Tuesday, October 8, 2013

Pittsburgh Pirates: Always An Exciting Team To Watch In The World Series!

The Pirates have an interesting World Series history. One that, this blogger sort of wishes he could have seen.

The very first World Series, in fact, involved the Pirates. It was 1903, and they opposed the Boston Americans (They became the Red Sox in 1908). Pittsburgh may have lost it, but The first ever World Series homerun was hit.

In 1909 the Pirates had Canadian George Gibson on the team, but the big matchup was Ty Cobb vs. Honus Wagner. The Series was close, but the Pirates took it in 7 games. Wagner also was clearly better than Cobb in this one.

In 1925, the Pirates came from 3-1 down to beat the Washington Senators. Amazingly, the beat Walter Johnson in game 7.

1927 saw the Pirates lose to the Yankees in 4 straight. But, two games were close. Too bad it had to end on, of all things, a wild pitch!

In 1960, it was Harvey Haddix who helped the Pirates beat the seemingly invincible Yankees in the 1960 World Series. But, come on, all I have to do is say the right two words. That being, of course, Bill Mazeroski!

In 1971, the World Series was now ready for prime time, and the Pirates won game 7 thanks to the bat of Roberto Clemente and the pitching of Steve Blass!


Then, in 1979, it was the same two teams again in the World Series. Again it went 7. Like in 1925, the Bucs had to rally from a 3 games to 1 deficit, but they managed to win the World Series again.

The 1979 team used the Sister Sledge's song, "We Are Family", to make sure that the team stayed a close-knit team. Indeed, they were. And who can forget about Pops? Willie Stargell! 7 extra base hits, 3 of them homeruns.


One of my all-time favs, Bert Blyleven was a pitcher for the Pirates that season. My favourite pitcher from that team though, is the reliever Ken Tekulve. Ken had this neato submarine style. But it was effective! He saved 3 games in 1979 to tie a another Pirates, Elroy Face, for most in one series. Too bad John Wetteland of the 1996 Yankees came along and broke that!

References

Baseball: A Film By Ken Burns. Prod. Ken Burns. PBS. 1994. Television.

Enders, Eric. 100 Years Of The World Series. New York: Sterling Publishing Co., Inc. 2005. Print.

Neft, David S., Richard M. Cohen, and Michael L. Neft. The Sports Encyclopedia: Baseball, 1992. 12th ed. New York: St. Martin's Press, 1992. Print.

Nemec, David, and Scott Flatow. Great Baseball Feats, Facts & Firsts. Toronto: Signet (Penguin Group), 2010. Print.

Nemec, David et all. 20th Century Baseball Chronicle: A Year-by-year History of Major League Baseball. Collector's Edition. Lincolnwood, Ill: Publications International, 1993. Print.

Retrosheet. Web. 8 Oct. 2013.  <www.retrosheet.org>

Seaver, Tom, and Martin Appel. Great Moments in Baseball. New York, NY: Carol Pub. Group, 1992. Print.

Shalin, Mike, and Neil Shalin. Out By A Step: The 100 Best Players Not In The Baseball Hall of Fame. Lanham: Diamond Communications, 2002. Print.

Snyder, John S. World Series!: Great Moments and Dubious Achievements. San Francisco: Chronicle, 1995. Print.

Sports Reference LLC.  Baseball-Reference.com - Major League Statistics and Information. http://www.baseball-reference.com/. Web. 9 Oct. 2013.

Wikipedia. Wikimedia Foundation. Web. 8 Oct. 2013. <https://en.wikipedia.org>.

Youtube. Web. 8 Oct. 2013. <https://www.youtube.com>.

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