The Pittsburgh Press from Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania • Page 19

Parker's Feat Didn't Fail Pirates By RUSS FRANKE, Press Sports Writer CINCINNATI A year ago, Dave Parker's attempts to be nimble would have been laughable. No one is laughing at him these days and his nimbleness afoot helped the Pirates end a three-game losing streak. The Pirates beat the Cincinnati Reds, 5-4, last night at Riverfront Stadium and Parker's footwork The Press made two of the runs possible. It takes all kinds of people to make a winner or a loser and those who do not like Parker will have to accept the fact that he has done his part in making the Pirates a winner since his return from the disabled list the first week of June. He is batting a modest .276 and does not lead the team in any offensive category, but his presence in the lineup makes a difference.

In the sixth inning last night, the Pirates were behind, 3-2. Leading July 20, 1982 C-l UPI Telephoto Umpire John McSherry calls Dale Berra out at home after he was tagged by Reds catcher Alex Trevino. Press Photo by Anthony Kaminski Randy Grossman had ball in pros. Grossman Was Winner THE GOOD ONES are going out the door with too much frequency anymore and Art Rooney rues the day when all those Super Bowl heroes of the 70s depart the Three Rivers Stadium scene. The blinding spotlights that had shone on Randy Grossman minutes before were now turned off, the cameras were carried away, the writers comparing notes, and Art Rooney was walking, with his head down, through the lobby of the club's offices.

X'S O's "You're losing another off the inning, Parker chopped a ball to third base and his speed enabled him to beat the throw to first. Mike Easier hit a ground ball that made it through the middle and Parker nervily tried for third base. He should have been out, and he would have been except for some clever footwork. Instead of sliding to beat the throw from the outfield, he adagio danced past the tag by third-baseman Ron Oester and was safe. Easier went to second on the throw and the Pirates scored two runs on a scratch single by Tony Pena and a sacrifice fly by Dale Berra.

Parker said he would have been out had he slid, and third-base coach Joe Lonnett said, "I don't know how he did it. He faked Oester all to hell. It was a great piece of baserunning, and I still don't know how a guy Parker's size (6-5 and about .235 pounds) could stop dead and do that running full speed." The Cincinnati fans, becoming accustomed to adversity these days after years of front-running baseball, booed Oester and the umpire, Billy Williams. Two of them were so vehement that Williams stopped the game, and while the Pirates stepped from their dugout to watch the All this matters little to the Pirates, of course, after their boring series in Houston where they could do very little against the Astros' enervating pitchers. Last night the Pirates returned to customary form at the plate with 12 hits and they continued to get decent pitching.

Their pitching was decent enough to win all four games on the trip to Houston, but the Pirates won only once because the Astros' pitching was more effective. Ross Baumgarten started last night for the Pirates but his lack of work showed up in his control. He is a finesse pitcher and his finesse was lacking. He did not last three innings. Manny Sarmiento came in and got the win, thanks to the two-run sixth inning made possible by Parker.

"Sarmiento was outstanding again and I'm really happy with all our pitching," Tanner said. "We're .500 on this trip and I'm not worried about anything." There may be some cause to worry later today, however, when Tanner takes a second-day look at the right hand of Jason Thompson. It could be the Dave Parker case all over again. Just as Parker did two months ago in Houston, Thompson strained his hand checking a swing and had to be commotion, Williams ordered the stadium security guards to eject the fans. It was an eventful night, if anyone would care to use the word "eventful" when a young female fan falls to her death from the upper deck, another occasion that brought the Pirates out of the dugout.

They did not know until after the the game that there was a fatality, and the clubhouse atmosphere was one of open-mouthed concern. Riverfront Stadium is not the fun place it was a year ago, a year in which the Reds won the most games of anyone in the National League but did not make the playoffs because of the split-season system invoked after the player strike. There is internal squabbling over the moves made by Dick Wagner, the general manager, and the media has made quite a thing over it. One of the moves brought rookie Tom Lawless up from Indianapolis to play second base in effect, an order from Wagner to Manager John McNamara to change his lineup and a move which forced McNamara to shift Oester from second to third and take Johnny Bench out of the lineup. Bench is batting .227.

taken out of the game in the eighth inning. Trainer Tony Bartirome said the injury is "similar" but may or may not be as serious as Parker's was. 1 I PIRATE NOTES Berra had one of his best nights of the season with three RBIs but he wasn't overly excited about it. "I'm just trying to be a complete player," he said. "I'm not putting as much pressure on myself as I was early this Berra fouled off six pitches from reliever Joe Price in the eigthth inning and then hit a 3-2 fastball over the left-field fence that gave the Pirates a 5-3 lead Frank Pastore, the losing pitcher, was brought back from the disabled list only yesterday as a replacement for the announced starter, Greg Harris.

Pastore was out for 21 days with a finger injury Parker has an eight-game hitting streak Sarmiento tired in the heat and asked to be relieved in the eighth inning witl) a 5-3 lead. Rod Scurry gave up a home run to Paul Householder in the eighth, and it was only the second homer off him this season. Philadelphia's Gary Matthews hit one May 17 John Candelaria pitches against the Reds' Bruce Berenyi tonight. gooa one, we remarKea 10 Rooney. "We sure are," he responded, smiling.

"He was always making the team and ending up a regular. I always had confidence when the ball was thrown his way. And I think everybody else did, too." Grossman had gone to the locker room to clear out some of his personal belong Sk "Jill! By Jim O'Brien ke Old In D.C It Was Just Li ings and they were now piled to the brim of a cardboard box. He set it down outside the trainer's room door to accept congratulations on his retirement from another receiver, Lynn Swann. "Every year, for eight years, they said you weren't going to make the team," said Swann.

"And you did! And now you're leaving on your own. I think it's great." It was great as far as Grossman was concerned, too. The press conference and all the pass receptions were behind this clean-shaven young man, just 29, but finished as far as he was concerned with pro football. "I'm relieved," he said. "I really didn't want to go to camp this time." He looked the same as he did at the end of last season, solid, firm, ready to run a short route and grab a bullet from Terry Bradshaw like it was a ball of pink cotton candy.

Ready to go in motion behind the line, tap the center on his behind so he knew where he was, and then bury his head into the bodies before him to clear a hole for the backs on short yardage situations. "I'm in good shape, I know," he said. "I'm probably in better shape than 95 percent of the guys on the team. I always was. But everybody gets just as sore because you push yourself to the limit.

I know what I'd have to do and I just don't feel like doing it again." In short, he" no longer felt like pushing himself to the limit, so he decided to step down on his own, and go, from broken ribs to spare ribs. Such an injury caused him to lose his starting job as tight end in the first exhibition game a year ago, and now he's leaving the game to be a co-owner and co-manager of a Bobby Rubino's Ribs restaurant in Station Square. Randy reached for his box and lifted it. "After eight years," he said, pointing to the contents of the box, topped by a gray sweat suit, "this is all I have to show for it." He was kidding, of course. He has four Super Bowl rings and the satisfaction of fooling everyone, from the high school and college coaches who shied away from him because of his size and speed or lack of both to the doubting sports writers, the so-called experts.

Last year, at this time, there was a rumor making the rounds that Grossman was going to retire then. I mentioned the rumor in a column. It bugged Grossman. have acted as though the whole show were tainted. "No, we haven't gotten any support from the commissioner's office," admits the game's managing director, Dick Cecil, who has spent 15 months in organizing.

Many involved with this game, believe that baseball's reluctance is twofold They didn't think of it and don't control it, and, Kuhn looks askance at The Cracker Jack's policy of actually paying old timers a stipend to play. "We went first class," said Cecil. "The 'stipend' wasn't large and it was equal to every player." DiMaggio is typical of many players that were here who believe that baseball has been remiss in not being considerably more helpful to the Association of Professional Ball Players of America a charity designed to help old ballplayers that certainly isn't endowed well. "The players of our eras didn't make the money that they make today," said DiMaggio, an official of the association. "You wouldn't believe it, but in recent years, baseball has actually given the association less money down from $50,000 to $30,000.

And costs are going way up. This game will bring the association more money $50,000 guaranteed than baseball provides in a year." Despite its problems, this game was exactly what Cecil called it before it began, "a great success." When it looked as if the whole thing might be washed out for a night, the old timers went out of their way to assure organizers they would stay an extra day to make sure fans weren't disappointed. Perhaps the rains just heightened good spirits. Ernie Banks was constantly kidded with rejoinders like "Great night for a game, isn't it Ernie?" "Let's just play one today," answers Banks. For some, this was no doubt a bitter night.

Anyone who watched major league games in RFK for more than a decade had to grit his teeth at the sight of a "baseball" field with no infield dirt (just dirt patches around the bases) and left-field bleachers built for football that put the foul pole about 250 feet away. In a sense Washington was offered a pathetic, geriatric version of the sport it fostered for 70 years; this night could be seen as a sort of sop to a city whose franchise hopes are so far on the back burner that nobody knows if they're even still on the stove. However, for the peaceful crowd that milled on the field long after this game, decked out in big league jerseys and hats of every team except a Washington club this was an evening of sweet pleasures. That is, until the morning, when, their heads filled with names like Aaron, Spahn, Musial, Kaline and DiMaggio, they'll remember what they're missing. Washington Post Service By THOMAS BOSWELL WASHINGTON Last night in RFK Stadium, on a makeshift field ankle deep in water, with players who couldn't always count on themselves to run to first base in 10 seconds, baseball had its real All-Star game of 1982.

Forget the fiasco in Montreal last week. That was a drab yawn compared to the Cracker Jack Old Timers Classic, which was delayed an hour because of thunderstorms, that delighted a crowd of nearly 30,000 that divided its time between laughing, cheering, and, perhaps, crying as they watched the old timers of the American League down the National old timers, 7-2, despite ex-Pirate Bill Mazeroski's two-out home run in the fourth inning for the National League. Perhaps the most celebrated group of baseball players ever gathered in one spot had a joyous and funny five-inning romp that blended nostaglia and pathos in a gentle mix in which the sweet outweighed the bitter. Luke Appling, the 75-year-old former Chicago White Sox shortstop, and former Pirate Jim Fregosi, his replacement, hit home runs for the American League. Forget that major league baseball did not see fit to sanction or support this charity game for indigent old-timers, annoying even so placid a soul as Joe DiMaggio.

Forget that the District of Columbia police, who break their backs to police Redskin games, couldn't manage to provide even a cop at each block in the RFK environs to prevent a major traffic jam. No one in RFK Stadium on this charming evening will remember any of those things. Classy Stan Musial stood in a pouring rain to do a live 6 p.m. news television promotion to tell fans that the old guys were still going to try to play in the slop. Come on out for a good cause, said "The Man," a little rain won't stop us.

Fans will remember portly Hank Aaron as he: Hit a bases-loaded liner off the fence in left field, just in front of the thousands of fans who had been standing and begging him to deposit a grand slam in their laps. Almost got conked on the noggin by Brooks Robinson's routine fly that clanked off his glove and imbedded itself in the soggy earth at his feet. Then, in the same inning, made a running, stumbling, shoestring, ice creamcone grab of a hard liner to center that he turned into a double play as the crowd went crazy at his marvelous-ly apt atonement. They'll remember Appling "Old Aches and Pains" leading off the game for the American League with a home run into the short-porch in left field. As Appling ran the bases, his gopherball victim Warren Spahn chased him, slapping Appling with his glove.

As Appling reached UPI Telephoto Henry Aaron and Larry Doby share some Old Timers' memories. locker room kibitzing during the rain, "You never saw so many guys having a great time. You know, a lot of us only knew each other as competitors. Now, you get to know these guys as people. Everybody was in little groups, and guys would just wander from group to group, telling stories and catching up on old times." Any night that can make DiMaggio a chatterbox must have a lot going for it.

This one does, even if Commissioner Bowie Kuhn and the rest of baseball's hierarchy the dugout, he feigned a heart attack and fell into his mates arms. From the hardest line drive, like Willie McCovey's 430-foot batting practice homer off the right-field mezzanine, down to the clumsiest pratfall by a fat grandfather, this game showed nearly half a century of baseball's greatest players in a gentle and flattering light. Not necessarily flattering to their talents or their waistlines, but flattering to their easy grace and undiminished sense of joy. As DiMaggio said, after an hour's During one of the early days at the summer training camp at St. Vincent, Grossman came running by us on the sideline leading the pack, as usual, while running around the outline of the football field in the notorious "350s" and "gassers." Grossman caught sight of us and snarled, "I'm here, just for the record!" Grossman liked to rib reporters for being doubting Thomases.

All his life, people kept telling Grossman he didn't measure up to their standards, anyhow. David Susskind once asked Grossman on a Channel 13 fund-raising show, "What's a nice Jewish boy like you doing playing football?" Grossman once remarked, "I could have been born rich and blond-haired, blue-eyed and Anglo-Saxon. I have a pretty good time as it is, and I'm curly-haired, brown-eyed and Jewish." Another time, he said, "They say I'm too small, too slow and too weak. But I'm like the guy in the decathlon who doesn't win any of the individual events, but who ends up winning the whole thing." As Steeler Coach Chuck Noll once put it, "If you handicapped football players the way you do yachts in races, you'd have to put Randy in the Class category. His size and speed wouldn't impress those computers the Dallas Cowboys use to grade those guys they have.

All big, fast guys who'd be Class A. "All Randy does is go out and win. His boat comes in first in the overall race. Those are the kind of guys-we like to have on our team." Drugs Are A Bummer, Phillips Will Tell Saints year the coaches had to find out about the players and put i 1 1 1 that although he used cocaine last season, he had not used the drug since January and would not use it again. Phillips said the incidence of drug use was not serious last year and would not be present in any form from now on.

What was serious, he said, was the building effort going on with the team. Sixty-five rookies, free agents and a few veterans reported to training camp. They were scheduled to have their physicals and be timed in the lV2-mile run today. "This year we know everybody," Phillips said. "Last VERO BEACH, Fla.

(UPI) New Orleans Saints Coach Bum Phillips says he wants to discuss drugs first with his football team, then get down to the business of filling out his roster. "I'll talk to them once as a group about drug use," the coach said yesterday as he brought his players together for training camp. "If I have to talk to someone individually after that, it'll be to say goodbye." A federal investigation has reportedly linked Saints players to cocaine use. Running back George Rogers said earlier this monf1! in tneir piays. now we Know ineir weaKnesses aim strengths.

"We can start working on a guy's weaknesses and trying to take advantage of the things he does do good." Beginning his second year as Saints coach, Phillips said the team had improved substantially since last year's training camp. "It's going to be harder for a player to earn a spot on the team this year," he said. "The football team is better and Chat makes it harder to beat someone out.".