trade to the Oakland Athletics gave Page an opportunity. His .307 average, 21 homers, 75 RBIs, and 42 stolen bases placed him second in American League Rookie of the Year voting that year.20

After working four innings, giving up two runs on two hits and a walk, Whitson gave way to Giusti, who pitched a shutout fifth inning with one strikeout.21

As Jones coaxed harmless grounders and flies from the Pirates’ batters, his teammates expanded the lead. With one out in the seventh inning, Augustine singled22 off Pittsburgh’s third pitcher, a temporary call-up from Class A Niagara Falls who’d marked his 22nd birthday two days earlier. Game accounts called the rookie left-hander “Fred Honeycutt,” but major-league fans knew him as Rick during a 21-season career that began in 1977.23

Second baseman Fernando González doubled to left field to send Augustine to third, and catcher Steve Nicosia’s groundout brought Augustine home for a 3-0 lead. Honeycutt was still pitching in the eighth when Diloné tripled and scored on a sacrifice fly by left fielder William “Tommy” Thomas24 to make the score 4-0.

Three outs from defeat, the Pirates perked up in the ninth — with help from a gift. Sanguillén, subbing at third base following a minor injury to Hebner,25 reached second when shortstop Craig Reynolds misplayed his grounder. A groundout by Omar Moreno moved Sanguillén to third, and he scored on Parker’s only hit of the night, a single. Bill Robinson followed with another single, and Parker took third on a wild throw by center fielder Alberto Lois.26

With two left-handed batters scheduled in Kirkpatrick and Ott, Tim Murtaugh went to his bullpen for 25-year-old lefty Steve Williams, working his sixth and last pro season. For the full season, Williams posted a 2-4 record, a 4.59 ERA, and three saves in 37 appearances, almost all in relief.

Williams never reached the majors, but in this game, he retired two big-league hitters when it counted. Kirkpatrick hit a run-scoring groundout that made the score 4-2, then Ott grounded out to end the game in two hours even. Jones got the win, Whitson took the loss, and Williams earned a save.

Jones, who scattered eight hits, said he hadn’t been trying to impress the Pirates: “[I] just wanted to keep the ball low and across the plate. But I guess the Pittsburgh people had to notice.” Danny Murtaugh singled him out for doing “a fine job,” diplomatically adding, “There are some good young players on this team. … There are some guys here that are going to help us soon.”27

Nothing could help the Pirates catch the Phillies, though: Pittsburgh’s 92-win season was only good for second place in the NL East, nine games back. Charleston finished in sixth place at 62-73, 24½ games behind Rochester. The exhibition was the Pirates’ last trip to Charleston, as they moved their Triple-A team back to Columbus, Ohio, in 1977.

The Murtaughs’ first managerial faceoff turned out to be their last. Danny Murtaugh had already retired as Pirates manager three times due to heart problems, and he stepped down a fourth time in October 1976. He suffered a stroke the following month and died on December 2, 1976.28 The Pittsburgh job went to Chuck Tanner. Tim Murtaugh began 1977 managing at Columbus, was demoted in midseason to Double-A Shreveport, and left the Pirates organization and pro baseball after the season.29

Acknowledgments

This story was fact-checked by Gary Belleville and copy-edited by Keith Thursby.  

Sources and photo credits

In addition to the specific sources cited in the Notes, the author consulted Baseball-Reference.com and Retrosheet.org for box scores and general player, team, and season data.

Baseball-Reference and Retrosheet do not provide box scores for exhibition games, but the July 2, 1976, edition of the Charleston (West Virginia) Daily Mail published a box score.

Danny Murtaugh and Tim Murtaugh cards downloaded from the Trading Card Database.

Notes

1 “Charleston Takes Win Over Bucs,” Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, July 2, 1976: 11. SABR member Walter LeConte’s list of major-minor exhibition games, cited later in these notes, also supports the claim that this game was the Murtaughs’ only matchup. The list cites no examples of the Pirates playing any minor-league team lower than their Triple-A affiliate during Tim Murtaugh’s career as a minor-league manager, and 1976 was the only season when Danny and Tim Murtaugh managed in Pittsburgh and Triple A respectively.

2 The Pirates won the NL East every season from 1970 to 1975 except for 1973. Danny Murtaugh moved into the Pirates’ front office for the 1972 season, and that year’s division winners were skippered by Bill Virdon. Virdon and Murtaugh each managed part of the 1973 season, when the team lost future Hall of Famer Roberto Clemente to an offseason plane crash and starting pitcher Steve Blass to an unexplained, career-ending bout of wildness. The 1973 Pirates went 80-82 and finished third, 2½ games behind the division-winning New York Mets.

3 The Phillies went 59-97 in 1972, 71-91 in 1973, 80-82 in 1974, and 86-76 in 1975. By 1975 the Phils had risen from last place all the way to second in the NL East, finishing 6½ games behind the Pirates.

4 For most intents and purposes, Murtaugh’s playing career spanned six seasons, from 1965 to 1970. After switching to managing, he made brief playing appearances in three more seasons, appearing in 10 games in 1972 and 2 apiece in 1973 and 1974.

5 Canadian Press, “Thetford Wins,” Vancouver Sun, September 9, 1974: 29. 

6 The Captains had held a 13½-game division lead midway through the season but couldn’t maintain it. Jerry Byrd, “Captains Close, But…,” Shreveport (Louisiana) Journal, September 2, 1975: 6A.

7 Associated Press, “Captains’ Tim Murtaugh After His Father’s Job?” Shreveport Times, October 2, 1975: 7E.

8 “International League” (standings), Rochester (New York) Democrat and Chronicle, July 1, 1976: 2D.

9 Hebner’s .221 average was fourth-worst in the league among qualifying batters. Hebner ended up signing as a free agent with the Philadelphia Phillies after the 1976 season. In an 18-season major-league career, the native of suburban Norwood, Massachusetts, never played for the Boston Red Sox.

10 Mark Lowery, “First Person Look Awaits Murtaugh,” Raleigh Register (Beckley, West Virginia), July 1, 1976: 17. Diloné played seven regular-season games at third base for the 1976 Charlies and did not develop into a long-term solution for the Pirates at that position. He played only 16 games for the Pirates near the end of 1976, nearly all as a pinch-hitter or pinch-runner. In a big-league career that spanned 12 seasons and 800 games, Diloné appeared at third base three times, all with the Oakland Athletics in 1978.

11 Lowery. Augustine, who hit .259 over the full 1976 season with Charleston, was not called up and did not return to the majors.

12 Chuck Rist, “Jones Makes Exhibition a Choice Assignment,” Charleston (West Virginia) Daily Mail, July 2, 1976: 3B. Jones is referred to as Tim Jones in contemporary game stories. As of 2026, he was referred to in Baseball-Reference as Timothy Jones, perhaps to differentiate him from a different Tim Jones, an infielder with the St. Louis Cardinals from 1988 to 1993.

13 According to Baseball-Reference, Whitson’s 15 wins tied him for the league lead with Don Fowler of the Peninsula Pilots, a Philadelphia Phillies farm club.

14 Whitson and Jones also both appeared in a 7-1 loss to the New York Mets on September 27, 1977.

15 “Pirates Down on Farm,” Pittsburgh Press, July 2, 1976: 33. Ed Ott and Ed Kirkpatrick replaced Sanguillén and Stargell, respectively. Sanguillén played briefly at third base in the exhibition, while Stargell did not appear. Suffering from bruised hands, Stargell had also missed the Pirates’ June 30 game against the Chicago Cubs. Bob Smizik, “Surging Bucs Punctuated with Question Marks,” Pittsburgh Press, July 1, 1976: 30.

16 Smizik, “Surging Bucs Punctuated with Question Marks”; Charley Feeney, “Pirate Confidence Fattened by Cubs,” Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, July 1, 1976: 11.

17 Retrosheet’s list of in-season exhibition games from 1921 to 2012, compiled by Walter LeConte with assistance from other SABR members, reports that the Pirates-Charlies exhibitions began in 1971, the season Charleston took over from Columbus, Ohio, as the home of the Pirates’ Triple A affiliate. The Pirates and Charlies played two exhibitions in May 1974–one in Charleston, the other in Pittsburgh. List accessed in January 2026, https://www.retrosheet.org/InSeasonExhibitionGames1921-2012.htm.

18 Unless otherwise noted, all game action is based on Rist, “Jones Makes Exhibition a Choice Assignment.”

19 United Press International, “Page Leads Charlies to Win,” Raleigh Register, July 2, 1976: 13. Game stories do not specify who was on base for Page or how they got there. A cross-check of the box score against game stories suggests that the runner who scored ahead of Page was left fielder William “Tommy” Thomas, who preceded Page in the lineup.

20 The winner was future Hall of Famer Eddie Murray of the Baltimore Orioles, who hit .283 with 27 homers and 88 RBIs.

21 The box score in the Charleston Daily Mail lists Giusti as holding the Charlies hitless; “Pirates Down on Farm” has him giving up a hit. Either way, his inning appears to have passed uneventfully. Giusti’s first regular-season game back was July 15 against the Atlanta Braves.

22 United Press International, “Page Leads Charlies to Win.”

23 The pitcher’s full name is Frederick Wayne Honeycutt. Honeycutt made his big-league debut with the expansion Seattle Mariners, where he was sent in August 1977 to complete a trade that had earlier brought pitcher Dave Pagan to Pittsburgh.

24 The player is identified as William Thomas in Baseball-Reference but Tommy Thomas in United Press International, “Page Leads Charlies to Win” and “Charleston Takes Win Over Bucs.”

25 A thrown ball hit Hebner on the instep of one of his feet in the eighth inning, as he was trying to make a play on Diloné’s triple. “Charleston Takes Win Over Bucs.” Hebner played the next day, then sat out for seven games after aggravating an old back injury. Bob Smizik, “Phils Slide Past Pirates, 3-2,” Pittsburgh Press, July 4, 1976: D1.

26 Rist’s “Jones Makes Exhibition a Choice Assignment,” the most detailed account of the game, has Richie Zisk hitting the single that moved Parker to third. But other stories credit the hit to Robinson, and the Charleston paper’s box score indicates that Robinson substituted for Zisk in left field.

27 Rist, “Jones Makes Exhibition a Choice Assignment.”

28 Andy Sturgill, “Danny Murtaugh,” SABR Biography Project, accessed January 2026, https://sabr.org/bioproj/person/Danny-Murtaugh/.

29 Tom Patterson, “Wellman, Murtaugh Take Different Routes,” Jackson (Mississippi) Clarion-Ledger, July 10, 1977: 1D; “Timmy Murtaugh Leaves Pirate Organization,” Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, October 27, 1977: 21.