9/16 Through 1964: Red Hot; Ralph Gets 40, Rizzo Tops 20; 12 In '12; Game Tales; HBD Mark, Scott, Chuck, Con & Sam

• 1870 - LHP Sam Moran was born in Rochester, New York. A 22-game winner for Nashville in the Southern Association who had bested Cy Young in an exhibition game against Cleveland, the Pirates bought his contract in mid-August and he went 2-4/7.47 in 10 games, walking 51 batters in 62-2/3IP. That ended the southpaw’s major league days; he hung around in the minors for a couple of more seasons before getting on with his life’s calling. 
• 1912 - Pittsburgh won its 12th game in a row by beating the Brooklyn Superbas, 2-1, at Washington Park behind Rube Robinson’s four-hitter. The Bucs got their runs in the second inning when Honus Wagner tripled and jogged home in front of Chief Wilson’s homer. The Pirates were a strong club that season, finishing 93-58, but that was only good enough for second place in the National League, 10 full games behind John McGraw’s champion New York Giants. 

Chief Wilson - 1912 T207

• 1922 - RHP Cornelius “Con” Dempsey was born in San Francisco. Con was a highly touted sidewinder with the old San Francisco Seal teams of the Joe DiMaggio era. He led the Pacific Coast League in strikeouts twice but never quite got over the hump. In 1951, he was called up to the major leagues, pitching seven innings for the Pirates in three games (two starts, 0-2/9.00) before being released. He also attended spring training with the Philadelphia Phillies before getting cut. Dempsey then returned to pitching in the PCL through the 1953 season before moving on to prep coaching & teaching. 
• 1935 - Mace Brown tossed 5-1/3 frames of one-hit, shutout ball from the pen in relief of Guy Bush to beat the Boston Braves, 5-3, at Forbes Field. Gus Suhr subbed at 1B in the last inning to run his streak of consecutive games played to 619, breaking the old NL mark of Eddie Brown. Suhr wouldn’t miss a game until 1937, running his iron man streak to 822 games. 
• 1938 - Johnny Rizzo became the first Pirate to hit 20 home runs in a season (Gus Suhr held the team record with 19 long balls in 1935) in a 7-6 win over the Boston Bees at Braves Field, winning the opening game of a twin bill in the 11th inning with his solo shot. Rizzo, a 25-year-old Texan who was hurt the following season and traded to the Phils in 1940, finished the campaign batting .301 with 23 round trippers and 111 RBIs. The first game was wide open with all hands on deck. The 13 runs scored by the two teams featured 11 different players plating and 11 others driving them in with Bill Swift taking the victory. The second game was a 5-4 loss, featuring ninth inning fireworks; the Pirates scored twice to take a 4-2 lead; the Braves answered with a three-spot to take the contest. Pittsburgh held on to a three-game lead in the NL with the split, but would lose 6-of-7 at the end of the month to finish second to the Cubs by two games. 

John Rizzo - 1938 photo via The Sporting News

• 1944 - C Chuck Brinkman was born in Cincinnati. He was a member of the Ohio State 1966 NCAA championship team before turning pro. Ed finished an on-again, off-again six-year MLB career with the Pirates in 1974, getting into four games and going 1-for-7 after being brought in to replace backup catcher Mike Ryan, who was on the DL. Chuck’s brother Ed, who was a longtime MLB shortstop, coach and scout, spent 15 years in the show, mostly with the Senators. 
• 1950 - Cliff Chambers and Boston's Vern Bickford dueled through 11 scoreless innings before the Bucs broke it open in the 12th frame at Braves Field. Two walks, a wild pitch and four singles gave the Pirates a 4-0 win, with Pete Castiglione’s two-run knock the big blow. Both pitchers went the distance, with Chambers tossing a six-hitter with six whiffs for the victory. 
• 1951 - Ralph Kiner set an National League record by hitting his 40th homer, the fifth consecutive year he reached that mark. The blast came in the seventh inning of the opener against Larry Jensen during a doubleheader loss to the New York Giants at Forbes Field. The only other players to hit 40 home runs for five or more consecutive seasons were the Yankees’ Babe Ruth, who did it for seven campaigns between 1926-32, the Cubs’ Sammy Sosa, who had a six-year run between 1998-2003, and the Giants’ Barry Bonds, who swatted 40 for five straight seasons between 2000-04. 
• 1958 - George “Red” Witt won his eighth straight game, 2-1, over the Cards. For Witt, it was his last appearance of the year as he left the club to finish his senior year at Long Beach State. He finished 9-2/1.61 in 106 innings, but reported to camp next season with a sore elbow and went 0-7/6.96 in 1959. Red won just two more games before retiring in 1962, but did work 2-2/3 scoreless innings in the 1960 World Series. Red’s win was the conclusion of a suspended game; the Bucs took two behind Ronnie Kline’s 3-1 nightcap victory as Dick Stuart and Bob Skinner combined for six hits, three RBI and two runs scored in the regulation game that followed. It kept the Pirates faint pennant hopes alive a bit longer, but they were eliminated a week later. 

Red Witt - 1959 Topps

• 1961 - RHP Scott Medvin was born in North Olmsted, Ohio. The Pirates picked up Scott (along w/Jeff Robinson) as part of the 1987 Rick Reuschel deal with the Giants. He worked from 1988-89 with the Bucs, posting a line of 3-1/5.03 in 23 appearances from the pen. The Pirates sent him to Seattle for Lee Hancock, and he worked his final season for the Mariners. 
• 1961 - C Mark Parent was born in Ashland, Oregon. Mark spent 13 years in the show as a back-up catcher with his busiest season in 1995 as a Bucco. He got into 69 games and amassed over 200 AB for the only time in his career that year, hitting .232 but with 15 HR. Mark was sent to the Cubs in late August, and he stayed in the show through the 1998 campaign. He spent most of his time since retiring as a player as a minor league coach/manager, bouncing from system to system and bench coach for the White Sox from 2011-15. He retired for good after the 2016 campaign. 
• 1962 - The San Francisco Giants scored three times off Al McBean and Roy Face in the eighth inning on a Willie Mays homer to tie the Bucs 4-4 at Forbes Field. The Pirates then stranded five runners in the eighth and ninth, but finally claimed the win in the 10th frame when pinch hitter Smoky Burgess launched a two-run shot off Stu Miller to give Joe Gibbon and Pittsburgh a 6-4 walk-off victory. Willie Stargell made his first MLB appearance in this game. It wasn’t very auspicious - he K’ed pinch hitting in the 10th, just before Smoky went long. 

Smokey Burgess - 1962 photo/Jay Publishing

• 1963 - Bob Veale fired a two-hit shutout and needed to be every bit that good as he and the Bucs topped the Cubs and Larry Jackson, 1-0, at Forbes Field. Big Bob also gave up two walks and whiffed nine; he didn’t allow a Cub runner until a fifth-inning free pass and didn’t give up a hit until the seventh. The Pirates collected eight hits off Jackson but couldn’t cash in until the ninth. Ken Hubbs booted Roberto Clemente’s grounder, Donn Clendenon bunted him up a station, and then he came home on Bill Mazeroski’s liner to left with the game’s walk off tally.