Bucs and Birds Battle It Out

"You haven't seen the real Pirates yet," said Pittsburgh Manager Danny Murtaugh after the Baltimore Orioles won the first two games of the World Series. So it seemed last week when the action shifted to Pittsburgh. Hitting, hustling and hurling like a team possessed, the Pirates swept three straight games from the heavily favored World Champion Orioles. Nevertheless, when the Series switched back to Baltimore, the Pirates had to battle more than the singing fastballs of Oriole Pitcher Jim Palmer. No team in Series history has ever lost the first two games and then come back to win the next four. The Orioles were able to keep the record intact, setting up baseball's most classic confrontation, the seventh game of a World Series.

Even so, the big bad Birds of Baltimore, heralded by most everyone save the Pirates as the best team in baseball, proved fallible. In Pittsburgh, they were held to a miserly nine hits and four runs through three games. Afield, Baltimore's play was even more disastrous --a wild pitch here, a passed ball there and bobbled grounders everywhere. In all, the Orioles committed five errors, two of them by Mr. Golden Glove himself, Third Baseman Brooks Robinson.

Elder Superstar. There were early signs that game No. 3 would be something different. Pirate Righthander Steve Blass, relying on a humming fastball and a sneaky slider, held the Orioles to one run and two hits through the first seven innings. The Pirates had two runs of their own when the last half of the seventh inning began with Roberto Clemente at bat, the 37-year-old rightfielder playing his 17th season with the Pirates. He bounced to Oriole Pitcher Mike Cuellar for what looked like a routine out. At least Cuellar thought so, until he caught sight of Roberto streaking for first like some revved-up rookie. Hurrying, Cuellar threw wildly and Clemente was safe.

That bit of hustle by one of the game's elder superstars seemed to turn the Series around for the Pirates--especially in light of what happened next. Cuellar walked Leftfielder Willie Stargell on four straight pitches, moving Clemente to second. Then, with a 1-1 count on First Baseman Bob Robertson, Roberto tried to call a time-out to get the sign straight. Too late. Robertson drove the next pitch into the right centerfield mezzanine for a three-run homer. As Robertson crossed the plate, Stargell exclaimed: "Attaway to bunt!" Bunt? Robertson had missed the bunt sign. Final score: Pirates 5, Orioles 1.

Game No. 4 was the first night game in World Series history. After erupting for three quick runs in the first inning, the Orioles seemed afflicted by some sort of night blindness when the Pirates brought in Relief Pitcher Bruce Kison, 21, a sidearming rookie brought up from the minors in July. Lean and whippy as a fungo bat, the 6-ft. 4-in. Kison allowed only one hit and shut out the Oriole musclemen for the next six innings. The Pirates, led by Stargell, Centerfielder Al Oliver and the irrepressible Clemente, pushed across two runs of their own in the first inning and another in the third to tie things up. Then, with a runner on third and two outs in the seventh inning, Murtaugh sent in another 21-year-old rookie, Pinch Hitter Milt May, who lined a sharp single to give Kison and the Pirates a 4-3 victory.

Magic, if Not Momentum. Next day it was the Orioles who figured to do the overpowering. They started Dave McNally, the lefty who had throttled Pittsburgh in game No. 1. If not momentum, the Pirates had something magical going for them.

Sparked by another Robertson home run, the Pirates sent McNally to the showers in the fifth inning. Pittsburgh Starter Nelson Briles stayed on to shut out the Orioles 4-0 with a nearly flawless two-hitter.

So it was back to Baltimore and game No. 6. At first, the Pirates still seemed in command. With the incomparable Clemente leading the way (a triple, an opposite-field home run in his first two at-bats), the Bucs jumped off to an early 2-0 lead. Pirate Starter Bob Moose effectively clipped the Oriole wings through five innings, extending the Birds' runless skein to 22 innings. Then Baltimore Leftfielder Don Buford drilled a home run in the sixth. The Orioles tied the game on two singles in the seventh, and it stayed tied until the tenth. With one out, Frank Robinson walked, raced from first to third on Merv Rettenmund's single to center, and scored the winning run with a brilliant slide on a shallow fly ball hit to centerfield.

The stage was set for game No. 7 in Baltimore, where the Orioles, having blocked the Pirates from one record, faced a historic hurdle of their own: no World Series team had ever before won all four of the games played in its own ballpark.

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