Pittsburgh Roots: Dick Allen, Like Dave Parker, Misses Moment in the Sun
When Dave Parker died last month, I wrote about how bittersweet it would be for the former Pittsburgh Pirates right fielder’s induction into the Hall of Fame.
Induction day arrived on Sunday, and Parker was not present in person. That was sad because Parker waited a long time, from the end of his career in 1991, to be enshrined in Cooperstown, N.Y, finally.
I would have loved to have been there, just as I was last summer, for the induction of former Pirates manager Jim Leyland. Sadly, once Parker passed away, I had to change my plan.
However, from a selfish standpoint, there was another reason I wanted to be in Cooperstown on Sunday: to see Dick Allen be honored.
The slugging corner infielder waited even longer than Parker. Allen retired after the 1977 season, and his family had to wait 48 years to learn he was a Hall of Famer.
Like Parker, Allen wasn’t there to see it on Sunday. He died in 2020 at 78.
Allen was one of my childhood heroes for many reasons, none more so than that he was from Wampum, a small town in Lawrence County. Allen grew up in Chewton, which could be considered a rural “suburb” of Wampum.
I, too, grew up in a rural community, Ohioville in Beaver County. As a child, I was fascinated that someone from a similar setting, just 20 miles away, could become a star player in Major League Baseball.
Beaver County had produced one of the most famous athletes in Hall of Fame quarterback Joe Namath, who was from Beaver Falls and led the New York Jets to a historic upset in Super Bowl III.
However, that was football. I loved football, but not nearly as much as I loved baseball.
I was 8 years old when I came to appreciate Allen. That was in 1972, when Allen won the American League’s Most Valuable Player award while playing first base for the Chicago White Sox and fellow Western Pennsylvanian, manager Chuck Tanner from New Castle.
Allen hit .308 while leading the AL in home runs (37), RBIs (113), walks (99), on-base percentage (.420), and slugging percentage (.603). What made Allen’s season truly remarkable is that he played his home games at Comiskey Park, a cavernous stadium on Chicago’s South Side where fly balls went to die.
Sabermetrics weren’t a thing back then. Bill James hadn’t started writing his yearly Baseball Abstract.
However, the modern numbers reveal that Allen’s 1972 season was one of the greatest of all time. His OPS+ was 199, which meant he was 99 percent better offensively than the rest of the players in MLB that year, taking into account the league’s offensive environment and his home field.
Allen’s traditional career statistics were excellent. He hit .292 with 1,848 hits, 351 home runs, and 1,119 RBIs in 15 seasons.
However, those numbers fell short in the eyes of Hall voters. There is no doubt some of the electorate held it against Allen that he did not put up with the systemic racism that pervaded baseball in the 1960s and was outspoken about it.
I have difficulty summarizing a player’s career with just one statistic. However, Allen’s 156 OPS clearly shows that he was one of the most dangerous hitters of his era.
Allen finally got his due recognition on Sunday. So did Parker.
I wish they could have been there. More importantly, I wish they could have been there.
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