Dick Groat, American baseball player and sportscaster
Richard Morrow Groat (born November 4, 1930) is a former two-sport athlete (professional baseball and basketball) best known as a shortstop in Major League Baseball (MLB). He played for four National League (NL) teams (mainly the Pittsburgh Pirates and St. Louis Cardinals) and was named the league's Most Valuable Player in 1960 after winning the batting title with a .325 average for the World Champion Pirates. From 1956 to 1962, he teamed with second baseman Bill Mazeroski to give Pittsburgh one of the game's strongest keystone combinations.
Groat led the NL in double plays a record five times, in putouts four times and in assists twice. At the end of his career he ranked ninth in major league history in games at shortstop (1,877) and fourth in double plays (1,237), and was among the NL career leaders in putouts (10th, 3,505), assists (8th, 5,811) and total chances (9th, 9,690).
Also an excellent basketball player, Groat attended Duke University and is a member of the Sigma Chi fraternity. He was twice an All-American at Duke and was voted as the Helms National Player of the Year in 1952 after averaging 25.2 points per game. He played the 1952-53 season as a guard in the National Basketball Association for the Fort Wayne Pistons. In 2011 Groat was inducted into the National College Baseball Hall of Fame, becoming the first man ever inducted into both the college basketball and college baseball halls of fame. From 1969 to 2019 he was the color commentator for Pittsburgh Panthers men's basketball radio broadcasts.