Elroy Face, who came out of this region to help the Pittsburgh Pirates win the 1960 World Series and became a stellar reliever, died Thursday night of natural causes in his suburban Pittsburgh home. Face was 97, and passed three days shy of his 98th birthday.

“At 97, he had a great long run. We got to be teammates and I was a big fan of how he, with his body language, would come in and take over a ball game, whether it was the seventh inning or the ninth inning,” former Pittsburgh Pirates pitcher Steve Blass said. “He also became a great friend.”

Face, who grew up in nearby Stephentown, N.Y., was another of those baseball players from in and around Berkshire County who made a name for himself in the Major Leagues.

Blass grew up in Canaan, Conn., about 40 miles south of Pittsfield. In a phone interview with The Eagle, Blass was asked about players like himself and Face who grew up in this area making it to The Show. Stephentown is only some 20 miles from the heart of The Berkshires.

“I know in high school, we scheduled 30 games and we hoped to get 15 of them in. It wasn’t like Arizona, California or Florida. We had some good arms come out of there,” he said. “At our high school, Housatonic Valley, three of us got to the big leagues out of that small high school.

“He had the mental makeup. Maybe it’s part of the mental makeup from that area, but Elroy, I watched him as a young Pirate. His body language told me that he came in to take control of that ballgame.”

Face, who is a member of the Pittsburgh Pirates Hall of Fame, is part of a pretty exclusive club that includes, but not exclusively, the likes of Mark Belanger, Turk Wendell, Jeff Reardon, Dale Long and Art Ditmar, all of whom came out of The Berkshires in the 1950s through today.

“Elroy was a pioneer of the modern relief pitcher — ‘The Baron of the Bullpen’ — and he played a critical role in our 1960 World Series championship,” Pirates owner and chairman Bob Nutting said in a statement, “leading the league in appearances and recording three saves against the Yankees.”

Face pitched 16 seasons in Major League Baseball, 15 of those with Pittsburgh.

His best season might have come in 1959 when he went 18-1 with 10 saves out of the Pirates bullpen. Face’s winning percentage that year was .947, which to this day, is a Major League record. he lost only one time in 57 appearances.

In 1960, Face went 10-8 with 24 saves in the regular season, leading the National League with 68 appearances and the Major Leagues with 61 games finished.

The 1960 World Series, won by Pittsburgh on Hall of Famer Bill Mazeroski’s walk-off home run in the bottom of the ninth inning of Game 7, was not only huge for Face, it was a real local baseball party.

The Yankees had Pittsfield High School graduate Ditmar in the rotation while Adams High graduate Long, a former Pirate, was a reserve. 

Ditmar lost Games 1 and 5 of the World Series, both of which were saved by Face. 

Former Eagle sports editor Roger O’Gara attended the 1960 World Series games played at Yankee Stadium. And after Face recorded saves in Games 1 and 4, O’Gara wrote this in the Oct. 8, 1960 Eagle.

“Back in 1948, when pint-sized Elroy Face was striking out semi-pro baseball players from Pittsfield and the surrounding area on the Showboat Field at New Lebanon, nobody ever expected to see him in a World Series game. His fine relief performance for the Pittsburgh Pirates in Thursday’s opening Series contest against the New York Yankees was proof of how badly his talents had been underestimated in this area.”

As it turned out, while Face saved three games for the Pirates, the Yankees’ Bobby Richardson was named the Most Valuable Player of the 1960 World Series. It was the only time a player from the losing team was named MVP.

“He was one of those guys left over from the ’60 championship team. That group of guys that were still left over. There weren’t many, but Elroy was one of that group,” Blass said. “They helped me going from being a ballplayer to being a Major Leaguer. I never lost track of that.”

Blass made his big league debut with the Pirates in 1964, and was a teammate of Face’s that year and again in 1966-68, before Face’s contract was bought by the Detroit Tigers in late 1968. Face’s baseball career finished the next year in Montreal.

In another story in the Eagle, Face said the plan was to stay in the Pittsburgh area after his career.

“If I can make a home here, I’ll stay,” he was quoted as saying. “Jeanne and I like it. But if I don’t, we might go back to the Stephentown area.”

Blass threw a complete-game, four-hitter in the 2-1 Game 7 win over Baltimore in the 1971 World Series. One of the four hits for the Orioles was off the bat of Pittsfield’s Belanger.

But Blass’ best season was 1968, when he was 18-6 with a 2.12 earned-run average, and he walked only 57 in 220 1/3 innings. That season leads to another story.

“One of the great stories about Elroy and my relationship, in 1968, I had my best year. Seven shutouts, and led the National League in winning percentage. There was a game late in the year, we had finalized a [deal] for Elroy to go to Detroit, but he needed one more game to set a record for National League appearances with one team,” Blass said. “It was going to happen and they were going to announce it one Saturday when we were playing the Braves. I was scheduled to pitch. I went out and got the first out. They called time out, brought Elroy in and sent me to left field. Elroy faced one batter, I went to left field and he got his appearance in for that record. 

“The Braves didn’t score, and I didn’t get a complete game or a shutout,” Blass said with a laugh, “because Elroy had come in for one batter. I applauded that and I was happy for him.”