Pgh media and the Dock Ellis no-no

With musing about the Buccos and the past in the air, here's another Pittsburgh-related but non-politics post this muggy mid-July day:

As you can see above, the Pittsburgh Press, the Post-Gazette and the great Bob Smizik play a major role in a well-done Deadspin piece about the legend of Dock Ellis throwing a 1970 no-hitter while on LSD. Appropriately enough Squiggy from Laverne & Shirley also has a bit part.

From Deadspin's A.J. Daulerio:

Like most stories that sound too fantastical to maintain any shards of truth, it depends on whom you let tell it. Bob Smizik, who covered the Pirates from 1972-77 for the Pittsburgh Press (which eventually folded, after which Smizik wrote for the Post-Gazette), believes Dock's version. He didn't cover the game and was nowhere near overcast San Diego that day to watch it in person, but he says he was the first writer to break the story about the mythical acid no-no. Smizik's piece was published on April 8, 1984, on the front of the sports section, under the tabloidy headline, "Ellis: I Pitched No-Hitter On LSD." Smizik's interview focused more on Dock's work as a California drug and alcohol counselor, but the revelation about his psychedelic escapades was what anchored it and was where the tale first took flight.

. . . And how's this for another level of absurdity: Smizik says he was first tipped off about Dock's acid-drop from actor David Lander, a long-time Pirates fan, best remembered for his role as "Squiggy" on Laverne & Shirley. "I saw Lander [Squiggy] at spring training that year," Smizik says. "So [Squiggy] and I were talking and [Squiggy] says to me, 'Hey, Dock told us that he threw that no-hitter on acid, did you ever hear about that?'"

From Squiggy's tip, Smizik tracked down Dock in Los Angeles, got the interview, and even scored himself an Associated Press sportswriting honor for that story.

. . .[Former P-G baseball writer Bill Christine] was right in Dock's face immediately after the game for a clubhouse interview, battling a three-hour time difference to squeeze the no-hitter story into the night edition.

"I dunno, maybe it would have worn off by then?" Christine says. "But there was no reason for us to think anything funny was going on," Christine exhales and then grumbles some more about the contradictory details of Dock's varying accounts. I tell him that Smizik says that it's all true: "Yeah, well, he's probably saying that because he wrote a story about it and doesn't want it to not be true. Well, I'm the same way, but opposite — I definitely don't want to think that I blew that story!"

Here's the great No Mas cartoon on the no-no, using a 1989 American Public Media interview with Ellis for audio: