By Paul Casey Gotham
****Remember, try this without research. Make like Wally, and release your inner James Joyce. Show us your stream of consciousness as you try to decipher the answer.
My Major League career started at Forbes Field and ended at the confluence of the Allegheny, Monongahela and Ohio rivers. What happened in between made a few people scratch their heads. In my first start, I out-dueled Don Dryesdale for a complete-game win. In the seventh and deciding game of the ’71 World Series, I, again, went the distance. The game started with Earl Weaver trying to distract me. He argued something about how I was standing on the rubber. It didn’t make much sense. I went 15-8 that year with an ERA of 2.85. That off-season we buried a teammate. I delivered the eulogy. The next year, I finished second to Steve Carlton in Cy Young voting. I tied Bob Gibson that season with five shutouts. I tossed almost 250 innings and walked 84 that campaign. I repeated that effort a year later – 84 base on balls. This time I only hurled only 88 innings. Prior to that season, my highest ERA was 4.46. In 1973 my ERA ballooned to 9.85. I made just 24 appearances over the next two seasons, and my career ended.
Who am I?
This player obviously pitched for the Pittsburgh Pirates pretty much during the Clemente era. I don’t remember this pitcher’s first World Series, but the second one vs the Orioles was epic, and I have some foggy memories of it. Clemente was the series MVP and tragically died in a plane crash that off-season. Given the Orioles had four 20-game winners that season (Palmer, Cuellar, Dobson & McNally), remembering the Pirates pitching staff is a bit of a challenge. Some of them had cool names though, which made them more memorable than their performances on the field. Doc Ellis and Bob Moose were a couple … those were the cool names. Wasn’t there also a Doc Medich? Anyway, Bruce Kison was another that I remember. But the hurler that stands out as the WS pitching hero was Steve Blass, who was really the Pirates best pitcher over several years during that time frame. My final answer is Steve Blass.
I scrolled quickly down to avoid seeing Wally’s ( I presume) or maybe Dan’s guess. I am thinking Elroy Face or Vernon Law. Both were pitchers for the Pirates in that era, but I have no idea if either went to Reds. I’m thinking one of those guys was a reliever (the first “fireman”) and so it’s not him. I just don’t know who filled that role and who was the starter-type. Those Pirates, the first fireman and the first really great pinch-hit specialist, Smokey Burgess.
Wow! If Wally is right, I am WAAAY wrong!
Wally was WAAAY right. Steve Blass is the answer. Wally – great stream of consciousness.
The 1971 World Series is really the earliest one I remember. Good thing too … I essentially missed the Cubs collapse in ’69 when the Miracle Mets won.