April 8, 1985: Detroit’s Chris Pittaro lives up to manager’s hype on celebratory Opening Day

“I really wasn’t scared,” a grinning Chris Pittaro quipped. “That’s a lie. I was scared. Nervous. Everything.”1

And who could blame him? The 23-year-old had just made his major-league debut as the third baseman for the defending World Series champion Detroit Tigers on Opening Day 1985.

Despite a fine 1984 campaign, when he batted .284 with 11 home runs and had 61 RBIs as the second baseman for the Birmingham Barons of the Double-A Southern League, Pittaro had no expectations of getting promoted to “The Show” in 1985.2 “Honestly, I was prepared to go to Triple A,” he said. “When I got to camp I just wanted to open some eyes.”3

But when Pittaro hit well over .300 and displayed good instinctual glove work during spring training, Tigers manager Sparky Anderson raised eyebrows, gushing that Pittaro had “a chance to be the greatest second baseman who ever lived.”4

Anderson was known for talking up young players, sometimes out of proportion to their talent. But in this case, Anderson was so enamored with his prospect that he went beyond verbal hype. In late March he controversially reassigned All-Star Lou Whitaker from second to third base to make room for the youngster.5 The switcheroo was met with consternation by Whitaker (and reportedly some teammates), so Detroit’s skipper backtracked a few days later on his head-scratching move that would have broken up the duo of Whitaker and future Hall of Fame shortstop Alan Trammell – widely regarded as one of the greatest double-play combinations in baseball history.6

Still determined to find a position for the “best rookie infielder [he had] seen in 15 years of managing,” Anderson declared that Pittaro would open the season as the club’s third baseman.7 This was the only position that still “confused” the reigning champs; up-and-coming third sacker Howard Johnson was traded after the 1984 season, and the club did not view veteran Tom Brookens’ “solid glove and light bat as good enough.”8 Although Pittaro had never played the hot corner at a professional level, his manager was unconcerned but irritable in defending the decision. “I don’t care how many errors he makes,” Anderson said. “He’s my third baseman.”9

Indeed, Pittaro found himself penciled into the Bengals’ starting lineup at third base for their season opener against the American League East rival Cleveland Indians at Tiger Stadium on April 8, 1985. “I was fine yesterday until I came to see the stadium,” he said that day. “It seemed so big.”10

Battling a severely inflamed leg caused by pseudogout,11 manager Anderson nearly missed his prized rookie’s premiere but was released from a local hospital just in time to make it to the game.12 Opening Day brought a sellout crowd of 51,180 fans to the ballpark, with the Detroit Free Press estimating that nearly half of those present on the unofficial weekday afternoon “holiday” had played hooky from work or other responsibilities to attend.13

Although Detroit Mayor Coleman A. Young’s dropped ceremonial first pitch from Michigan Governor James Blanchard brought jeers, the spectators cheered in “delirious” fashion during pregame festivities as Tigers players and coaches received diamond-studded rings for their 1984 World Series title.14

The club’s decision to sell only low-alcohol beer to create a more family-friendly environment did dampen the spirits of some of the revelers, as did frigid weather conditions that forced players to don “scuba gloves to keep their hands warm” while “snow swirled and gusted through every crack and crevice” of the ballpark.15 In fact, Detroit’s regular national anthem singer, Fat Bob Taylor, said he “was half expecting the [NFL’s Detroit] Lions to come running out on the field” after finishing his operatic rendition of the “Star-Spangled Banner.”16

In a battle of future Hall of Famers, Detroit sent staff ace Jack Morris to the mound to square off against veteran star Bert Blyleven, whose Cleveland club had lingered near the bottom of the AL East the previous season.

“Just try to relax,” Tigers first baseman Darrell Evans advised Pittaro during batting practice. “Just try to get the first fielding chance out of the way and then you’ll be comfortable.”17 The rookie quickly got that chance, ending the top of the first inning with an assist on the force out of Cleveland’s Mel Hall. Earlier in the frame, however, Julio Franco had doubled and scored on Hall’s base hit to give the Indians a 1-0 lead.

In the bottom of the third, Pittaro got his first taste of major-league pitching in front of family and friends who were on hand to provide their support. Pittaro fanned when unable to hold up on a checked swing, but took it in stride. “Striking out especially had a relaxing effect on me,” he said after the game. “I couldn’t do any worse after that.”18

Detroit finally broke through against Blyleven in the bottom of the fourth with the assistance of some sloppy Cleveland defense. With one out, Johnny Grubb walked and advanced to second on a passed ball by Chris Bando, then scored on a single by Evans. Blyleven retired the next two batters to limit the damage.

After Morris again held the Indians scoreless in the top of the fifth, the Tigers’ potent offense came alive in the bottom half of the inning. Pittaro provided an immediate spark with a leadoff single. The afterglow of his first big-league hit was short-lived, however, as he was tagged out after oversliding second base on an attempted steal. “A couple of the guys told me that they were having a tendency today to slide over the bag,” Pittaro explained. “Then the umpire, Durwood (Merrill), said the same thing – that today everybody was sliding through the bag.”19

Subsequent back-to-back singles by Whitaker and Trammell were rewarded when slugger Lance Parrish delivered a tiebreaking two-out base hit to give the home team a 3-1 lead. After Blyleven walked Grubb, he was replaced by Mike Jeffcoat, who stopped the bleeding by retiring the only batter he faced.

The scrappy Indians’ offense bounced right back and gave Morris fits in the top of the sixth. Franco got things started when his leadoff single that Tigers’ beat writer Tom Gage opined “most major-league third basemen would have gobbled up easily” skipped past Pittaro.20 Three more hits, a stolen base, and a wild pitch later, Cleveland had tallied three runs to jump back in front, 4-3. Pat Tabler, Brook Jacoby, and George Vukovich each notched an RBI in the frame.

Doing his best to jump-start a two-out rally in the bottom half of the inning, Pittaro stroked a bases-empty single and got his first major-league stolen base. But he was stranded by reliever Tom Waddell, who was riding a scoreless streak of 23 consecutive innings. The Indians held their one-run lead for the next inning and a half.

After Larry Herndon looped a one-out single to center in the bottom of the eighth, closer Ernie Camacho – who had set Cleveland’s single-season saves record with 23 a year earlier – was summoned from the bullpen to replace Waddell. Camacho walked Chet Lemon on four pitches, putting the tying run in scoring position for Pittaro. Capping a magical debut, Pittaro bounced a single up the middle – his third hit of the day – past the outstretched arm of second baseman Mike Fischlin that scored Herndon and advanced Lemon to third.

In recounting his game-tying hit, an elated Pittaro said that once the ball got past Fischlin, he did not think he “touched the ground the rest of the way to first.”21 Camacho’s postgame commentary was less enthusiastic. “If it was a clean hit, I’d feel bad,” he said after being tagged with the loss. “Ninety percent of the time, [Fischlin] will get that ball.”22

The excitement of Pittaro’s heroics had barely subsided when Whitaker followed with a sacrifice fly to deep center field that scored Lemon with the go-ahead run, eliciting loud chants of “Looooooou.” With a 5-4 lead heading into the final stanza, Detroit replaced Pittaro with the more seasoned Brookens. And the Tigers unsurprisingly called on bullpen arm Willie Hernandez; the ace closer was coming off a stellar campaign as the AL’s MVP and Cy Young Award winner. Picking up where he left off, Hernandez struck out two in tossing a one-two-three frame to secure the Tigers’ victory.

“This is fantastic,” Pittaro gleefully said after the game. “I couldn’t ask for anything more than this.”23 Anderson, feeling vindicated, said that “it showed that this old man isn’t crazy, although I may act that way sometimes.”24

Skeptics were ultimately proved correct, however; Pittaro soon floundered and was demoted to the Triple-A level in June where he hit a dismal .194 in 60 games for the American Association’s Nashville Sounds. Traded to the Minnesota Twins in early 1986, he languished almost exclusively in the minor leagues for the next three seasons before suffering a knee injury that ended his playing days in 1988.

Although he did not live up to Anderson’s lofty scouting evaluation, Pittaro himself became a respected judge of talent within the Oakland Athletics’ front office staff under general manager Billy Beane, who spoke favorably about him in the 2003 book Moneyball. Pittaro was inducted into the Professional Scouts Hall of Fame in 2012.

Acknowledgments

This article was fact-checked by Mike Huber and copy-edited by Len Levin. The author wishes to thank John Fredland for his research assistance.

Sources 

In addition to the sources cited in the Notes, the author accessed Baseball-Reference.com and Retrosheet.org for pertinent information, including the box score and play-by-play. He reviewed a recording of the game’s television broadcast from WDIV-TV in Detroit, posted on YouTube. He also relied on GenealogyBank.com, NewsBank.com, NewspaperArchive.com, Newspapers.com, Paper of Record, and Stathead.com.

https://www.baseball-reference.com/boxes/DET/DET198504080.shtml

https://www.retrosheet.org/boxesetc/1985/B04080DET1985.htm

Notes

1 Lynn Henning, “Pittaro Displays His Mettle,” Detroit News, April 9, 1985: 2D.

2 Of Birmingham’s 147 games in 1984, Pittaro played second base in 135 and shortstop in one.

3 Jerry Green, “Calm Professionals Go About Their Work,” Detroit News, April 9, 1985: 3D.

4 Steve Rushin, The Caddie Was a Reindeer: And Other Tales of Extreme Recreation (New York: Atlantic Monthly Press, 2004), 232.

5 Jack Ebling, Tales From the Detroit Tigers Dugout (Champaign, Illinois: Sports Publishing, 2007), 102.

6 Kevin Allen, “Who’s on 3rd? Now It’s Pittaro,” Port Huron (Michigan) Times Herald, March 28, 1985: 1B.

7 Rushin, The Caddie Was a Reindeer: And Other Tales of Extreme Recreation.

8 Mike Downey, “Even the New Boy Has the Blessing,” Detroit Free Press, April 9, 1985: 1A; Pat Kilroy and Larry Hilliard, “Tom Brookens,” Society for American Baseball Research, https://sabr.org/bioproj/person/tom-brookens, accessed January 22, 2023.

9 Tom Gage, “Experiment Ends With Lou Back at 2nd,” Detroit News, March 28, 1985: 1E.

10 Glen Macnow, “Heady Start,” Detroit Free Press, April 9, 1985: 6D.

11 According to the Cleveland Clinic, “pseudogout (or ‘false gout’) is a form of arthritis that results from deposits of calcium pyrophosphate crystals. … It commonly affects the knees and wrists.”

12 Tom Gage, “Tigers Ring in the New Season 5-4,” Detroit News, April 9, 1985: 1D.

13 Tim Kiska and David Ashenfelter, “Hooky: Name of Game for Many in the Crowd,” Detroit Free Press, April 9, 1985: 1A.

14 Keith Gave, “Rings Bring Back Memories of ’84 at ’85 Opener,” Detroit Free Press, April 9, 1985: 4D.

15 Bill McGraw, “Beer Lovers Find Little to Cheer in Low-Alcohol Brew at Stadium,” Detroit Free Press, April 9, 1985: 8A; Paul Hoynes, “Tribe Loses Opener as Bullpen Fails,” Cleveland Plain Dealer, April 9, 1985: 1D.

16 Patricia Edmonds, Gary Graff, and David Kushma, “A Few Opening Day Lines,” Detroit Free Press, April 9, 1985: 9A.

17 Macnow, “Heady Start.”

18 Tom Gage, “Tigers Ring in the New Season 5-4.”

19 Henning, “Pittaro Displays His Mettle.”

20 Tom Gage, “Pittaro Is a Hit in Detroit Debut,” The Sporting News, April 22, 1985: 27.

21 Gary Santaniello, “Tigers Keep It Alive in Opener, 5-4,” Detroit Free Press, April 9, 1985: 1D.

22 Joe Lapointe, “Indians Lose 1 of 3 Ways,” Detroit Free Press, April 9, 1985: 4D.

23 Paul Hoynes, “Cold Doesn’t Faze Tigers Rookie,” Cleveland Plain Dealer, April 9, 1985: 2D.

24 Joe Dowdall, “Opener Leaves Sparky Ready to Dance a Jig,” Detroit News, April 9, 1985: 2D.