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Bream, Kucek talk MLB at Hubbard dinner
Former players recount careers
at Hubbard Spring Training Dinner
By Greg Gulas
HUBBARD
Former Pittsburgh Pirates first baseman Sid Bream will forever be remembered for “The Slide.”
It occurred in the seventh game of the NLCS when — as a member of the Atlanta Braves — he scored the winning run in the bottom of the ninth inning against his former team to vault the Braves into the World Series against the Toronto Blue Jays.
Speaking at the fifth Hubbard Eagles Spring Training Dinner on Thursday night, Bream was joined by former MLB pitcher and Newton Falls native Jack Kucek as they recapped their careers and shared some special thoughts about the game.
“I loved playing the game of baseball,” Bream said. “It’s too bad when you still want to play and aren’t able to.”
Bream’s slide was voted as the fourth-most exciting play in baseball history and he said fans to this day won’t let him forget about that moment.
“Most players play a few years and then it’s relative obscurity,” Bream said. “For me, the slide has given me a platform which allows me to speak to a wide range of groups, which I really love.”
Bream serves as chaplain of PGT Trucking in Hopewell, Pa., telling those in attendance that it is all about the team and not any one individual.
“To the team members in attendance, be a team,” he said. “I challenge you to encourage those coming up behind you and be a man of integrity. We might not know what kind of baseball player you will become, but with the opportunities that will come your way we do know you’ll be a man of character when it’s all said and done.”
Bream played 12 years in the majors, calling Jim Leyland the best manager he had.
“Jim was always thinking two or three steps ahead of the opposing manager, but he understood his team and what they could do,” Bream said. “He didn’t care who they were, he treated everyone equally the same.”
Kucek’s career spanned seven big league seasons and he credits his Newton Falls High School football coach, Andy Pike, as the person who got him noticed.
“For me, it was one day, one moment and one person with that person being Andy Pike,” Kucek said. “He made a call to a friend, who then dispatched a scout named Fred Schaeffer of the Chicago White Sox to come and see me and that is how everything started.
“Because of that call, baseball has opened so many doors for me and I give all the credit to coach Pike. It’s all because of that one person, that one moment and the call he made that one day.”
Kucek believes that a bust of his former White Sox teammate Dick Allen should already be in the Baseball Hall of Fame.
“There is no doubt in my mind that Dick Allen belongs in Cooperstown,” Kucek said. “He was a big-game hitter, a real class act who didn’t care if you were a superstar or a rookie. He treated you the same, and that was always with class.”