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Few dates in Pittsburgh’s baseball history were anticipated as enthusiastically as April 9, 2001, when the Pirates opened PNC Park by hosting the Cincinnati Reds. But sad news preceded the celebration: Hall of Famer Willie Stargell, one of the franchise’s signature stars, died that morning at age 61. In the afternoon the biggest bat belonged […]

Rookie right-hander Fred Cambria was the starting pitcher for the Pittsburgh Pirates as they took on the Philadelphia Phillies at Three Rivers Stadium on Saturday, September 5, 1970. A late August call-up from the Columbus Jets of the Triple-A International League, where he had been 12-7 with a 4.17 ERA, Cambria was 0-1 in two […]

The Pirates’ 1976 season and Danny Murtaugh’s managerial career concluded with a doubleheader against the St. Louis Cardinals on October 3, 1976. Both teams disappointed that year, the Cardinals dropping from 82-80 in 1975 to 72-88 beginning the season’s final Sunday. For Pittsburgh, although it had won only two fewer games than in its Eastern […]

The Pittsburgh Pirates traveled to Milwaukee in 1960 for their July 4 doubleheader with the Braves with both good and bad news on their minds. With 43 wins and 27 losses, they were in first place in the National League by 3½ games over the 39-30 Braves. It was the first time the Pirates had […]

“Desperate times call for desperate measures.” The quote, attributed to the ancient Greek physician Hippocrates, also describes the circumstances behind the lone pitching win of Johnny O’Brien’s career in an afternoon game on July 3, 1956. Johnny and his identical twin brother, Eddie, were signed off the Seattle University campus by Pittsburgh to bonus contracts […]

At a press conference on Monday, July 8 — the day before the 2002 All-Star Game in Milwaukee — National League manager Bob Brenly was asked about his decision to replace the injured Tom Glavine with another starting pitcher, Vicente Padilla. “This is my first go-round with these All-Star Games,” Brenly said, “but I have […]

After starting their 1967 season with a loss, just as they had for the previous six years, the New York Mets sent their newest young star, Tom Seaver, to the mound for the second game of their season-opening series against the Pittsburgh Pirates.1 An audience of 5,005 “polar bears,” among them movie director Alfred Hitchcock, […]

Although he had an excellent 20-season major-league career, Rafael Palmeiro may be best remembered for something he did off the field. Called to a congressional hearing before the 2005 season to discuss the use of steroids in baseball, he wagged his finger while emphatically denying using banned substances. Just five months later, about two weeks […]

Sandy Koufax of the Los Angeles Dodgers threw a five-hitter and collected two singles and an RBI in a 4-2 victory over the Pittsburgh Pirates in the first game of a doubleheader at Forbes Field on July 11, 1965. It was Koufax’s ninth consecutive win and 15th of the season, the most in the majors. […]

“He has that old stroke back and he’s swinging a fast bat again.” — Pittsburgh Pirates batting coach George Sisler on Bob Skinner during spring training in 1960.1   A new decade of Pittsburgh Pirates baseball dawned in 1960. One couldn’t blame the team for bidding a fond farewell to the 1950s. From 1950 to […]

On September 15, 2022 – celebrated as Roberto Clemente Day across all of baseball’s major leagues – the Tampa Bay Rays, playing the Toronto Blue Jays at the Rogers Centre in Toronto, deployed a batting order of players native to Colombia, Cuba, the Dominican Republic, Mexico, and Venezuela. The Rays won the game, 11-0, and […]

Major-league baseball came to Jersey City, New Jersey, for the 1956 and 1957 seasons. The ongoing saga of the mid-1950s determining the future of baseball in Brooklyn now included New Jersey. Over these two seasons, the Dodgers played 15 home games at Roosevelt Stadium, one against each National League team each season, and two against […]

The contrast could not have been starker on a Friday night in August 1965. While Claude Osteen of the Los Angeles Dodgers picked the Pittsburgh Pirates apart in a six-hitter at pristine Dodger Stadium, California National Guardsmen were occupying large swaths of South Central Los Angeles, engulfed in flames and violence less than nine miles […]

The New York Mets began their 1964 season the same way as in the previous two years. They lost one game after another, leaving fans wondering when they might get a number in the win category. They lost nine games before their first victory in 1962 and eight in 1963 before getting one in the […]

Adrian Beltré may be the least well known of players to reach the 3,000-hit plateau this millenium. His 21-year career mostly stayed under the radar nationally because he played in only one World Series. But his relative anonymity masks a superlative career. As of 2022, he was one of just five players with 3,000 hits, […]

Two months before the Pittsburgh Pirates made history by winning the 1960 World Series with Bill Mazeroski’s seventh-game, bottom-of-the-ninth, walk-off home run, they hosted the St. Louis Cardinals in a crucial five-game series. On August 11 the Pirates were first in the National League with a record of 65-40, while the second-place Cardinals were aiming […]

The Pittsburgh Pirates suffered through a miserable 1955 season, and entered the final weekend hosting the NL-leading Brooklyn Dodgers. Back in April, Pittsburgh GM Branch Rickey was optimistic heading into the season opener, citing outfield and pitching improvements, with third base as his major concern: “This 1955 club will be the best Pittsburgh has had […]

In major-league baseball when a team dominates its opponents for several years, it’s usually because it has a solid nucleus of players. For instance, in the early 1970s in the American League the Oakland Athletics captured three successive World Series. In the National League the Cincinnati Reds were a powerhouse. Both clubs had a strong […]

From 1953 through 1956, Jim Woods was Mel Allen’s and Red Barber’s partner on New York Yankees radio/TV. One day, eying Woods’ slight overbite and gray buzz cut, Enos Slaughter jibed, “I’ve seen better heads on a possum.” In 1958 Jim moved to Pittsburgh, where announcer Bob Prince’s wife called Woods’ spouse “Mrs. Possum.” In […]

Of the many talented players involved in the successes of the early 1990s pennants won by the Pittsburgh Pirates, one player who flew under the radar was amateur free-agent signing Orlando Merced. Orlando Luis Villanueva Merced was born on November 2, 1966, to José R. and Sylvia Villanueva. Merced’s parents were both originally from Puerto […]

Curt Schilling’s father, Cliff, served in the United States Army for 22 years, a master sergeant with the 101st Airborne Division who was stationed at Elmendorf Air Force Base adjacent to Anchorage, Alaska, when his son Curtis Montague Schilling was born on November 14, 1966. Curt was the middle child of Cliff and Mary Schilling. […]

When people think of Nicaragua and baseball, the first name that comes to mind will always be El Presidente, Dennis Martínez. The second Nicaraguan in the majors was Tony Chévez, who signed together with Martínez with the Baltimore Orioles in 1973. Chévez was the bigger star at home, and expectations were higher for him.[fn]Hernández, Gerald. […]

Alvin O’Neal McBean – for decades, the only big-league pitcher from the Virgin Islands – was a good one. His hard sinker and limber, resilient arm made him valuable as a starter and even more as a reliever. Throwing from various arm angles as the spirit moved him, McBean was somewhat reminiscent of Orlando “El […]

“Baseball is in the heart of all Latin people. They feel in baseball. They think in baseball.” — Pancho Coimbre Baseball in Puerto Rico has a long and storied history; many fans of the game on the island are willing to regale one another at the drop of a hat about the careers and exploits […]