Dick Groat Biography, Wikipedia, Age, Networth, Career, Family, Wife and Children

Dick Groat Biography

In the 1950s and 1960s, baseball star Dick Groat established himself as a legend. He was born in Wilkinsburg, Pennsylvania, on November 4, 1930, and raised in Swissvale nearby.

In high school, Groat excelled in the sports of football, basketball, and baseball. He played baseball for the school while attending Duke University on a basketball scholarship after graduating.

In 1952, the Pittsburgh Pirates selected Groat, and that same year he made his Major League debut with the group.

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He became one of the league’s finest shortstops very fast, and in 1960 he took home the MVP of the National League. He batted.325 in the regular season and.400 in the World Series that year, helping the Pirates win the championship.

Throughout his career, Groat played for a number of organizations, including the San Francisco Giants and the St. Louis Cardinals. He ended his playing career in 1967 with a batting average of.286 and two World Series victories.

Groat went on to have a successful broadcasting career in college basketball following his playing career. In addition, he worked from 1980 to 1994 as Duke University’s athletic director.

In baseball, Groat’s legacy is still honored today. Both the Western Pennsylvania Sports Hall of Fame and the National College Baseball Hall of Fame inducted him in 2013. Along with his athletic prowess, Groat was renowned for his leadership qualities both on and off the field.

Dick Groat Career

Before Jackson and Sanders popularized major sports multitasking, Groat was a great on the baseball diamond and the basketball court in the 1950s. He was a wiry shortstop with a slick glove and a lightning-quick guard with a devastating set shot.

Groat, who turned his outstanding basketball career at Duke into a brief time in the NBA before winning the 1960 National League MVP and being named an All-Star while playing baseball for his hometown Pittsburgh Pirates, passed away on Thursday. He was 92.

Groat, a talented athlete at Duke who came from the Swissvale district east of Pittsburgh’s downtown, received All-American recognition in baseball and basketball. The program retired his number after the conclusion of his senior season in 1952, and his No. 10 jersey is now hanging in Cameron Indoor Stadium.

“A true multisports icon, Dick represented Duke University and the city of Pittsburgh with the utmost class and dignity, which resulted in universal admiration,” former Duke basketball coach Mike Krzyzewski said.

Within weeks of one another in 1952, Groat signed with the Pirates and was selected by the Fort Wayne Pistons of the embryonic NBA in an attempt to play both baseball and basketball professionally. 13 players, including him, have played professionally in both Major League Baseball and the NBA.

In the winter of 1952–1953, Groat was routinely traveling from Durham, North Carolina, to Fort Wayne, Indiana so he could divide his time between his classes at Duke, where he was finishing his degree after his eligibility expired, and the Pistons, long before Jackson and Sanders made two-way playing popular in the 1980s and ’90s.

While playing for them, Groat remarked, “I had a blast and had some of the scariest trips of my life.” I only had to play on the weekends; I never had to practice.

Although basketball was Groat’s preferred sport, a military assignment and a threat from Pirates general manager Branch Rickey changed the trajectory of Groat’s athletic career.

According to Groat, “baseball was always like work for me.” “I loved basketball, but baseball was the sport where I knew I would make a living,” he said.

Rickey concurred, instructing Groat to cease playing basketball after the young shortstop returned home and joined the Pirates in 1955. Groat agreed, albeit grudgingly, and this choice led to a successful 14-year career with Pittsburgh, St. Louis, Philadelphia, and San Francisco. In 1960, he batted.325 and led the majors in hitting, earning a spot on the All-Star team in each of his five seasons.

For a Pittsburgh Pirates club that defeated the New York Yankees in seven games to win the World Series, Groat was named the NL MVP for the 1960 year.

Throughout his major league career, which lasted from 1952 through 1967, Groat finished with 2,138 hits. He will be honored into the Pirates’ recently created Hall of Fame this summer, the organization revealed last week.

Groat, a two-time All-American guard at Duke and a member of the College Basketball and College Baseball Halls of Fame, averaged 23.0 points per game for the Blue Devils and is still the second-highest scorer in school history. In the 1952 NBA selection, the Pistons selected him third overall.

Groat averaged 11.9 points, 3.3 rebounds, and 2.7 assists over the course of his 26 games with the Pistons. However, his basketball career came to a stop once he joined the Army in 1953. After serving for over two years, Groat was discharged, and Rickey effectively threatened to take away his signing money if he didn’t focus on baseball.

Groat gave in and became into one of the most reliable shortstops of his time. It was Groat, not future baseball Hall of Famers Bill Mazeroski and Roberto Clemente, who led the Pirates’ unlikely rise from perennial also-ran to championship team during Pittsburgh’s improbable run to the World Series title in 1960. Groat participated in eight All-Star games (there were two games a season for a brief period in the 1950s and 1960s).

The Hall of Famers Clemente, Willie Mays, Hank Aaron, Stan Musial, and Eddie Matthews are among the players that came in last place behind Groat in the 1960 NL MVP voting.

Smooth shortstop Groat played 1,290 games for the Pirates, ranking fourth on the team’s all-time chart for shortstops. He paired up with Mazeroski to lead the NL in double plays five times, a record that still holds.

In November 1962, Pittsburgh traded Groat to St. Louis. In response, he had the best statistical year of his career in 1963, hitting.319 with a major league-high 43 doubles and placing second in the MVP voting to Dodgers pitcher Sandy Koufax. That autumn, Groat earned a second world title as the Cardinals defeated the Yankees in seven games.

Groat made a brief appearance for Philadelphia before moving on to the Giants, where he ended his career in 1967. After his playing career, he continued to be involved in the Pittsburgh community by managing his golf club in the Laurel Highlands, an hour east of the city, and by working for 40 years as the color analyst for the University of Pittsburgh basketball team.