It was spring training, 1975. The last game Steve Blass pitched in as a Pirate.
He had struggled for years after suddenly developing control problems in 1973. He and the Pirates were giving it one last go that spring to see if something would change.
This start would indicate that it wouldn’t.
“I was awful as usual,” Blass told me. “I had been awful for two years. It was my last shot and there wasn’t any change. I was still awful. I was throwing the ball all over the place.”
Pirates manager Danny Murtaugh came out of the dugout in the second inning, not to take Blass out, but to argue with the home plate umpire.