Dick Groat, celebrated two-sport athlete, turns 90

Dick Groat, a two-time World Series champion, MVP, basketball and baseball All-American and a member of three Halls of Fame, reached another milestone Wednesday.

He turned 90.

Groat, a Swissvale native, celebrated with a private dinner, seated with family at Champion Lakes, the golf course he owns in Fairfield Township, north of Ligonier.

Reached by phone Wednesday night at Champion Lakes, he said of his longevity, “I’m very, very fortunate. Thank God.”

Groat is considered by many to be the best athlete in the history of this region. He earned All-American honors in baseball and basketball at Duke, where his framed photo hangs in Cameron Indoor Stadium.

He was a first-round draft choice (third overall) of the NBA’s Fort Wayne Pistons, but he gained his greatest fame through a 14-season Major League Baseball career.

He joined the Pittsburgh Pirates in 1952 and then was with the Pistons for 26 games of the 1952-53 season. He hit .284 in one league and averaged 11.9 points per game in the other.

“He was the Deion Sanders of his generation,” said Robert Gregerson, University of Pittsburgh at Greensburg president, last year when Westmoreland County Commissioners declared Oct. 18 to be Dick Groat Day.

He played shortstop for nine seasons with the Pirates, earning MVP honors in 1960 while hitting .325 and helping defeat the New York Yankees in the World Series. He also was with the St. Louis Cardinals when they beat the Yankees in the 1964 World Series.

Groat was enshrined into the College Basketball Hall of Fame in 2007, inducted into the National College Baseball Hall of Fame in 2011 and was part of the inaugural class of the Southern Conference Hall of Fame in 2009.

Groat said Wednesday night he doesn’t watch much baseball these days.

“Everybody walks up there trying to hit a home run,” he said. “There’s more to the game than that.

“When was the last time you saw somebody bunt somebody over to win a game? It’s not as enjoyable to watch as it was when we grew up playing major league baseball.”

Groat remains one of Pitt basketball’s biggest boosters. He was color analyst on Pitt radio broadcasts for 40 years through the 2018-19 season, sitting with Bill Hillgrove to form the longest-tenured broadcast team in college basketball.

Groat, who owns six Pitt season tickets, believes coach Jeff Capel, another Duke product, will lift Pitt among the top teams in the ACC.

“I think the world of their basketball coach, and he will turn that program around,” he said. “They will be in the NCAA Tournament within a year or so. He’s a great coach and a great recruiter and a first-class gentleman.

“He will turn Pitt into a winner. Take my word for it.”