But it was talking that did it, and my point is that Steve cant talk to people that way. Then, at some point, I turned the corner. But Seavers problems were only relatively serious (his record for 1974 was 1111), and were at least partly explicable (he had a sore hip), and he has now returned to form. They have two children. He always found something to hold on toa couple of good pitches that day, some little thing he had noticed. Steves a very private person.. Pete Rose is leading offright? He was the son of a plumber. With Steve, everything is right out in the open, Karen said. He made brief appearances in two games against Pirate farmhands, and threw well. Karen Blass. I didnt know how to solve my problem, but I knew I had to solve it. Their fastball comes in high, their curves hang, the rest of their prime weapons desert them. But after this began, when he was taken out of a game he only gave the impression that he was happy to be out of thererelieved that he no longer had to face it that day. Ive got to work very carefully to him, because when hes hot hes capable of hitting it out anytime., Well, the sliders only been fair today. Big-league baseball isnt easy, yet you can stand it when things are going your way. The pitching staff included Bob Moose, Bob Veale ( and later pitching coach for the Utica Blue Sox ), and Steve Blass. The phone numbers for her are (712) 273-5345 (Frontier Communications of Iowa, Inc), (712) 320-3324 (United States Cellular Corp.Frontier Communications of Iowa, Inc). It was an outstanding Series, made memorable above all by the play of Roberto Clemente, who batted .414 over the seven games and fielded his position with extraordinary zeal. He was in great physical shape, as usual, and his arm felt fine; in his entire pitching career, Blass never experienced a sore arm. I dont know, she said. PITTSBURGH . He entered the program at the suggestion of Joe Brown, who also enrolled Dave Giusti, Willie Stargell, pitcher Bruce Kison, and himself in the group. They have also lived in Santa Barbara, CA and Santa Monica, CA. Join Facebook to connect with Karen Lamb and others you may know. He fell into a slump, which led to an irreparable loss of confidence. Id have lasted until I was fifty.. 'The Mooncatcher's Rescue' is out now, published by Walker Books, illustrated by Lia Visirin. Slow-motion films of his delivery were studied and compared with films taken during some of his best games of the past; much of his motion, it was noticed, seemed extraneous, but he had thrown exactly the same way at his peak. A few of them are bromides: He was too nice a guy. All this was said with an air of summing up, of finality, but at other times that evening I noticed that it seemed difficult for Blass to talk about his baseball career as a thing of the past; now and then he slipped into the present tenseas if it were still going on. Virdon and Blass agreed that a spell in the bullpen seemed called for; at least he could work on his problems there every day. When Chris Blass went down swinging in the fourth, his father came over and said, The sinker down and away is tough. Steve Blass has a longish, lightly freckled face, a tilted nose, and an alert and engaging expression. Family (1) Spouse But then he suddenly shut up about it, and he never talked that way again. On any level, baseball is a tough game if it isnt really fun, Blass said. My Work. Now go and do that again for me. So much money and so many people depend on you. Thats what people mean when they say youre in the groove. The game he picked was against the Cubs, in Chicago, on September 11th. Everybody has been great to me, all through this thing, Blass said. Joe Morgan stood in, and Blass puffed on his cigar and looked at the ceiling. Intelligent, knows how to win. I think he felt he didnt need any of thatthat at any moment hed be back where he was, the Blass of old, and that it all was up to him to make that happen.. He hit Willie Stargell and Manny Sanguillen in batting practice; both players told him to forget it. Youre just flowing easy.. Karen M Lamb. Im not bitter about this. Lamb was 67 and had been in the hospital a week or . Pitching, it sometimes appears, is too hard for anyone. Pretty good inning, I said. I dont think Ill ever forget it. close to or above the 4.00 level will always be brought up by management. He and Karen had agreed that the family would go back to Bradenton for spring training, and that he would give it one more try. Responsibilities have included sales management, high level business development, staff development . Bradenton, FL Upper St Clair, PA Upper Saint Clair, PA. Stephen Blass. Steve Blass Disease. Robinson fanned, and Blass said, Same old twenty-eight., The Pirates won easily, 50, with Jerry Reuss going all the way for the shutout, and just before the end Steve said, I always had trouble sleeping after pitching a real good game. ), The Pittsburgh organization signed Steve Blass right out of Housatonic High in 1960, and he began moving up through the minors. No wonder its so hard to play this game right., In the Pirates seventh, Bill Robinson pinch-hit for Ed Kirkpatrick, and Blass said, Well, that still makes me wince a little. It was a moment or two before I realized that Robinson was wearing Blasss old uniform number. He threw well. He tried pitching while kneeling on the mound. There is no doubt that during the past two years he didnt react to a bad performance the way he used to, and you have to wonder why he couldnt apply his competitiveness to his problem. Select this result to view Stephen Mark Blass's phone number, address, and more. In spite of it all, Blass has kept his humor and has enjoyed life. Dennis Bowen, Kurt Grayson, Steve Forrest, Gerrit Graham, Karen Lamm, Darrell Fetty, James Keach, extras appearing in the ABC tv movie 'The Hatfields. That year, in his first outing Blass pitched five scoreless innings in relief against the Braves, facing, among others, Hank Aaron. We are no longer at a game. SEND FLOWERS Add a Memory Share Obituary . Invariably, they asked him how much money he was earning as a player; then they asked if he thought he was worth it. Finally, Murtaugh came out very slowly to the mound and told Blass that he was taking him out of the game; Dave Giusti came in to relieve his old roommate. Anyone who takes the trouble to write a man who is suffering deserves to be thanked, he told me. In 2009, he sent a record of a completely different variety that demonstrated his ability to still be accurate at something: he posted two holes-in-one in a single round of golf. The Mets won, 102, dropping the Pirates out of first place, but Blass, although unhappy about his showing, found some hope in the fact that he had at least been able to get the ball over the plate. Near the end of an article I wrote about that 1971 World Series, I mentioned watching Steve Blass in batting practice just before the all-important seventh game and suddenly noticing that, in spite of his impending responsibilities, he was amusing himself with a comical parody of Clemente at the plate: Blass. Perez had shortened up on the bat a little, but he took the pitch. Tony Perez was the next batter. Forty-seven years old): Right after that terrible game in Atlanta, Steve told me that it had felt as if the whole world was pressing down on him while he was out there. Karen L Blass Phone Number (412) 835-2786 Landline phone by Verizon Pennsylvania, Inc, four persons associated Ads by BeenVerified Background Report Click here to view details Persons Associated with Address 1756 Quigg Dr Stephen R Blass Details (412) 835-2786 Kelly M Fabian Details Age ~41 (412) 854-1986 Todd E Fabian Details Age ~42 Its Gimme the ball, boom! What was mystifying about the whole thing was that Blass still had his stuff, especially when he warmed up or threw on the sidelines. Steve Blass was born on April 18, 1942 in Canaan, Connecticut, USA. Johnny Oates walked. In spite of such hovering and inexplicable hazards, every big-league pitcher knows exactly what is expected of him. And if we were home, Id get up about seven in the morning, before anybody else was up, and go downstairs and make myself a cup of coffee, and then Id get the newspaper and open it to the sports section and just Just soak it all in., We thanked Joe Brown and said good night, and as we went down in the elevator I asked Steve Blass if he wanted to stop off in the clubhouse for a minute and see his old friends. I had talked that day to a number of Blasss old teammates, and all of them had mentioned his cheerfulness and his jokes, and what they had meant to the team over the years. The distance between the minors and the majors, always measurable in light-years, is probably greater today than ever before, and for a man making the leap in the wrong direction the feeling must be sickening. The catcher is Manny Sanguillen, of the Pirates, and his leaping teammate is pitcher Steve Blass, who has just defeated the defending (and suddenly former) World Champion Baltimore Orioles by a score of 21, giving up four hits. This is my debut book as an author. I thought it might be the end for me. Steve Blass played 10 . Last year, I went through something like Steves crisis. For a time, his performance was borderline, but his few wins were in sloppy, high-scoring contests, and his bad outings were marked by streaks of uncharacteristic wildness and ineffectuality. SSG STEVE BLASS passed away on March 11, 2013 at the age of 27 in ESTHERVILLE, Iowa. Hey, you can really see how it works from here, cant you? he said. He appeared in 23 games, started 18 and only amassed 88.2 innings pitched. Advertisement. I was a total Indians fan, completely buggy. A Southwest Florida golf legend died Sunday. Nobody knows, but some speculation is permissibleindeed, is perhaps demanded of anyone who is even faintly aware of the qualities of Steve Blass and the depths of his suffering. This was a late-afternoon date in the Upper St. Clair (Pennsylvania) Recreation League schedule, played between the White Sox and the Orioles on a field behind the Dwight D. Eisenhower Elementary SchoolLittle League baseball, but at a junior and highly informal level. It was probably at this time that Blass consulted a psychiatrist. This famous photograph (by Rusty Kennedy, of the Associated Press) does not require captioning for most baseball fans or for almost anyone within the Greater Pittsburgh area, where it is still prominently featured in the art collections of several hundred taverns. One day, the team made an eight-hour trip from Charleston to Toledo, where they played a night game. Steve Blass, Erik Sherman. Steve Blass, the Pittsburgh Pirates hero of the 1971 World Series, was on of the most effective pitchers during th e spna 1968-1972. [1] [2] He was the recipient of many fashion awards, including seven Coty Awards and the Fashion Institute of Technology 's Lifetime Achievement Award (1999). (719) 200-8191. Home Real Estate, LLC. He felt that the Pirates and Joe Brown had been extraordinarily patient and sympathetic in dealing with a baffling and apparently irremediable problem. He threw fifty-one pitches, but only seventeen of them were strikes. The Pirates had scored again in the eighth, but the Orioles had responded with a run of their own and had brought the tying run around to third base before Blass shut them off once and for all. I was embarrassed and disgusted. How much is Steve Blass worth? Steve Blass was born on April 18, 1942, in the rural town of Canaan, Connecticut. He was seriously affected by the death of Roberto Clemente. Karen Lamb Steve Blass/. The booing from the fans, at first scattered and uncomfortable, grew louder. (202) 225-7084. Here are pictures from November 2022 show. One of the teams always had to be the Indians. Once, in a Canaan game, he actually threw a pitch over the backstop.) Steve Blass pitched two no-hitters in his junior year at Housatonic Regional High School, and three more as a senior, but there were so many fine pitchers on the team that he did not get to be a starter until his final year. Blass has known the best and the worst of Pirates seasons on a personal level. Finally, of course, one must accept the possibility that a great many players may have suffered exactly the same sort of falling off as Blass for exactly the same reasons (whatever they may be) but were able to solve the problem and continue their athletic careers. Karen Lamb (Blass) is a 1960 graduate of Housatonic Valley Regional High School in Falls Village, Connecticut. Reconnect with Karen Lamb (Blass) by joining our alumni site today. share to facebook . I tend to take things not too seriously. Early that season, however, baseball suddenly stopped being fun for him. No one, including Blass himself, can cure or explain it. A lot of the Sox struck out, too, and a lot of players on both teams walked more than I could count, in fact. A big-league fastball comes in on the batter at about eighty-five or ninety miles an hour, completing its prescribed journey of sixty feet six inches in less than half a second, and, if it is a strike, generally intersects no more than an inch or two of the seventeen-inch-wide plate, usually near the upper or lower limits of the strike zone; curves and sliders arrive a bit later but with intense rotation, and must likewise slice off only a thin piece of the black if they are to be effective. 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