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An Ode to Al Oliver, Pirates Hall of Fame Inductee

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Al Oliver will be inducted into the Pittsburgh Pirates Hall of Fame with Kiki Cuyler and Vern Law on Friday. He was an outfielder/first baseman and one of the most underrated hitters ever to play the game. More importantly, by all accounts, he’s an all-around good guy. He craved recognition and, as a result, was largely misunderstood by Pirates fans.

Jun 1974; Pittsburgh, PA, USA; FILE PHOTO; Pittsburgh Pirates outfielder Al Oliver at bat during the 1974 season. Mandatory Credit: Malcolm Emmons-USA TODAY Sports

Richie Ashburn, a great hitter in his own right from 1948-62, didn’t understand it: Oliver goes to a team, hits, and gets traded. On March 26, 1985, Ashburn told The Pittsburgh Press, “Al Oliver is a very nice man. He is intelligent, articulate, considerate, and well-liked by his teammates. He is not a troublemaker or a clubhouse lawyer, and yet he can’t seem to find a team that will have him and hold him.”

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Remembering the Career of Al Oliver, Pirates Hall of Fame Inductee

Indeed, Oliver played for seven teams during an 18-year career that spanned from 1968 to 1985. He played for five teams from 1983 to 1985, spawning Ashburn’s comments. For his career, the left-handed batter hit .303/.344/.451, 219 HR, and 1,326 RBI, with a 121 OPS+, .352 wOBA, and 120 wRC+ while accumulating 43.7 WAR. He had 2,743 hits, a bit shy of the 3,000 that virtually guarantees entry into the National Baseball Hall of Fame. Today, he remains on the outside looking in. He was the National League batting champion in 1982, when he hit .331 for the Montreal Expos and also led the NL with 204 hits, 43 doubles, 109 RBI, and 317 total bases. Of course, it’s what he did as a Pirate that has propelled Oliver into the Pirates Hall of Fame. We’ll get to that shortly.

Sportswriter Bob Smizik maintained a blog after retiring from the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette. He often posted that Oliver was one of the most decent men he had met in all of sports. Oliver didn’t smoke or drink or cheat on his wife on the road as many of his contemporaries did. Mark DeAndrea, who met Oliver through his work on the Josh Gibson Negro League Centennial Committee, told me in a 2021 email, “Al Oliver told us his favorite thing to do on the road was to stay in the hotel and order room service. He loved that. Just as you said, he never went out, didn’t go to bars, didn’t hang out, just stayed in his hotel room and feasted on room service.” Today, Oliver is a Baptist minister and motivational speaker.

“You’ve Just Got to Make Contact”

Oliver played for the Pirates from 1968-77. Over that period, he hit .296/.335/.454, 135 HR, and 717 RBI, and was a three-time All-Star. In 1969, he was tied for second in voting for the NL Rookie of the Year. It seems ridiculous today that the award went to Ted Sizemore, while Oliver garnered as many votes as Coco Laboy.

Oliver stood motionless at the plate, his bat held at a 45-degree angle, as he awaited the pitch. Then he unleashed a vicious swing. In 1979, he described his hitting philosophy to Richard Justice of The Dallas Times Herald. “I make no move until the ball is 20 or 25 feet from the plate. If you do that, you won’t be fooled often. . . You’ve just got to make contact. I think only once in my life have I gone to the plate trying to hit a home run. I’ve gone to the plate a lot of times wanting to hit a homer, but never trying. There’s a big difference.”

He didn’t let many pitches go by. Not only did he hit the ball where it was pitched, he hit the ball if it was pitched. His Pirates teammates Manny Sanguillén and Rennie Stennett had reputations as free swingers and bad-ball hitters. However, Oliver’s 4.8 percent walk rate as a Pirate was only slightly higher than the 4.2 rate registered by Sanguillén and Stennett.

“I Didn’t Play Enough”

Oliver was brash, confident, and outspoken at a time when fans preferred black athletes to be humble. He would point out that he was merely answering reporters’ questions truthfully. His teammate Roberto Clemente could have filled him in on the hazards of doing that. Oliver began his career as a first baseman and earned the nickname “Scoop” for his ability to dig grounders and errant throws out of the dirt. At the same time, the Pirates also had a big, slugging right-handed first baseman in Bob Robertson. Thus, manager Danny Murtaugh also employed Oliver in the outfield so that there was enough playing time for both.

But not enough to suit Oliver. In the spring of 1970, the 23-year-old Oliver told Al Abrams of the Post-Gazette, “Nobody is going to take first base away from me. But I didn’t play enough [in 1969]. I should have been playing there all season. [By platooning with Robertson] I lost six weeks. I figured I would have hit for a better average and at least 25 home runs for the year.”

“I Think I Can Hit”

Oliver spent 1970 sharing first base with Robertson while also starting games in the outfield. On June 28, Oliver became the answer to a trivia question when he hit the final home run at Forbes Field. The confident young Oliver didn’t like platooning. After the 1970 season, the Pirates traded their center fielder, Matty Alou, to open up that position for Oliver. Yet, in 1971, Oliver found himself in a left-right platoon again, this time with speedy outfielder Gene Clines.

As a member of the eventual 1971 World Series champions, Oliver hit .282/.317/.446, 14 HR, and 64 RBI. Oliver saved his biggest hit of 1971, and of his entire Pirates career, for Game 4 of the NL Championship Series against the San Francisco Giants at Three Rivers Stadium. The Pirates were ahead, two games to one, in the best-of-five series. In the bottom of the fourth inning, the Pirates had runners on second and third with two outs. Giants manager Charlie Fox ordered pitcher Gaylord Perry to intentionally walk Willie Stargell, who led the majors with 48 home runs. Oliver, the next batter, popped out to end the threat.

Oliver got a second chance in the bottom of the sixth. Clemente’s two-out RBI single put the Pirates ahead, 6-5. When he reached second base on a passed ball, Fox again ordered an intentional pass to Stargell. This time, Oliver made Fox pay. Against pitcher Jerry Johnson, Oliver launched a three-run home run deep into the right field seats. The 9-5 score held up, and the Pirates were on their way to Baltimore to open the World Series.

Afterward, Oliver told Phil Musick of the Press, “I hate it when they walk someone to get to me. I think I can hit, see. The first time I was mad enough. And I stayed mad. It was smart strategy as far as the long ball goes, but I’m a contact hitter. I can hit with anybody.”

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“If I Drove in 200 Runs, It Would Be the Same”

When Murtaugh retired after the 1971 championship, his replacement, Bill Virdon, told Oliver his platooning days were over. Virdon was fired late in the 1973 season, with Murtaugh returning to take his place. However, Oliver remained an everyday player for the Pirates. Oliver responded with some of the best seasons of his Pirates career, hitting at least .308 in four of his final six seasons with Pittsburgh. This was before the analytics era, when hitting .300 was a “thing.”

Oliver chafed over his lack of recognition. In Cincinnati, their loquacious manager, Sparky Anderson, constantly talked up his Reds players for postseason awards and All-Star recognition, while the more reserved Murtaugh never actively sought out the media. In 1974, Oliver told Smizik he’d given up all hope of getting recognized for his achievements. “If I drove in 200 runs, it would be the same,” said Oliver. “Some guys can produce every year and aren’t appreciated. Some others haven’t produced like I have and are tabbed as the best in baseball.”

“I Never Asked to Play Center Field”

Thus, it was a shock to Oliver when the Pirates tried – and failed – to trade him after the 1975 season. The deal would have sent Oliver and infielder Art Howe to the Kansas City Royals for center fielder Amos Otis and infielder Cookie Rojas. However, Rojas exercised his 10-and-five rights to veto the deal. Rojas owned a chain of shoe stores in KC and didn’t want to leave. The rationale for the proposed deal was that Otis was the superior defensive player. Oliver conceded as much to Charley Feeney of the Post-Gazette, but went on to say, “I don’t think he’s a better ball player. . . Remember, I never asked to play center field.” (By 1978, Rojas was a coach with the Chicago Cubs. Kansas City’s retail shoe industry survived in his absence.)

Oliver responded to the perceived slight by putting up his best slash line as a Pirate in 1976, when he hit 323/.363/.476, 12 HR, and 61 RBI. He didn’t mind when Murtaugh retired after that season and Chuck Tanner took his place. Tanner was a master psychologist who, as the Chicago White Sox manager, succeeded with Dick Allen where others failed.

Tanner immediately began publicly extolling Oliver’s virtues. Said “Scoop” to Musick, “All these years and a guy comes in and tells people something I’ve been trying to tell them for years.” Oliver could have left the Pirates as a free agent in 1977. Instead, he signed a three-year extension and agreed to move to left field and bat cleanup, vacating the customary No. 3 spot he inherited when Clemente died tragically. For Tanner’s Pirates, Oliver hit .308/.353/.481, 19 HR, and 82 RBI. He gladly filled in at center field for a time when rookie Omar Moreno was slumping.

“It Was a Whole Lot of Nothing”

My favorite in-person Al Oliver memory occurred on June 24, 1977, at Three Rivers Stadium against the Expos. Montreal right-hander Wayne Twitchell pitched a perfect game through seven innings and had a seemingly insurmountable 5-0 lead. Leading off the bottom of the eighth, Bill Robinson beat out an infield grounder to end Twitchell’s no-hit bid. Oliver followed by crushing a fast-traveling, line drive home run over the right field wall. Exit velocity wasn’t a “thing” at the time, but from my seat high above home plate, the ball in flight seemed to shrink rapidly as though it were a golf ball. Oliver sparked a four-run rally and the Pirates went on to win the game, 6-5, in 10 innings.

After the 1977 season, Pirates general manager Hardy Peterson traded Oliver to the Texas Rangers for pitcher Bert Blyleven and first baseman/outfielder John Milner. It angered Oliver. When Peterson called Oliver to inform him of the deal, Oliver hung up on him. Describing the call to Pat Livingston of the Press, Oliver said, “It was a whole lot of nothing.” He felt that the Pirates wanted rid of him before his 10-and-five rights kicked in. He’d long felt unwanted by the Pirates but absolved Tanner. Said Oliver, “There were only two managers I respected in Pittsburgh, Tanner and Bill Virdon.” Ouch!

The Last Word

Regardless of how Oliver felt about him, Peterson entertained a deal to return Oliver to Pittsburgh after the 1981 season, according to Dave Parker’s book, Cobra!  The trade would have sent Parker and Jason Thompson to Texas for Oliver, Johnny Grubb, and Danny Darwin. This time, it was Parker who vetoed a trade involving Oliver. Oliver was sent off to Montreal instead.

The Pirates of the 1970s made six postseason appearances, winning the World Series in 1971 and 1979. Those players had a saying: Once a Bucco, always a Bucco. Oliver was on record as rooting for the Pirates when they reached the 1979 postseason and has returned to Pittsburgh on numerous occasions for reunions and such. He’ll be there on Friday, too.

For another lasting memory of Oliver, I fast forward to 1985 when he was a Toronto Blue Jay. That Toronto team won the American League East Division and faced the eventual World Series champion Royals in the Championship Series. The decisive Game 7 was Oliver’s last in the majors. With Oliver due up in a key situation against a left-handed pitcher, Toronto manager Bobby Cox called him back and sent right-handed-hitting Cliff Johnson to pinch hit. The television cameras caught a visibly upset Oliver in the dugout, openly complaining to all around him. He hit only .252 in 1985, but “Scoop” was confident till the very end.

 

Main Photo Credit: Charles LeClaire-USA TODAY Sports

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