Pittsburgh Pirates History: 21 Years Ago, First Base Was Stolen

The Pittsburgh Pirates play in the best ballpark in Major League Baseball, PNC Park.  Unfortunately, this has been the home to some infamous happenings as well.

The most positive moment from PNC Park history has to be the 2013 Wild Card game.  The sea of Pittsburgh Pirates fans wear black shirts, and the chanting of Cueto, it is memorable and there is no doubt about it.  However, there have been some really bad moments during PNC Parks’ History, a park that has only seen a total of 4 winning seasons.

On this day, June 26, 2001, the first memorable moment at PNC Park would take place.  This was a negative moment but an entertaining one nonetheless.  The Pittsburgh Pirates were taking on the Milwaukee Brewers and McClendon was already hot.  The first base ump made a questionable call earlier in the game that the manager disagreed with.

The player hitting was Jason Kendall.  Kendall obviously is one of the better Pittsburgh Pirates in recent history and that is because of how he played the game, hard.  Kendall rarely took a play off.  With that being said the Pirates’ catcher hit a slow chopper up the middle.  The ball was fielded and thrown to first for a bang-bang play.

The umpire called Kendall out, making it the second call to go against the Pittsburgh Pirates.  McClendon was hot and came out of the dugout.  He charged over to argue and was promptly tossed from the game.  On his way out he would remove the first base bag from the field and take it with him as he exited.

It was really crazy to see and is still considered to be one of the biggest blowups by a Baseball Manager.  McClendon has been involved in Major League Baseball for over 30 years.  This play happened 21 years ago.  Yet, when you hear Lloyd McClendon chances are you think of this day and him stealing first base.