Juan Pizarro Dies; Was Pathbreaking Latino Baseball Player of Early 1960s

By William S. Bike

If Chicago White Sox outfielder Minnie Minoso was the Jackie Robinson of Latino baseball players, blazing a path to the major leagues for Latinos as Robinson did for African Americans, then Juan Pizarro was the Don Newcombe of Latino pitchers. Newcombe of the Brooklyn Dodgers was the first black pitcher to become a team’s ace starting pitcher, and just as Robinson and Minoso proved minority players could be stars at the plate and in the field, Pizarro, like Newcombe, proved that a minority pitcher could be the ace pitcher on his team.

Juan Pizarro’s passing on Feb. 18 was little noted, and that’s a shame. He not only was the best Puerto Rican pitcher to make it to the major leagues, but he was the ace of the Chicago White Sox staff in the early 1960s, and then worked his way into the Chicago Cubs’ starting rotation a decade later.

“Wonderful Juan” broke into the majors with the old Milwaukee Braves in 1957, and helped pitch them into the World Series that year and the next as a spot starter and reliever.

Besides his blazing fastball, Pizarro was known for demolishing the stereotype of the quiet Latino baseball player who was just glad to be playing “beisbol.” As I relate in my book The Forgotten 1970 Chicago Cubs: Go and Glow, Pizarro was known for his eating, drinking, gambling, and carousing and his penchant for throwing at batters who were crowding the plate. In fact, it was some chin-music he threw at the beloved Stan Musial of the Cardinals that cemented his bad-dude reputation and made the Braves decide to trade Pizarro to the Chicago White Sox.

On that early 1960s White Sox team known for its stellar pitching, Pizarro was the ace, the star, although he was the youngest pitcher in the rotation. He led the team in victories in 1961, was the opening day pitcher in 1962, made the American League All-Star team in 1963, and was 19–9 with four shutouts in 1964, when he pitched the White Sox to a second place finish, only one game behind the New York Yankees. He also drew a considerable contingent of Puerto Rican fans to Comiskey Park every time he pitched, despite the Puerto Rican community being located predominantly on the North Side.

With the White Sox having come so close in 1964 and the Yankees aging, baseball experts expected the Sox to go all the way in 1965. That they did not is directly attributable to injuries…