12/25 From 1935: RIP Patsy; HBD Tarrik, Gene, Rick, Scott & Al

• 1935 - LHP Al Jackson was born in Waco, Texas. He was a Bucco product and worked his first two pro campaigns of 1960-61 as a Pirate, getting into 11 games and going 1-0/4.75. He was then lost to the Mets in the 1961 expansion draft. Al started there, and while he suffered through a couple of 20-loss seasons, he also won 40 games in four years for the sad sack Metropolitans. He ended up with 10 campaigns in the show and then coached 20 more seasons with the Mets, Orioles and Red Sox. 

Al Jackson - 2008 Topps Heritage Autograph

• 1946 - Gene Lamont was born in Rockford, Illinois. After serving stints as Jim Leyland’s 3B coach, he took over the team reins in 1997. In his first year, Lamont finished second with a young, inexperienced team (“The Freak Show”) that was widely predicted to finish last, and he was the runner up behind Dusty Baker for the Manager of the Year. That was the highlight; after the 2000 season, Lamont was fired after compiling a record of 295–352 and replaced by Lloyd McClendon. After coaching stops at Boston, Houston, and Detroit, Lamont moved to Kansas City in 2018 as a special assistant to the GM. 
• 1953 - OF/Manager Patsy Donovan died at the age of 88 in Lawrence, Massachusetts. Donovan played with the Pirates from 1892-99, putting together a stretch of six consecutive .300+ seasons and serving as player-manager in 1897 & 1899. That seemed to be Donovan’s niche; he was player/manager for four different clubs and managed two more after his playing days. The Pirates were sold late in 1899 to Barney Dreyfuss, who brought in Fred Clarke as, yes, player/manager, and the result was that Donovan was sent to the Cardinals to remove any potential friction. Fun fact: after Patsy retired, he coached for a bit at Phillips Academy in Andover, where one of his players was the future 41st President, George H.W. Bush. 
• 1961 - Rick Renteria was born in Harbor City, California. The Pirates selected him 20th in the 1980 draft, and he was rewarded with a cup of coffee with the team in 1986, going 3-for-12 in 10 games. He went on to play parts of four more seasons in the show before taking coaching jobs with the Marlins and Padres. He landed a gig as the manager of the Cubs for a year, but despite doing a generally fine job with a rebuilding team, he was shown the door when Joe Maddon became available. RR moved crosstown to become the White Sox’s bench coach; a year later, he was their manager. 
• 1968 - OF Scott Bullett was born in Martinsburg, West Virginia. The Pirates signed Scott out of high school in 1988 and he was up-and-down in the minors. He got a couple of short visits to the big club in 1991 and again in 1993, batting .186 in 34 games. He fell behind other Bucco OF prospects like Midre Cummings, Al Martin and Trey Beamon and was traded to the Cubs for Travis Willis, a pitcher who couldn’t get past AAA. He put in two years with the Cubs and closed out his career playing in Japan and Mexico. He now runs a baseball development camp called Bullettproof Baseball Prospects.  

Scott Bullett - 1992 Fleer Ultra Rookie

• 1973 - Tarrik Brock, the Pirates first base/outfield/baserunning coach, was born in Goleta, California. Brock, a second round pick of the Tigers in 1991, had a cup of coffee with the Cubs in 2000. By 2006, he joined the coaching ranks, working with the Florida Marlins, Houston Astros, San Diego Padres and Los Angeles Dodgers before he was hired by the Bucs in late 2019 to replace Kimera Bartee on Derek Shelton’s staff.