Tuesday, January 25, 2011

1983 Pittsburgh Pirates


This week, the Pittsburgh Steelers have made their record tying 8th trip to the Super Bowl. Today we get to the black sheep of Pittsburgh sports teams, the Pirates. 1983 wasn't a bad season for the Bucs. They had an unexpected winning season. This would be the last Pirates team that didn't include Barry Bonds that had a winning season. In fact this would be their last winning season until 1988.

Best Player: Tony Pena

Best Pitcher: Rick Rhoden

All-Stars: Bill Madlock

Hall-of-Famers: none

Rookie Card of the Year: Cecilio Guante, pitched through 1990 with the Pirates, Yankees, Rangers, and Indians. Odd thing is, he never started until the very last game of his career against the Yankees.

Other rookie cards: Jim Smith (listed under retired players), Lee Tunnell

First Pirate card: Lee Mazzilli, Larry McWilliams, Manny Sarmiento, Gene Tenace

Most interesting non-Topps card: Cecilio Guante, appeared in only the Donruss set, but with the name "Matt Guante". Where did the Matt come from? His full name was Cecilio (Magallane) Guante. From my understanding of Spanish naming conventions, and this may be wrong, but Magallane would've been his dad's last name and Guante would've been his mother's. They really don't have middle names like Americans do. So it makes no sense to turn Magallane into Matt. Then again, this just may have been an error at the Donruss factory and nothing more.

Other notes: Bob Owchinko's card showing him as an Oakland Athletic is listed here.

Starters
__ TO 590 C Tony Pena PIT
__ TO 730 1B Jason Thompson PIT
__ TO 149 2B Johnny Ray PIT
__ TO 433 SS Dale Berra PIT
__ TO 645 3B Bill Madlock PIT
__ TO 385 LF Mike Easler PIT
__

CF Marvell Wynne
__ TO 205 RF Dave Parker PIT
__ TO 69 OF Lee Lacy PIT
__ TT 67 CF Lee Mazzilli PIT

Starting Pitchers
__ TO 781 SP Rick Rhoden PIT
__ TO 253 SP Larry McWilliams PIT
__ TO 755 SP John Candelaria PIT
__ TT 118 SP Lee Tunnell PIT
__

SP Jose DeLeon

Relief Pitchers
__ TO 17 CL Kent Tekulve PIT
__ DO 423 RP Cecilio Guante PIT
__ TO 566 RP Manny Sarmiento PIT
__ TO 355 RP Jim Bibby PIT
__ TO 537 RP Rod Scurry PIT

Other Players
__ TO 778 3B Richie Hebner PIT
__ TO 173 IF Jim Morrison PIT
__

LF Brian Harper
__ TT 110 UT Gene Tenace PIT
__

LF Doug Frobel
__ TO 462 C Steve Nicosia PIT
__

C Milt May
__

CF Joe Orsulak
__

C Junior Ortiz
__

MI Ron Wotus
__

SS Rafael Belliard
__

PR Miguel Dilone
__ TO 44 SP Don Robinson PIT
__ TO 329 RP Randy Niemann PIT
__

RP Jim Winn
__

RP Dave Tomlin
__

SP Alfonso Pulido
__ TO 338 RP Bob Owchinko OAK

Manager
__ TO 696 MG Chuck Tanner PIT

2 comments:

  1. I've always been curious about the "Matt" Guante card. It's just so random. Maybe we would have heard more about this uncorrected error had Guante put together an All-Star career. If Albert Belle had never been an All-Star player, would we have ever heard the story behind his Joey Belle cards?

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  2. His middle name was JoJuan, which is where the Joey came from...that makes a little more sense, and I am pretty sure he doesn't have a Latin background

    Guante's card may have more in common with the "Jeff" Pendleton card Donruss put out in 1985.

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