Dick Groat: The Heart of a Winner
Image credits: Wikipedia
If Dick Groat had not been the heart of the 1959 Pittsburgh Pirates, Roger Maris would not have hit 61 home runs for the Yankees in 1961.
Following a disappointing ’59 season in which the Bucs had dropped from second to fourth, GM Joe Brown negotiated a multiplayer trade with the Kansas City A’s that would have sent Groat to KC and Maris to Pittsburgh. The A’s agreed to the deal, but Brown asked for more time to think it over.
When Pirates manager Danny Murtaugh told Brown, “I really hate to give up Groat,” the deal was dead. Maris wound up going to the Yankees in a seven-player swap. It is doubtful if Maris would have hit 61 home runs in spacious Forbes Field.
Shortstop Dick Groat. Image credits: Missouri Sports Hall of Fame
What was it about Groat, a shortstop with no wheels, that made him the NL MVP for the Pirates’ 1960 world champions?
Pittsburgh columnist Les Biederman wrote, “If you could measure his heart, his desire and his ability, he’d be the biggest man you could find. Groat is one of the few players I have seen in my time who could laugh and live it up if the Pirates won, even if he didn’t get a hit. Yet when he had a big day and the Pirates lost, he was the picture of dejection. Nothing phony about him.”
An All-American basketball star at Duke, career .286 hitter over 14 seasons, five-time All-Star shortstop, NL batting champion in 1960, consistently among the leaders in every fielding category, winner of two World Series rings (both 7-game Series against the Yankees) – not bad for a guy who couldn’t run.
“I was a much better basketball player than baseball player,” Groat said as we began a visit during the 1960 Bucs’ thirtieth-anniversary reunion in Pittsburgh.
“I couldn’t run. But nobody knew I was slow because my first two steps were quick, and it didn’t show up on the basketball court. I developed the quickness you needed to get the jump to go around somebody. I never had any problems in basketball. I had much problems in baseball. I never got an infield hit – ever.”
While at Duke, Groat made the transition from the two-hand set shot style of play to the jump shot, and led the nation in scoring his last two seasons. Duke was 24-6 in his last season, but they turned down an invitation to the NIT because of the point-shaving scandals then in the news.
He joined the Ft. Wayne Pistons of the NBA while still in school and flew to the games, then flew back to school; “I never practised with the team.” He averaged 12 points a game, then signed with the Pirates.
He never played in the minors.
Dick Groat was a basketball player first, playing for Duke University. Image credits: Wikipedia
Groat was a line drive, ground ball hitter, not a lofter. In 14 years he hit 39 home runs. “I was an inside-out hitter when I came up; my hands were always ahead of the bat. Paul Waner had a batting range in Pittsburgh and I went out there a lot. I liked Paul. He taught me quickness with the bat. I learned to stand back and get in front of the ball and pull it. George Sisler also taught me how to be a good hitter.”
After the disappointing 1959 season, five key players were forced to take pay cuts: Groat, Mazeroski, Skinner, Virdon and Friend. All five responded with better years; Groat’s BA jumped 50 points to a league-leading .325. He was on pace to become the first Pirates player to get 200 hits since Paul Waner in 1937 when a pitch by Lew Burdette broke his wrist in September; he finished with 186.
Groat was the only player named on every ballot in winning the first MVP ever awarded to a Pirates player. After the World Series Groat said, “You can wrap up our success in one word: desire. We were 25 men who wanted so much to win.” He also cited Danny Murtaugh for doing the finest job of getting the best out of a team he ever saw.
In 1963 Groat was traded to the Cardinals and the following year earned another World Series ring against the Yankees.
“I was the luckiest shortstop in the game. I had Don Hoak on my right and Maz on my left in Pittsburgh, then I go to St. Louis and I have Julian Javier and Ken Boyer alongside me.”
After his playing days he returned to his first love as the radio voice of University of Pittsburgh basketball. He died in 2024 at the age of 92.
