Pittsburgh Pirates
UISNFO | 2013-06-20 09:50
Pittsburgh Pirates
 2013 Pittsburgh Pirates season
Established 1882
 
Team logo Cap insignia
 
Major league affiliations
National League (1887–present)
East Division (1969–1993)
Central Division (1994–present)
Current uniform
 
Retired numbers 1, 4, 8, 9, 11, 20, 21,33, 40, 42
Colors
Black, gold, white
              
Name
Pittsburgh Pirates (1912–present)
Pittsburg Pirates (1891–1911)
Pittsburg Innocents (1890)
Pittsburgh Alleghenys (1887–1889)
Allegheny (1882–1886)
Other nicknames
The Bucs, The Buccos
Ballpark
PNC Park (2001–present)
Three Rivers Stadium (1970–2000)
Forbes Field (1909–1970)
Exposition Park (II) (1891–1909)
Recreation Park (1884–1890)
Exposition Park (I) (1882–1883)
Major league titles
World Series titles (5) 1979 • 1971 • 1960 • 1925
1909
NL Pennants (9) 1979 • 1971 • 1960 • 1927
1925 • 1909 • 1903 • 1902
1901
   
Central Division titles (0) None
East Division titles(9) 1992 • 1991 • 1990 • 1979
1975 • 1974 • 1972 • 1971
1970
Wild card berths (0) None
 
Front office
Owner(s) Robert Nutting, others
Manager Clint Hurdle
General Manager Neal Huntington

The Pittsburgh Pirates are a Major League Baseball club based in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. They play in the Central Division of the National League, and are five-time World Series champions. The Pirates are also often referred to as the "Bucs", or sometimes the "Buccos" (derived from buccaneer, a synonym for pirate).
The franchise joined the National League in its sixth season in 1887 and was competitive from its early years, winning three National League titles from 1901 to 1903, playing in the veryfirst World Series in 1903 and winning their first World Series in 1909 behind Honus Wagner. The Pirates have had many ups and downs during their long history, most famously winning the 1960 World Series on a game winning homerun by Bill Mazeroski, the only time that Game 7 of the World Series has ever ended with a home run. They also won the 1971 World Series behind Roberto Clemente and the 1979 World Series under the slogan "We Are Family", led by "Pops" Willie Stargell. Overall the Pirates have won five World Series and lost two. The five that the Pirates won were all seven-game Series. After a run of regular-season success in the early 1990s (making the NLCS three straight years), the Pirates have struggled in recent decades, with 20 consecutive losing seasons to date, the longest in North American professional sports history.

Franchise history
Main article: History of the Pittsburgh Pirates

19th century
Professional baseball has been played in the Pittsburgh area since 1876. The teams of the era were "independents", barnstorming throughout the region and not affiliated with any organized league, though they did have salaries and were run as business organizations.[1] In 1882, the strongest team in the area joined the American Association as a founding member. Their various home fields in the 19th century were in a then-separate city called Allegheny City, across the Allegheny River from Pittsburgh. The team was listed as "Allegheny" in the standings, and was sometimes called the "Alleghenys" (not the "Alleghenies") in the same generic way that teams from Boston, New York, and Chicago were sometimes called the "Bostons", the "New Yorks", and the "Chicagos", in the sports writing style of that era. After five mediocre seasons in the A.A., Pittsburgh became the first A.A. team to switch to the older National League in 1887. At this time, the team renamed itself the Pittsburgh Alleghenys,[2] although Allegheny remained a separate city until it was annexed by Pittsburgh in 1907. At that time, owner-manager Horace Phillips sold the team to Dennis McKnight; Phillips stayed on as manager.[3]
In those early days, the club benefited three times from mergers with defunct clubs. The A.A. club picked up a number of players from a defunct Columbus, Ohio, team in 1885.
The Alleghenys were severely crippled during the 1890 season, when nearly all of their stars jumped to the Pittsburgh Burghers of the Players' League. With a decimated roster, the team experienced what is still the worst season in franchise history, going 23–113.[4] The battle nearly ruined McKnight, and he was forced to return his franchise to the league. However, almost immediately after this, McKnight joined the backers of the Burghers as a minority owner, which then repurchased the Pittsburgh National League franchise and rechartered it under a different corporate name. They were thus able to legally recover the services of most of the players who had jumped to the upstart league a year earlier.[3]
The new owners also signed several players from American Association teams. One of them was highly regarded second baseman Lou Bierbauer, who had previously played with the A.A.'sPhiladelphia Athletics. The Athletics failed to include him on their reserve list, and the Alleghenys picked him up. This led to loud protests by the Athletics, and in an official complaint, an AA official claimed the Alleghenys' actions were "piratical".[5] This incident (which is discussed at some length in The Beer and Whisky League, by David Nemec, 1994) quickly accelerated into a schism between the leagues that contributed to the demise of the A.A. Although the Alleghenys were never found guilty of wrongdoing, they made sport of being denounced for being "piratical" by renaming themselves "the Pirates" for the 1891 season.[2] The nickname was first acknowledged on the team's uniforms in 1912. Around the time the team adopted the Pirates nickname, the United States Board on Geographic Names forced the city of Pittsburgh to undergo a controversial name change by having them drop the "h" at the end of the name, making the team's official name the "Pittsburg Pirates" from the adoption of the Pirates nickname until Pittsburgh was able to get the "h" restored to its name in 1911.
After the 1899 season, the Pirates made what is arguably the best player transaction in franchise history when they picked up nearly all of the star players from the Louisville Colonels. Louisville owner Barney Dreyfuss had been told that the Colonels were slated for elimination when the N.L. contracted from 12 to 8 teams. He secretly purchased a half-interest in the Pirates, then after the season sent nearly all of the Colonels' stars up the Ohio River to Pittsburgh. Since the transaction occurred before the Colonels officially folded, it was structured as a trade; the Pirates sent four relatively unknown players to Louisville.[3] Despite their nickname, the Pirates at least waited until after the season to pull off this blockbuster trade. This is unlike what happened in 1899 to the Cleveland Spiders and, to a lesser extent, the Baltimore Orioles, who were also part of two-team ownerships. Dreyfuss later bought full control of the team and kept it until his death in 1932.

1901–1945
Bolstered by former Colonels shortstop Honus Wagner (who was born and raised in the Pittsburgh area) and player/manager Fred Clarke, the Pirates completely dominated the National League, in part because they lost few star players to the rival American League. However, owing to injuries to their starting pitchers, they lost the first modern World Series ever played, in 1903, to Boston. Deacon Phillippe pitched five complete games, winning three of them, but it was not enough. With largely the same star players, the Pirates would continue to be a strong team over the next few years, and won their first World Series title in 1909, defeating the Detroit Tigers in seven games. The same year, the club openedForbes Field, which would be its home stadium for the next 61 years.
 

 

The 1909 Pirates in a poster celebrating their National League pennant. Frank Chance of the Chicago Cubs and John McGraw of the New York Giants, two teams the Pirates beat for the pennant, are being made to walk the plank.

The Pirates originally played in Recreation, Union, and Exposition Parks, all in what was then Allegheny City. Allegheny City was annexed by Pittsburgh in December 1907. Accordingly, the Pirates did not play their first major league game in Pittsburgh until 1908 – over 25 years after their founding.[6]
The decline of Honus Wagner, considered by many to be the greatest shortstop ever, led to a number of losing seasons, culminating in a disastrous 51–103 record in 1917; however, veteran outfielder Max Carey and young players Pie Traynor and Kiki Cuyler, along with a remarkably deep pitching staff, brought the Pirates back into the spotlight. The Pirates recovered from a 3–1 deficit to win the 1925 World Series over the Washington Senators, and reached the 1927 World Series before being swept by the New York Yankees, who at that time had built the most dominant team in baseball. The 1927 season was the first for the sharp-hitting combination of brothers Lloyd Waner and Paul Waner, who along with shortstop Arky Vaughan ensured that the Pirates had plenty of Hall of Fame-caliber position players through 1941. However, the Pirates' crushing defeats in 1927 and 1938 (when they lost the pennant to the Chicago Cubs in the final days of the season) were tremendous setbacks.

1946–1969
The post-World War II years were not kind to the Pirates, despite the presence of a genuine star in Ralph Kiner, who led the National League in home runs for seven consecutive seasons (1946 through 1952). While attendance at Forbes Field rose to among the top in the NL, the team built around Kiner placed in the first division only once – in 1948 – and in 1952 compiled one of the worst records in major league history, winning 42 and losing 112 games (.273) and finishing 54½ games out of first place. In 1946, the long era of ownership by theBarney Dreyfuss family came to an end when it sold the team to a syndicate headed by Indianapolis businessman Frank McKinney that included entertainer Bing Crosby. By 1950, Columbus, Ohio-based real estate tycoon John W. Galbreath emerged as majority owner, and his family would run the team for another 35 years and supervise its rise to the top of the NL.
 

 

1953 Bowman Color baseball card of Ralph Kiner.

Galbreath's first major move, the hiring of Branch Rickey as general manager after the 1950 campaign, was initially a great disappointment to Pittsburgh fans. Rickey had invented thefarm system with the Cardinals and broken the baseball color line with the Dodgers, building dynasties with each club. In Pittsburgh, though, he purged the roster of its higher-salaried veterans (including Kiner in 1953) and flooded the team with young players. Many of those youngsters faltered, but those who fulfilled Rickey's faith in them – pitchers Vern Law, Bob Friend, and Elroy Face, shortstop Dick Groat, second baseman Bill Mazeroski, and especially outfielder Roberto Clemente, drafted from Brooklyn after his only minor league season (1954) – would form the nucleus of the Pirates' 1960 championship club. Moreover, as in St. Louis and Brooklyn, Rickey put into place one of baseball's most successful farm and scouting systems, keeping the Pirates competitive into the late 1970s. However, all this was not evident when Rickey retired due to ill health in 1955, with the Pirates still struggling to escape the NL basement.
The 1948 team was the only postwar Pirates squad with a winning record until 1958, Danny Murtaugh's first full season as manager. Murtaugh is widely credited with inventing the concept of the closer by frequently playing Elroy Face late in close games. The 1960 team featured eight All-Stars, but was widely predicted to lose the World Series to a powerful New York Yankees team. In one of the most memorable World Series in history, the Pirates were defeated by ten or more runs in three games, won three close games, then recovered from a 7–4 deficit late in Game 7 eventually to win on a walk-off home run by Mazeroski, a second baseman better known for defensive wizardry. The 1960 Pirates were the only team between 1945 and 2001 to have not succumbed to the so-called "Ex-Cubs Factor" in the postseason. They also became the first team to win a World Series on a home run, a feat later achieved by the Toronto Blue Jays in 1993, although Joe Carter's home run came in Game 6 of the 1993 Series. Mazeroski's homer remains the only walk-off home run in Game 7 of a World Series.
The 1960s would continue with extremely solid defensive play by Bill Mazeroski and the great offensive and defensive abilities of Clemente, baseball's first Puerto Rican superstar. Clemente was regarded as one of the game's best all-time hitters, and possessed a tremendous arm in right field. Although not the first black-Hispanic baseball player (an honor belonging to Minnie Miñoso), Clemente's charisma and leadership in humanitarian causes made him an icon across the continent. During his playing career, Clemente was often overlooked, but today many consider him to have been one of the greatest right fielders in baseball history.
Even with Roberto Clemente, however, the Pirates struggled to post winning marks from 1961 to 1964, and Murtaugh was replaced by Harry Walker in 1965. With Walker, a renowned batting coach, at the helm, and the hitting of Clemente, Matty Alou, Manny Mota and others, the Bucs fielded contending, 90-plus win teams in both 1965 and 1966, with Clemente claiming the National League MVP Award in the latter year. However, Pittsburgh had no answer for the pitching of the Dodgers and the San Francisco Giants, and finished third both seasons. In 1967, they fell back to .500, and did not contend through the rest of the 1960s.

1970–1979 and "The Family"

 


 

 Aerial view of Three Rivers Stadium.

1970–1973
Slugger Willie Stargell became a fixture in the Pittsburgh lineup in the late 1960s, and the Pirates returned to prominence in 1970. Murtaugh returned as manager and the Pirates' home field, Forbes Field, was demolished in favor of the multi-purpose Three Rivers Stadium. In 1970, the Pirates won their first of five National League East division titles over the next seven years, and won their fourth World Series in 1971 behind a .414 Series batting average by Clemente. They also thought they had a genuine superstar pitcher (historically rare for the Pirates) in Steve Blass, who pitched two masterful games in the World Series against Baltimore and had excellent seasons in 1968 and 1972.[7] That lineup, on September 1, was Rennie Stennett, Gene Clines, Roberto Clemente, Willie Stargell,Manny Sanguillén, Dave Cash, Al Oliver, Jackie Hernández, and Dock Ellis.[8]
Clemente died in a plane crash on December 31, 1972, while accompanying a shipment of relief supplies to the victims of an earthquake in Nicaragua. He had reached a milestone by rapping his 3,000th career hit, a stand-up double off Jon Matlack of the New York Mets on September 30, 1972, in what would prove to be his last regular-season at-bat. The Baseball Hall of Fame waived its usual waiting requirement and inducted Clemente immediately. Pittsburgh would erect a statue and name a bridge and park near the stadium after him, as well as a street in the Oakland neighborhood near the former site of Forbes Field.
In 1973, Blass suffered a mysterious decline in his pitching abilities, posting a 9.85 ERA. To this day, pitchers who suddenly lose the ability to throw strikes are said to have "Steve Blass disease."[9] Blass retired soon after; he has since, for almost two decades, been one of the Pirates' radio and TV announcers.

1974–1978
The Pirates made the playoffs in 1974 and 1975, but lost the National League Championship Series to the Los Angeles Dodgers and the Cincinnati Reds, respectively. The speedy Omar Moreno and the power-hitting Dave Parker joined Stargell in the lineup during this period. After the 1976 season, in which the Bucs finished in second place behind the cross-state Philadelphia Phillies, Danny Murtaugh died. The Pirates struck a trade with the Oakland Athletics in which catcherManny Sanguillén was sent to Oakland for manager Chuck Tanner. The Pirates would finish second to the Phillies once again in 1977, with Parker winning a batting title. It was also in 1977 that the Pirates began wearing yellow and black uniforms with pillbox caps. Stargell would award teammates with "Stargell Stars" on their caps for excellent plays on the field. The following year, the Pirates turned the end of the 1978 season into an impromptu race for the NL East, as they tried to chase down the collapsing Phillies, who ultimately won the division, only to fall short during the final home stand of the season (ironically against the Phillies). Despite this, Parker won another batting title and was namedNational League MVP to go with it.

1979
Main article: 1979 Pittsburgh Pirates season
Adopting the popular song "We Are Family" by the Philadelphia disco group Sister Sledge as their theme song, the 1979 Pirates held off the Montreal Expos to claim the pennant. "We Are Family" was elevated from theme song to anthem status (and is still nearly synonymous with the '79 Pirates), with fans chanting "Fam-a-lee!" from the stands. The Pirates faced the Baltimore Orioles again in the World Series, which (like 1971) they won in seven games, on October 17, 1979. During the 1979 championship season, a Pirate player was designated as Most Valuable Player in every available category: All-Star Game MVP (Dave Parker), NL Championship Series MVP (Willie Stargell), World Series MVP (Willie Stargell), and National League MVP (Willie Stargell, shared with Keith Hernandez of the Cardinals).

1986–1996: The Leyland era
 

 

Barry Bonds played the first 7 seasons of his career with the Pirates, beginning in 1986.

After the 1979 World Series, the Pirates entered a period of decline, steadily declining until they were regarded as the worst team in baseball during the mid-1980s. After the Pittsburgh Drug Trials and a league worst finish in 1985, the Galbreath family sold the franchise to the Pittsburgh Associates, a consortium of area businesses determined to keep the team from relocating. [10] Jim Leyland took over as manager in 1986, and under his guidance the Pirates gradually climbed out of the cellar. They featured young and exciting players such as the "outfield of dreams" Bobby Bonilla, Barry Bonds, and Andy Van Slyke; infielders Jay Bell, Steve Buechele, Sid Bream, and José Lind; catcher Mike LaValliere, and pitchers Doug Drabek, John Smiley, and Stan Belinda.
As a rookie in 1982, Johnny Ray played in every game and was named the Rookie of the Year by the Sporting News.

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