- 1930 - SS Dick Bartell was traded by the Pirates to the Philadelphia Phillies for SS Tommy Thevenow and P Claude Willoughby. Thevenow spent six season with the Bucs and hit .251 while Willoughby went 0-2 for Pittsburgh in his final MLB season. Bartell played 14 more seasons and ended up with a .281 lifetime BA. But the seemingly one-sided swap of SS’s worked out OK - Thevenow hurt his leg in 1931, and in 1932 was replaced in the lineup by Hall-of-Famer Arky Vaughan. Tommy Thevenow factoid: he didn't homer in his final 3,347 at-bats, the most consecutive at bats without a home run in MLB history.
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| Tommy Thevenow 1933 Goudey |
- 1950 - Branch Rickey signed a five-year contract with the Pirates to become the team executive vice president/GM, replacing Roy Hamey. His son, Branch Jr., assumed the post of Pittsburgh's VP and farm system director. Branch laid the groundwork for future success, but the Bucs put together just a 269-501 record (.349) during his tenure as GM.
- 1953 - LHP John Candelaria was born in New York. The Bucs selected the LaSalle Academy (Brooklyn) star in the second round of the 1972 draft. In 12 years (1975-85, 1993) with the Pirates, his line was 124-87-16/3.17, with a 1-1, 3.91 ERA slash in his four post-season starts. The Candy Man earned one All-Star nod in his 19 year MLB career.
- 1969 - RHP Don Wengert was born in Sioux City, Iowa. Don had spent 1996-97 full-time with Oakland but had been bouncing back and forth since when the Pirates signed him as a FA in 2001. The 32-year-old got four starts in May, went 0-2, 12.38, and spent the rest of the year back on the farm. That ended his MLB days; he tossed one more year for the Boston system before retiring and returning to Iowa.
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| Matt Skrmetta 2000 (Jeff Gross/Getty) |
- 1972 - RHP Matt Skrmetta was born in Biloxi, Mississippi. Matt got to toss briefly in the bigs during 2000, first getting into a half-dozen games with the Expos and finishing with eight outings and an 0-2, 9.26 line with Pittsburgh. Matt was a determined hurler: he played for 25 teams, believed to be a record, and 13 organizations, including a couple of seasons in Japan and an indie campaign. He’s now a scout for Softbank in the Japanese League,
- 1979 - 1B Adam LaRoche was born in Orange County, California. He played for the Bucs from 2007-09, hitting .265 with 58 HR. During his last Pirate season, he got to play with his brother Andy and also became the first player in major league history to lose a home run to video review.
- 1981 - Dave Anderson of the NY Times wrote that the Bucs and Yankees were discussing a deal for RF Dave Parker with the departure of Reggie Jackson on the horizon. The Pirates originally wanted five pitchers; the Yankees countered with an offer of hurlers Ron Davis and Gene Nelson along with SS Andre Rodgers. There were two sticking points: Pittsburgh wanted lefty Dave Righetti, whom New York considered an untouchable, and the Gotham gang wanted Parker to agree to a playing weight of 210 pounds. No match was made and The Cobra played as a Pirate for two more seasons, then signed as a free agent with the Reds.
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| Dave Parker 1981 Topps - No Deal, New York. |
- 2014 - CF Andrew McCutchen won his third consecutive NL Silver Slugger award and 2B Neil Walker took home his first. Cutch became the first Pittsburgh outfielder to earn three consecutive Silver Sluggers since Barry Bonds in 1990-92 while Walker was the first Pirate second baseman to earn a Silver Slugger since Johnny Ray in 1983. Cutch and SS Ian Desmond were the only NL repeat winners.
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