This week on Memory Lane I caught up with former Pirates' first basemen Sean Casey. From hitting an unforgettable homer in little league, to playing in the World Series for a manager he grew up admiring, Sean told a ton of great stories that I think you'll all enjoy!
You can check out the podcast here:
If you'd rather read than listen, you can check out a transcribed version of the interview below:
Noah: As past guests will tell you, I take my prep for this show very seriously. Last night I was up until 2:30 a.m. searching for an old baseball card I had of you because I remember it having an interesting fact on the back of it. While I didn’t find the card in my basement, I was able to google the card and find the fact online. It had to do with your first ever home run as a little leaguer. Do you mind starting things off by telling that story?
Casey: Yeah, I was 11 years old. I still live in Upper St. Clair where I grew up, a town right outside of Pittsburgh in the South Hills. There’s a field down there, it’s still there and looks exactly the same, like it’s a time warp. I’m 46 and I can go back to 11 like that, you know? It’s called Municipal field, it’s right next to the municipal building. There’s the library and police office right there and it runs on McLaughlin run road where Upper St. Clair high school is. It connects Bridgeville, Peters and Bethel so it’s kind of a busy road. So I was 11 years old and we were playing a night game and that was so cool, like a Tuesday night game.
You’re in school with your buddies and you’re like ‘dude we’re playing a night game tonight,’ we were so excited about it. I remember it was early in the game and I ended up hitting a rocket and like I said, the field sits right beneath McLaughlin run road, so when I crush a ball to right I’m thinking ‘oh my gosh I think that’s gone,’ and it just keeps going. Right when the ball is going out and I’m rounding first base, BOOM it hits this white camaro! As I round first and am heading to second I see it pull into the parking lot and think ‘oh buddy!’ I just hit my first home run and I hit this white camaro. The ball comes back where we can get it but the guy pulls in and he wants to know what’s going on. Someone tells him ‘hey buddy, you’re driving by a little league park. You’ve got to be aware when people are hitting.’ So I thought it was such a cool thing, the game ends and I still have… hang on a second.
*The next few minutes turn into a show-and-tell where Sean and myself talk about our baseball collection*
Casey: So anyway, as I’m talking about baseballs, the reason I’m doing that is because I just looked at that ball recently and I have it here somewhere. It says ‘first home run, hit white camaro.’ I just looked at it the other day and thought about how cool it was. I have that ball somewhere. After hitting 130 home runs in the big leagues, you look back through your life and think man, that first home run in little league, the one that goes over the fence you know? Not the one that’s in the gap on a field with no fence and you’re just running all day, the real one that goes over the fence, and I hit a car. That’s just really cool.
Noah: It also said on that card that your first home run was in the swimming pool in Arizona. Is that true?
Casey: No, but it was in Arizona. I have hit a couple in the pool in Arizona but for the first one, I had just been traded to the Reds in 1998 for their number one starter Dave Burba. My third day there I got hit in the eye so I had a tumultuous first few months. It was just kind of crazy. I had a four-hour surgery for an orbital fracture, came back six weeks later and I really stunk. I went 0-for-35 and they sent me to the minors. I came back, was ready to go and I think it was July 7 or something like that, maybe July 8 and we were in Arizona.
I hit an opposite field home run off of Clint Sodowsky and it was like July. They had traded for me in April and I didn’t hit my first home run until July and I just still remember it. I was starting to feel good and I hit one to left-center and I remember Barry Larkin kind of gave me a little jab. He was like ‘hey, glad we traded for this Casey kid. He hit his first home run in July.’ I’m thinking ‘oh, great, that’s awesome. That makes me feel so good.’ But yeah, you always remember your first big league homer too. Clint Sodowsky, in Arizona, I hit it left-center and the pool is in right-center. I would hit one into the pool a couple of years later.
Noah: Well it’s either I misread the back of that baseball card or Topps lied to me. You mentioned getting hit in the eye. Didn’t that happen because of one of your own teammates?
Casey: Yeah! Damian Jackson threw me a ball in batting practice. Barry Larkin and Damian Jackson were turning two during live batting practice and Pokey Reese was hitting. He hit the ball, they turned it, I caught it and I had a huge net in front of me which is so ironic. I went to throw the ball back in the bucket and when I threw the ball back in the bucket Pokey hit another ball and I didn’t see it. So I turned back and I had no idea another ball was in play, Larkin threw it to Damian Jackson to me then BAM it caught me and shattered my whole face.
Noah: It stinks that put you behind in your first year in the big leagues but do you feel that you were lucky that it wasn’t worse?
Casey: I’m so lucky, Noah. Looking back, I still have astigmatism in my eye but I was still able to have a 12 year career. It could’ve easily been the end of my career but just thank god that it wasn’t and I’m blessed for that.
Noah: Let’s talk about how you became ‘the Mayor.’ First base is the position where you have a chance to speak with the most players from the other team. Were you always someone who was open for conversation or did it take you some time to work up the confidence to start talking to opposing players?
Casey: I just always kind of had that personality. My dad growing up was always like, ‘the sweetest sound people can hear is their name.’ People like to be recognized, whether you're a kid or an adult. Treat people the way you’d like to be treated. Those kind of all meshed into me always wanting to say ‘hey, what’s going on?’ I always kind of had that gregarious personality but having that background of treating people the way I wanted to be treated, saying people’s names, recognizing people, for me first base was kind of a golden position because I was really able to talk to people. You’re really able to interact with them.
Noah: Did you ever have to extra prep if you were facing a team filled with players who you didn’t really know? Just to make sure that you could still be that friendly guy you enjoyed being?
Casey: That’s a great question! I never did any extra prep but you get to know these guys so well over the years because it’s such a small fraternity. ‘Hey how’s your wife doing? How are your kids doing? Looks like you’re swinging the bat well lately,’ stuff like that. There were only a couple of times it did not go well. I remember one of my first conversations with Rickey Henderson when he got on base during my rookie year. He comes there and I’m just so excited because he’s Rickey Henderson and I start talking to him saying ‘hey, man, great eye! It’s been fun watching your career. He just kind of looked at me like, ‘are you serious? I’m trying to steal bases here.’
Shortly after it was just BAM, he takes off and steals second. He was with the Mets at the time. So not everybody was up for a conversation but most people were. I think the more they knew that I was just there to enjoy myself. If I had to play centerfield, Noah, my career would’ve been over in like two years. I need more interaction, you know what I mean? When you’re at first base, it’s not just the people that come to first base, you got the first base ump. I look back, John Hirschbeck was always one of my favorite umps. We had some of the best conversations just talking over there at first. I just needed to talk to people.
Noah: Were you ever not in the mood to talk to someone but felt obligated to because of your reputation?
Casey: Ha! I mean, probably. Especially if I’m sitting on an 0-for-4 with a couple of punch-outs. Talking to people was not my most favorite thing to do at that time. So yeah, there were probably a few times where I wasn’t in a great mood or there were a few guys I didn’t love that were on first.
Noah: So a notable moment in your career when you were with the Reds happened in Pittsburgh. You had the first hit at PNC Park, which was of course a home run. Take me through that entire experience.
Casey: There was so much history behind it. I’m a Pittsburgher! All those years going to Three Rivers Stadium with my dad and my buddies… If you go back and look at my stats when I played at Three Rivers, I was a construction cone. I was terrible! I think it was because I was like, ‘Oh my god, I’m at the game and I’m in the dugout but I can’t believe I’m a player.’ It was surreal and I could never get past that. I was just never good there. So when PNC Park opened I was like, ‘oh good! It’s a place I didn’t grow up in as a kid. Now I can really start hitting here.’ I remember that offseason when the schedule came out I looked and noticed that we were opening PNC Park.
I thought that was so cool and hoped I would have a chance to get the first hit. Three days earlier we had opened up Miller Park, which is crazy, and I got the first hit ever at Miller Park. I was the only player ever in Major League Baseball history to open up two parks with a hit. So I got the hit at Miller Park but I kept thinking that the hit I really wanted was at PNC Park. It’s so cool to have the hit at Miller but PNC Park man, I knew I was leaving 70 tickets for the game, it’s Pittsburgh, it’s in my blood you know? So that day, I usually would hit third but Bob Boone had me hitting fourth. I’m like, ‘Fourth? I don’t want to hit fourth!’ So I got up there, the game was starting, I think Willie Stargell died that morning, which was a somber National Anthem but I had a lot of amazing feelings just being there. I remember being on deck, the first two guys get out, Dmitri Young comes up, he’s facing Todd Ritchie, the place is packed, I have a lot of friends there.
Todd Ritchie gets Dmitri Young 0-2 and I’m thinking, ‘oh my god, I’m not going to get up.’ If I don’t get up now the Pirates will have a chance to get the first hit. Ritchie tries to come inside against Dmitri and ends up hitting him in the ribs and I’m thinking, ‘yes! At least I get a shot.’ I just wanted a chance to get the first hit, that’s it. If I don’t do it, it’s on me and that’s all cool. I think it was a 2-1 cutter, it was down and in and I just remember just catching it out front. When you hit a ball good you know if it’s gone. Even right now I still get chills thinking about it. Just realizing that it was gone. I remember rounding first base and the ball went out and went into the stands and I just kept thinking ‘oh my god I did it. I got the first hit and it was a homer!’ I still can’t believe it to this day. Don’t think that when we go by there to this day, when I drive by it with my kids I don’t tell them, ‘hey, see that place right there? PNC Park? First hit, home run. My bad. No big deal.’
Noah: When you were with the Reds you had the chance to play with two pretty incredible stars in Barry Larkin and Ken Griffey Jr. Do you have any good stories about either one of them?
Casey: Oh, man. I have tons. I remember with Larkin, in 1999 I was raking and really having a good year and I lined out a couple of times. I used to get upset when I got out. I was young and just wanted to get a hit every time I was up. I remember a couple of players came up to me and said, ‘hey, you’re hitting .380. We have guys that are hitting .205, .210 and you’re coming back and you’re yelling. You need to calm down a little bit.’ It was my first year in the big leagues so I thought maybe they were right.
The next inning Barry Larkin comes and sits next to me. He asked me what I was hitting and I told him .380. At the time I had a bunch of homers and we were in first place. He was like ‘alright, good. I want you to be yourself. You just keep being who you are. If you feel like you’ve got to yell, if you feel like you’ve got to slam a helmet, do it. As long as you’re hitting .380 and driving in runs for us, I want you to be you. Don’t change that.’ I remember thinking that if Barry Larkin was saying that to me and had my back then I knew I could be me. He was just such a great teammate and a guy that I really looked up to and look toward for guidance.
Playing with Junior, man, who wasn’t the biggest Ken Griffey Jr. fan? I just looked at my baseball cards the other day and I still have his 1989 UpperDeck Rookie card. When he came in in 2000, it was just really cool. We lockered next to each other. Watching Griff, just how smooth he played the game and the sweetest swing the game has ever seen, period. I don’t care what anybody says, there will never be a sweeter swing than Ken Griffey Jr. It was just so beautiful. I have a lot of stories about Griff but one thing I always remember was he wasn’t a big weight lifter. He wasn’t someone who was always in the weight room but he was just a big guy.
His dad, Ken Griffey Sr. was also a big guy. Big bat, both were strong guys. His dad was from Donora. Junior would always bust my chops and say, ‘hey bro, I was born in Pittsburgh, you just moved there when you were five.’ I not only grew up in Pittsburgh, I still live there. He left when he was three. So we’d always go back and forth about who was the best Pittsburgher. Every day if I went out there to hit early, Griff would be out there hitting. Most people when they do batting practice, the first round you’re spraying a few to left field, center field, right field and then the last few rounds you might juice a couple all over the place.
When I would watch Griff when he would hit early by himself, it was like home run derby. He’d go three to left, all homers. Three to center, homers. Three to right, homers. He was literally just up there trying to drive the baseball. I guess that’s how you become one of the greatest home run hitters of all time and one of the greatest players of all time. He just expected to get his body in a position to drive the baseball which I thought was really cool.
Noah: So you get traded to the Pirates before the start of the 2006 season. You weren’t in Pittsburgh very long but what was it like to play for your hometown team?
Casey: It was a dream come true for me because I always wanted to play for the Pirates. Growing up as a kid I just thought they were the only team in baseball. I was a Pirate fan. I went to the games. So I took so much pride in wearing that uniform. I was so grateful. I remember being on deck one day and looking down at my jersey and thinking, ‘oh my god, I’m representing the city that I love.’ It was frustrating because we were not that good. It was not a good year, we were not a good team.
Then I got hurt. I broke my back in like the second week of the season but I was able to come back. Then I got traded to the Tigers which was basically like Pittsburgh Central because [Jim] Leyland was the manager, [Gene] Lamont was the bench coach, Andy Van Slyke was the first base coach, Rafael Belliard was the infield coach, Donnie Slaught was the hitting coach and Lloyd McClendon was the bullpen coach. So now, it was great. These were the guys I grew up loving and idolizing. It was literally like going from the outhouse to the penthouse as far as the organizations were at the time. I went to the worst team in baseball to the best but I felt like I stayed in Pittsburgh.
Noah: That was going to be my follow up question. How long did it take for the hometown love to wear off and the losing start to get to you?
Casey: That was the ninth year in the big leagues. I knew I had a lot of lean years with the Reds. We had some really good offenses but some bad pitching. It was just frustrating. I went to the Pirates and Jim Tracy was a great manager. Dave Littlefield was great. Even Kevin McClatchy, I liked Kevin a lot. But we had no money in the team. We weren't good. It was so gratifying for me, in my ninth year getting traded. In one phone call I was in first place. I was with the Tigers and I was with Leyland and we ended up going to the World Series. It was so cool for me.
Noah: I had Jim on the show not too long ago. He was great! How much did it mean to you that you had the chance to play for him?
Casey: I look back through my career and that year and a half in Detroit, playing for Leyland, it was priceless. Every big leaguer should’ve had the chance to play for Jim Leyland. It’s one of those experiences. I played in Boston in my last year in 2008 and got to play for [Terry Francona] and that was close to a Leyland experience. Tito was so wonderful. It’s that same experience playing in Boston. Every big leaguer should have the chance to play in Boston. But I feel that way about Leyland.
When I first got there, my first day. It was so funny, he called me and asked if I could be in Tampa Bay that night. I was like, ‘hell yeah I’ll be in Tampa. I’ll be there if I have to run there.’ So I get in Tampa, I get to my locker, the media is all around me asking how it feels to be there and if I’m excited. As I’m talking to the media Leyland comes over and says, ‘hey let me talk to Casey real quick.’ So he takes me back into his office, it’s Leyland, Lamont and McClendon and I say hello to all of them.
I didn’t know any of them other than just having played against them for all these years. So Leyland is like, ‘alright Geno, give Casey the signs.’ I go through the signs. He says if he goes to his ear it’s hot. If he goes to his hat it’s a hit and run. That was the one sign they said they were probably going to give me. He said, ‘you’re probably not going to bunt for us. So look for the hit and run.’ Once he was done, Leyland said, ‘okay, Casey stay with me on this one.
For the hit and run you’re looking down at Geno when you’re in the box. Now you get on first base with a hit or a walk, I don’t want you looking over at Geno any more, I want you looking in the dugout. Stay with me. If I come up to that top step and we catch eyes, as soon as we catch eyes if I jump and never come back down, you steal.’ I was so locked into the conversation I was like, ‘what the hell?’ This guy was busting my chops for being slow. My first conversation with Jim Leyland went like that. He had such a great way of breaking the ice and welcoming you in.
Noah: That year you get an opportunity to play in the World Series. I read that you tore your calf but still had a really strong World Series, hitting .529 with a pair of home runs. How did you manage to battle through that and produce the way you did?
Casey: It’s crazy. I blew out my calf in game one of the ALCS in Oakland. I had a friend who was a rolfer. Rolfing is a massage technique and it really gets into your muscle. So right when I tore my calf this guy, Michael Waller, I’ve got to get him to Detroit. So he came to Detroit and worked on me for like 11 days and the training staff worked on me a lot. It was a lot of moving parts just trying to get my calf back.
A lot of stuff with the trainers. I didn’t think I was going to play but one of the greatest things that ever happened to me was we swept Oakland but then the Mets and the Cardinals end up going to seven games with a rainout. So it gave me 11 days before game one of the World Series. I needed all 11 too, if game one was on day 10, I wouldn’t have played. Day 11 I was able to DH and I was not going to not play. I was telling them to tape it, to give me drugs, needles, anything. I needed to play in the World Series. I knew how hard it was to get there. I played nine years in the big leagues and I never even played in the postseason.
I knew how hard it was to get to the ALDS, let alone the World Series. So I end up playing, they end up getting me ready, with the training staff and my buddy Michael Waller and I was able to play. It’s amazing because, and this is a true Pittsburgh story, Donnie Slaught and Van Slyke were instrumental at that time because when I was coming back at the end of the year, that last week of the season I got really hot. I was doing this drill with Van Slyke. Andy was still jacked and had a cannon. He was throwing me batting practice from the normal distance in the cages and he was throwing as hard as he could. It was like 100 miles an hour. It was gas.
The whole drill was that. You’re going and if the ball was a strike you’re going to go and if it was a ball you’d take it. So I was really trained with my eyes at the time. When I came back ready for the World Series, I was doing this drill every day with Van Slyke in the tunnel. I’d come at like 1 p.m. and I’d hit for like 30 minutes. It just got my eyes so locked in. Even with those 11 days off, I was still OK because my eyes were like right on the money. I remember in game three we went to St. Louis before game three was cancelled and I’m in the tunnel with Van Slyke hitting and I remember having a moment thinking back to that 11 year-old kid who hit the white camaro.
I just put my bat down, looked at Andy and said, ‘hey man, I just want to tell you, I know this is ninth year in the big leagues and this might sound a little weird, but you were like my hero growing up and I can’t believe you’re throwing me batting practice. Taking time out of your day to get me ready to play in the World Series.’ I was having an out of body 11 year-old fat kid experience. I couldn’t believe Andy Van Slyke was throwing me batting practice as I was getting ready to play in the World Series for the Detroit Tigers and Jim Leyland was my manager. That’s just a funny side story that’s Pittsburgh related. During the World Series Andy Van Slyke was working with me every day.
Noah: Let’s finish things off with your life after baseball. I see you on MLB Network but I wanted to ask you about the charity work that you do. Could you talk about some of the things you do in this area?
Casey: My charity is the Miracle League of the South Hills. We started it like 10 years ago, we have over 350 kids and we are in the middle of a new project. We are building a concession stand that we are going to use as a job training facility for our kids. We are going to have our kids interview, have them fill out a resume, teach them how to interview and have them work there. We are going to try and partner up with other companies in the area to hire our kids, so we are really excited about that.
We are in the mix with all of that and covid hasn’t helped us as far as that goes. We are always looking for help. If anyone has any funds that they’re looking to help out Miracle League of the South Hills you can go to our website and donate or contact me on twitter. It’s a wonderful program and great to be a part of. It’s a real joy with our kids. We have kids that are autistic, have cerebral palsy, down syndrome. We have so many special kids out there and that has probably been one of my biggest passions. Also Light of Life downtown. They do a great job of serving men and women who are down on their luck. It’s just a great place to donate to. If anyone is looking to donate their time or money those are two great places to start.
