ORAL HISTORY PROJECT BASEBALL IN PENNSYLVANIA Karen Callender 1. Student's Name 2- Subject's Name 3- Subject's Background Sal1y 0'Leary Thirtv vears with a. date and place of birth b. Present address Pi ttshrrrsh - PA Same Stadium. c- Present Occupation ttsburgh Pirate public relations PR manager, rs Pgh. Pirates 11121194 4. Date of fnterview 5. General Cornrnents: Mrs. 0'Leary was very plesant to interview, and generous with her time. She provided me with a 1994 record and information guide that has a section on the history of the Pirates, as well as biographies, season reviews and other information. Mrs. 0'Leary was familiar with Slippery Rock University through interns that have served in the Pirate organization. She seemed pleased to contribute to our university archives. DO NOT I{RITE BELOTJ THIS LINE ORAL HISTORY PROJECT BASEBALL IN PENNSYLVANIA Subject: Ms. Sa1ly 0'Leary Public Relations Manager Pittsburgh Pirates Karen Callender 11l22le4 KC: SOL: When did you join the Pirate organization? In May of 1964. I joined when we were sti11 at Forbes Field. At Forbes Field we had a very smal1 staff of probably twenty-five people altogether I went into the public relations department, but we also did group sales, conmunity nights, promotions, speakers, and anything that came along we did it in PR. There were just two of us! The boss and myself. big is the department now? KC: How SOL: When we moved to Three Rivers Istadium] the staff enlarged. We probably went up to maybe seventy-five at that point, and since then its enlarged even more. I think we're probably up to one hundred and fifty. That isas cut back again because of the strike situation and club being up for sa1e. Its just grown and grown in all areas, every department. Now there is a group sales department, there's a community relations department, there's a promotions department. KC So its become more specialized? SOL: Yes, everything has its own area. KC: Before you joined the organization did you have an interest in baseball? SOL Very much. I'd always been a fan. I had applied for the job a couple of times and f always got the form letter back saying there were no openings but they would keep my name on fi1e. Fortunately, f worked for an ad agency in Pittsburgh, and one of our clients was Mellon Bank. I was scheduling commercials for Me11on, and they happened to be a sponsor of Pirate baseball on radio and TV. My name was on the commercials as a contact, if there was ever a problem. That's how f got to know Bob Prince, who was the "Voice of the Pirates" for many, many years. We became very good friends, and he knew of my interest in the game. He said that someday there would be and opening with the Pirates and he would see that I got a chance at the job. So, it happened. The girl that had the job had been there for about eleven years, and everyone thought that she would die there because she was such a fan. But she was from Philadelphia and she wanted to go back to Temple [University] and further her education, so there was an opening. f had my interview at a ballgame one saturday afternoon, and I got the job! KC That's great! And you've been here ever since? SOL: 0h yes, thirty KC: f'd like to ask you specifically about your duties, what you did then and what you do now. SOL: years later! f've been here ever since. It was basically secretarial. Although one big part of the job was statistics. I had to keep score of every game, so f had to go to every game. I had to update the statistics every day, and prepare press notes for the next home game. In those days f didn't have an adding machine or a calculator. I didn't have an electric typewriter, or a xerox machine. There was no such thing as a fax machine. Everything was very manual. 2 to be very well organized KC: You had SOL: 0h dear! And you rea11y had to know the game. You had to know how to keep score. You had to follow records and keep on top of things for the media. And I hated math when I was in school! f just despised math, and here I am in a job where f have to use it every day! KC I have a statistics frustrating ! class now, so f can sympathize with you, it can be very SOL: Yes, but it did keep my interest, and f always knew what was going on. I could answer questions, we had so many phone calls. But I could answer the questions from media and from fans. KC: So you SOL: 0h yes. KC rea1ly had an overall perspective of things. 0ver the years, aside from the growth of the behind-the-scenes organization; what other changes have you noticed? Such as the focus of PR; who were the fans? Were they the same thirty years ago as they are now? SOL: No, its changed considerably. The game, f think we all know has become a big business. There's so much money involved. When I first joined the c1ub, the players were very . . . you were very close to the players. You could deal with them directly. You could get them to make appearances for minimal fees. They were always available, they were always there. Now, its almost impossible to get a player to make an appearance, unless it'lson a charity basis, for a charity organization. But to just make an appearance as a speaker or to sign autographs for a couple of hours; there's a fee that has to be paid. That has taken some of the real close fan interest away, f think. There's not that closeness anymore. We've had an ownership change over the years too, which has effected a 1ot. When I joined the c1ub, the Galbreaths owned the club. They owned it for over forty years when they sold it in 1985. Then we were purchased by a conglomerate of twelve or fourteen business people. That changed it considerably. A11 of a sudden we had fourteen bosses to report to! Its been quite a change that I've seen over the years. KC: There are many people who say the players have benefited over the last thirty years, as far a salary and the treatment they receive. We've all seen films of the old days with the players crammed into a bus, being stitched up after a game. SOL: Yes, exactly. KC: But there had to be a turning point when everyone was satisfied with their situation, as far as what was expected and what they received. Something changed since that point. Whether it was free agency coming into the picture or something else. What do you think it was? SOL: We1l, f think it was when they organized, when they got their union. That's r^rhen it rea11y started to change. And all the players have an agent or an attorney who deals for that player. When Joe Brown was our general manager, 3 When he finally retired, he did so before this real1y took off. Because, he was of the opinion, if he couldn't deal face to face with a player and negotiate a contract, then he didn't want any part of it. ff he had to deal with an agent as a middle-person, that just took away a 1ot of the warmth and personal feeling towards it all. So f think that's when it started to change. When this union was formed. Grant it, the players certainly have benefited. he could see this coming. KC Financ ia11y? SOL: Yes, very much so. But it has taken away that closeness, f think KC What about public opinion toward the players? SOL: He1l, I think it is hot and cold. If you're winning, f don't think they rea11y care what they're [players] making or what they're doing. But if you're not winning all the time, then they [fans] start seeing all these other little things that effect it and they start blaming this or that. But we've been fortunate that we've had many good years here, as far as winning, or getting close to winning. This last year or two when we lost to Atlanta for the third time then it was a real downer. It never seemed to pick up again. KC: Do you rea11y see waves SOL: 0h yes, y€s. Definitely. Now we had a good advance sale through this past season because we were going to have the A11-Star game. And in order to get a ticket to the All-Star, you had to be a season customer, rea11y. So, there r^rere many different types of season ticket packages available to the fans, and there lrere a 1ot of advance tickets sold on that premise. But, I think it is going to be difficult to get many of those people back. I think when this is finally settled, it's going to be a real selling job. And f think that we anticipate that for a few years. We have to build it back up again, in many ways. KC: The fan loyalty? SOL: of attendance according to wins and losses? Yes,definitely. Because they feel betrayed, The season just shut-off August twelfth, and no post season, no world series since 1904. They're bitter, they rea1ly are, and a lot of us are too. KC: f can see that, and who do you blame for that? SOL: That's right. Both sides are involved. They both have their plate on the table and somebody's going to have to five. Sonething on both sides is going to have to give. KC: Is it a matter of too SOL: No, f don't think it's that. f think the players don't want to give up anything that they have, and the owners have given and given, and given all these years. Now they realizei hey, wait a minute, something has to change here. Because we're continuing to give all the time and that's not viable. The moneys just not going to be there. Especially in sma11 markets many people asking for too much? 4 like ours. So somebody has to say; okay, this is enough. The owners have consistently said they need a salary cap. I{hether that is going to happen or not I don't know. It has to happen in some form. Whether this new offer they've made in recent days is going to have it or not f don't know. We don't really get that close to knowing what is in the package. We just have to know what we read in the paper and wait and see. KC Throughout this whole season, what have you done for public relations? f'm sure you're trying to keep the love of the game alive, for when it does come back. SOL: Right, right. KC: How do you do that? SOL: It's pretty difficult, it real1y is. We can't use the players in any way, because they're on strike, so we have no contact with them. They wouldn't be able to do anything anyway under the circumstances. So this is one area in which we have used the former players a 1ot. We have about twenty-five who live in this area. If we get requests for speakers or assemblies, we try to put someone there. But mostly it's front office people who go out and try to convince the public that we will have a baseball season in ninetyfive [1995], and somebody will be playing ba1l. You just have to try your best. It's difficult. First you don't know who is going to be on your team. We have a 1ot of preparation to get ready for spring training. tr'Ie have to write a media guide, do a yearbook, and you don't know who to write about! You have a forty-man roster, but you don't know if those players who are going to be tendered contracts are going to come to camp. You don't know if they'11 cross the line and come. So you're rea11y at a standstill in a 1ot of areas. But I have noticed, this off-season, that I have not gotten the requests from the public for players to appear. I get all the requests for the former players through my office and they just haven't been there this year. f've had very few. This shows me that the fans, even for the old-time players, are losing their interest in the game. So t. there is going to be a big selling job. KC: I don't envy your position, and f think you're right, it is going to a lot to turn people around. SOL: It is KC: And depending upon could be tough. their [ttre ptayers] attitude SOL: That's right. KC: And SOL: Exactly, because of the sale, right. KC: And the new stadium, SOL: when this is complicated with the Pirate organization they come because take back, it of the sale? they're talking about that? Right, right. Personally, I don't think we need a new stadium, but they don't ask me. But it makes me laugh that twenty-five years ago when we 5 were moving here [Three Rivers Stadium], this was the greatest thing ever built. It had everything that anyone could ever want or need. Now, all of a sudden, it's out of date. f feel there are things that they can do to the stadium to make it more compatible to what the fan is looking for. There are things they could change rather than build a whole new arena someplace, I just can't see it. is the EC: What SOL: Ever since we've opened, people complain about the traffic, and parking and one thing or another. And there again it makes me laugh because the football fans come, and you don't hear any complaints about waiting in traffic after a game. f don't know if it's a different breed of fan, or what it is. The Civic Arena is the same thing. You hear no publicity about bad traffic jams after an event at the Arena. Yet anytime they're held up here after a baseball game . f guess it may be because we play so many home games. We have an eighty-one home game schedule. Maybe that's it, f don't problem people have with the stadium? know. KC It may be that public opinion has grown sour. You hate to see it effect the game itself. SOL: Yes. KC But you would say the game itself hasn't SOL changed? The game hasn't changed, no. fts become more scientific in a lot of ways. The players are certainly better prepared physically. They have all kinds of equipment and training available for them, that the old-timers didn't have. They're travel plans are first it's strange. class all the way. f don't know, KC: Is there a difference now between the richer c1ubs, clubs that are buying the large salaries and a smaller club like ours? ft hasn't rea11y helped a club like the Mets, at least in the last few years, but does it make a difference to the game? SOL: WelI, you can't really "buy" a team. You rea1ly can't. ff you have good talent, and good managers to bring them along . it its there, it will come through. f'm firmly convinced you can't buy a team like the Yankees have tried to do, or Oakland, or some of the other clubs. If you have the right group of fellas. that are dedicated, and if you have a good farm system, good minor league organization, if you build that up you're going to be fine. And we're doing that here. I think our minor leagues and farms have been working hard in the last few years and have built up a pretty good pool of players. They want to play. They're ready, they're anxious. The young Buys are ready to go. KC SOL; Could it come to that? Sure it cou1d. And there again I think the fans would come out to see that. f think they're [the fans] ready for this. f think they know you won't win right away but they would appreciate somebody hustling and playing a good game. And eventually they're going to be great. 6 KC: Do you think the fans, especially here in Pittsburgh, like the underdog t. team? SOL: Yes, they do. KC: For a couple of years. SOL: Yes, but not too long! KC: I remember in the seventi-es [1970's] we would come to games at least a week. That was the time of Dave Parker and Wi1lie Stargell, and it a very warmr loving feeling we had for the team. ;1. . once was SOL: 0h yes, the seventies were fun! KC: Even SOL: 0h, it takes awhile. KC: Yet when f went to a game a year or so ago, I just didn't sense that feeling. But all this was in the air, with salaries and everything. S0L: That's right. KC: Fans were booing Barry Bonds when he came SOL: Andit'rsbeen his attitude. KC And he could be. the seasons leading up to those winning years were wonderful. out on the field. The way he'11 not talk to people and to rnedia. He's:ran outstanding athlete. He has all the tools in the world, but he's Bot to learn to control his mouth. To be decent to people. He's the idol of a 1ot of little kids, they think he's just the greatest. SOL: That's right, but he's got to show some compassion. The players have to do that. They have to use their PR a little bit! KC: ft is a business. S0L: Yes it is. One thing we have been fortunate in is in the KC: management of our team. Murtaugh, Leyland. SOL: We've had some great managers, Chuch Tanner, Leyland. Leyland has been outstanding. Here was a minor league coach brought in as a manager. Nobody had ever rea1ly heard of him, but he has a way about him, the players rea1ly respect him, they'11 play for him. KC: I noticed that also. I remember that when Bonds showed disrespect for Leyland and the fans turned on him. It seems if a player is having a bad season, the fans will stay behind him, but, as with Bonds, if they do something toward Leyland, or make bad remarks about Pittsburgh, he'11 lose the town. SOL: That's right. 7 KC: SOL f hope it stays the same in this town, that we don't lost that feeling. I think it wil1. We've had baseball for 108, 109 years. f can't imagine it leaving. f just can't imagine that happening. That's why f felt that we would eventually get a new buyer, and we would stay here, f never felt threatened that we would 1eave. isn't much fear of that now, is there? Isn't it part of the deal that the club stays here? KC: There SOL Right, right. KC: What about the SOL: I don't think its going to be in written form, but it will be a good faith offering that there will probably be a new stadium. KC: So there''s S0L: 0h KC a stadium? Is that part of the deal? 1ot happening, much different from the days of Forbes Field? it sure is, it sure is. Another question regarding unions; I heard Myron Cope talking about working at Forbes when he was a teenager. He would se1l hot dogs or soda, or whatever he could and the working conditions were ar,sful . They would put him in what was ca11ed "the dungeon" if he wasn't working so he couldn't see the game. That was before the unions came in and things got better for most people. SOL: Yes, that's right. KC: Do you thinkifsgone past the point of helping? ill Yes, I think it's gone a little bit beyond. Sure, things can sti11 be irnproved in some areas, but I think you have to have a limit on everything. But maybe I'm from the o1d school, f don't know. KC: So actually it's SOL: SOL: the money that has prompted the change. 0h yes, the money, f think it is. Definitely the money. 0f course the big salaries create problems. You have to raise your ticket prices, food prices, parking prices. Everything goes up in accordance. And it has to stop someplace. KC: How SOL: Some people feel its been quite a bit, but f don't know. f think if people realIy want to come to a ballgame they're going to pay the ticket price. They may not come as often, the fanily of four or whatever. They can sti1l come and sit in general admission and have a good evening at a reasonable price. But if they want a box seat they're probably not going to come more than two or three times as a group. KC: Has SOL: Sure, sure. badly has that effected attendance? this inspired things like "family night"? We never used to have promotions like that, but once we got 8 over here we had to do something to fill these seats. The Galbreaths rea11y didn't promote that much, because in those days you didn't have to. But once we got over here they realized you have to change your thinking and That's when we started the different promotions. market it a 1itt1e differently. usually on weekends or Friday nights, Sundays. Recent years we started family nights, or buck night in the middle of the week. They're very popular, they really are. KC i: I SOL: r) I agree. You've made it possible to come and enjoy a game without having to stay home for the next two weeks! f'd like to ask you about the image of the game. All the problems you've talked about, the union and free agency, this pu11 between the owners and the players, not just in Pittsburgh. From the fans point of view, from the feedback your getting, do people sti1l love baseball? Is it sti1l America's sport? Well, it's going to have a pretty rough race right now. I think so many people are turned off. Because for years and years baseball was the number one game. f don't know if we're going to come out number one right away. If they don't settle this and we don't have a major league season next year, it is really going to be a battle. If the players do come back f think the fans will come back. f feel sure they wi11, all over the country, although you hear a 1ot of them say they'11 never Bo to another ba11game, and they could care 1ess. I think once the players go to camp and you start spring training and all this starts up again, f think your good fans will come back. Your basic fans. It is going to take awhile. f don't care what way it ends up, it's going to take awhile. think a replacement with minor league players will help? KC: Do you SOL: I think it will he1p, yes. I don't know whether it's going to be overwhelming right away. They're [the fans] going to wait and see just how interesting it real1y is. But, it's going to take awhile, in my opinion. KC: We11, we've SOL: That's right! KC I think baseball will be around for a 1ong, long time. got time. SOL: Well f do too. f can't imagine it dying. tr{hen you looked at "Basebal1" by Ken Burns you saw that they had problems in their day too. KC Has SOL: I don't know but when f watched it f was surprised at the things they were having problems with in those days. To us now some of them may seem very minor. But in that time it was probably a pretty major thing. f was surprised at some of the things the players were complaining about. They wanted to be organized in some way or another, but it never happened. KC: Burns focused a lot on racism. SOL: Yes, he did there been anything in baseball history to compare with this last year? Especially in this area between the sale, the stadium controversy, the strike? 9 KC; SOL: Is that stil1 a factor today? I don't think it is. I don't feel that here in Pittsburgh anyway. We've had some very good black athletes. Some outstanding ones like Clemente and Starge11. They certainly were behind them all the way. So I don't think that's a problem with us at all. KC: So there have been some good changes? SOL: 0h yes, I€s definitely.