6/16 Through the 1960s: Groat, Bailey Inked; Big Poison, Kiki Streaks; Game Tales; HBD KY, John, Dave, Max, Pete, Fritz, Marr & Ralph

• 1857 - SS Marr Phillips was born in Allegheny City (now Pittsburgh’s North Side). He played for three years and 198 MLB games, spending four of those contests as an Allegheny in 1885 and batting four-for-15 after coming over from the Detroit Wolverines. He played pro ball from 1877-99 and then retired. 
• 1888 - The Alleghenys swapped 3B’men with the NY Giants, picking up Elmer Cleveland in exchange for Art Whitney. Cleveland, 25, was untried and remained with Pittsburgh for just the rest of the year, hitting .222, with his big league days limited to one more go-around with Columbus in 1891. But the club didn’t have much leverage in the trade as Whitney, 30, was holding out for a new deal. An excellent glove man, he was coming off a .260 campaign, but after he left town, he had just four more MLB seasons left and batted .213 over that span. 
• 1889 - OF Ralph Capron was born in Minneapolis. The former Minnesota Gopher quarterback got into three big leagues games, his first with Pittsburgh in 1912 - he never got to bat - and a couple of years later pivoted and played a little football, following the career course of his older brother George, who also couldn’t decide which sport to commit to. Ralph was the first ballplayer from the U of Minnesota to reach the majors; big bro George topped out in the PCL before turning down a Barney Dreyfuss offer to remain on the West Coast. 

Fritz Mollwitz - 1917 photo/Charles Conlon

• 1890 - 1B Fritz Mollwitz was born in Coburg, Germany and raised in Milwaukee. The sweet fielding first baseman played from 1917-19 for the Pirates, hitting .245. The Bucs sold him to the Cards in August, 1919, and that was his last MLB stop after a seven-year career. Fritz played pro ball from 1909-24 before retiring to become a Wisconsin small-town cop. 
• 1913 - IF Pete Coscarart was born in Escondido, California. He spent the last five years of his career in Pittsburgh (1942-46) after an All-Star stint at Brooklyn. Coscarart backed efforts in 1946 to form a players union and voted to strike for its acceptance, and as a result, he found himself out of the major leagues. After his career, Coscarart scouted for the Minnesota Twins (he signed Graig Nettles) and the New York Yankees. He later worked in real estate for 30 years. He joined a group that sued MLB baseball in 2001 for royalties associated with the use of their names and images, lost the case and passed away a few months later at age 89. 
• 1916 - Boston RHP Tom Hughes tossed a no-hitter against the Bucs, striking out Honus Wagner to end the game and seal a 2-0 victory at Braves Field. The Pittsburgh Press cited Hughes’ fastball and change of pace, while noting “he has ever been a Buccaneer hoodoo.” Hard luck Pirate starter Erving Kantlehner worked his third straight game without the Pirates scoring a run in his support. 
• 1922 - RHP Max Surkont was born in Central Falls, Rhode Island. Max had been an effective pitcher for the Braves, but during his Buc years (1954-56) he sailed in rough waters, beset with nagging injuries and tossing for a team noted for its futility. He went 16-32/4.92 as a Pirate. He stayed in baseball until 1963 (he spent four decades in pro baseball, with nine years in the major leagues) before retiring. He opened a bar and traveled widely, lending his name and effort to a host of charitable fundraisers. Max Moment: In 1953 as a Brave, he set the MLB record for consecutive strikeouts with eight, a record that stood until 1970 when Tom Terrific fanned 10 straight batters. 

Max Surkont - 1956 Topps

• 1925 - The Pirates blew a 9-4 lead, allowing the NY Giants to come back and tie the game in the ninth and then jump ahead by a pair in the 10th. But the Bucs answered with four runs of their own with Kiki Cuyler’s two-run homer being the game winner to claim a 13-11 victory at Forbes Field for Lee Meadows, despite giving up a pair of tallies in his inning of work. Vic Aldridge started and Ray Kremer was the victim of the ninth inning uprising. Glenn Wright added some pop with four hits and a homer while Earl Smith chipped in a trio of raps. 
• 1926 - Kiki Cuyler collected two hits and three RBI to lead the Bucs to a 6-3 win over Boston at Braves Field. It ran his hitting streak to 22 games, which ended the next game when he was held hitless, although drawing a walk and HBP. Vic Aldridge went wire-to-wire for the win, collecting a pair of knocks and scoring twice on his own behalf. 
• 1927 - Lee Meadows defeated Boston 6-0 behind the smokin’ bat of Paul Waner. Big Poison ran his hitting streak to 19 games, his multi-hit and RBI streak to 12 games and his extra-base hit streak to 11 games, going 2-for-3 with a triple and three RBI. Meadows did his part, too, spinning a six-hitter against the overmatched Braves at Forbes Field. 
• 1940 - Max Butcher tossed a complete game, two-hit shutout against a NY Giants team that boasted five .300+ hitters in their lineup, taking a 5-0 decision in the opener of a Polo Grounds double header. Elbie Fletcher went 4-for-5 with a triple to support Butcher. The Bucs took the nitecap too, 5-3, with Rip Sewell earning the win after Ken Heintzelman came in to retire the last Giant. Debs Garms had three hits and three RBI in game two. 

Max Butcher - 1940 Play Ball

• 1952 - Dick Groat was signed out of Duke University as a bonus baby reportedly for $25,000 plus $5,000 annually for the next five years. At the time of his signing, the media speculated that it was more like $75,000, and the Pirates never officially announced a figure. The backstory is that the Pirates offered Groat a contract the year before, but the All-America hoopster & infielder told them that he wanted to play out his last college season, but if the team came back with the same offer after that, he'd sign with them. 
• 1960 - GM Dave Littlefield was born in Portland, Maine. He came from the Miami Marlins, where he was assistant GM, but he had a stormy reign in Pittsburgh with questionable deals, drafts and desertion of the Latino player market, hindered by a club that was perpetually cash poor. In September, 2007, Littlefield was canned by the Pirates and replaced on an interim basis by Brian Graham, the club's director of player development. Neal Huntington was later hired as GM. Littlefield then worked as a scout for the Cubs and Tigers, and in 2015 became Detroit’s VP of Player Development. 
• 1961- Pirate scouts Bob Hughes and Jerry Gardiner inked highly regarded Woodrow Wilson High grad Bob Bailey, 19, to a deal featuring a $150,000 signing bonus. He didn’t blossom into the next big thing (he never hit .300 or had 30 HR in his 17 year career) but the corner player (3B/1B/OF) did have a lengthy stay in the show, ending with a .257 BA, 189 HR and 773 RBI. Bailey played seven years with Montreal, five more seasons with the Pirates and had shorter stops in LA, Cincinnati and Boston. He picked up the nickname “Beetles” after the cartoon GI from the Gunner, Bob Prince. 

John Ericks - 1997 Fleer

• 1967 - RHP John Ericks was born in Tinley Park, Illinois. The big righty (6’7”, 220), a first round pick of the Cards, spent his entire 1995-97 MLB tour in Pittsburgh, slashing 8-14-14/4.78. His foot in the door with the Pirates came via Ted Simmons, then Bucco GM and before that a Cardinal staffer. Ericks and his 98 MPH heater were headed toward a breakout campaign in 1997, with John going 6-of-7 in saves with a 1.93 ERA in his first shot as full-time closer and a decent contract, when boom - he went down with shoulder woes. Two operations later, his big league career was done. 
• 1969 - 1B Kevin Young was born in Alpena, Mississippi. Young played 11 of his 12 seasons for the Pirates (1992-95, 1997-2003), hitting .259 with 138 HR. At the time of his retirement in 2003, he was the only player remaining who had been a member of the last winning Pirate team in 1992, during his rookie year. KY has been part of the AT&T SportsNet gang since 2020.