May 27, 2018 5 min read

Former Steelers running back Rocky Bleier will be the guest speaker at the induction ceremonies for the Washington-Greene Chapter of the Pennsylvania Sports Hall of Fame.

The ceremony will be held June 8 at the DoubleTree by Hilton in Meadow Lands.

Tickets can be purchased online at www.wash-greenesportshall.org through PayPal.

Ron Dellapina (wrestling), Craig Dellorso (wrestling), Lee Fritz (baseball), Bob Grove (sports journalism) Nancy Merkle (volleyball), Morgan “Mike” Mosser (track and field), Kurt Schottenheimer (football) and Rodney Wilson are in this year’s group. Coleman Scott of Waynesburg was originally elected in 2017 but because of a schedule conflict couldn’t attend and will be inducted this year. The 1971 Chartiers-Houston WPIAL championship football team will be inducted as the Team of Yesteryear.

The Chapter will also recognize former major league baseball players, Eddie Kazak of Cecil, and Andy Seminick of Muse, and the 1939 Waynesburg College football team – first team to play in a televised game – as Special Honorees.

The following is the final list of bios.

Eddie Kazak

Special Honoree – Baseball

Born in Steubenville, Ohio, Kazak graduated from Cecil Township High School in 1938.

He made his major-league debut in September 1948 for the St. Louis Cardinals and his last MLB appearance was July 1, 1952 for Cincinnati. Kazak was the starting third baseman for the 1949 National League All-Star team. The 1949 season was Kazakh’s best in the big leagues. He had a career-highb.304 batting average in 92 games. He hit six home runs and three triples.

In his lone MLB All-Star appearance, Kazak went 2-for-2. An injury in 1950 cost Kazak his starting position. In 93 games, he had 207 at bats, 42 as a pinch-hitter. He was traded to Cincinnati in 1952. He had one hit in 13 at bats for the Reds, which ended his big-league career.

Kazak hit .273 in his career with 11 home runs and 71 RBI. Kazak played professional baseball after his major league career ended. He played his final professional game at age 40 in 1960 while playing for Austin in the Texas League.

He died in Austin, Texas December 15, 1999

Andy Seminick

Special Honoree – Baseball

Born in Pierce, W.Va, his family moved to Muse when Seminick was 2-years-old.

In 1949, he was the starting catcher for the National League All-Star team. In that 1949 season, he hit 24 home runs and had 68 RBI. In a game against Cincinnati June 2, Seminick hit two of the Phillies’ five homers in the eighth inning. He belted three home runs in the game. The five home runs in one inning hit by the Phillies in that game tied an MLB record, achieved first in June 1939, when the Giants turned the trick.

Andy was part of the Phillies’ 1950 National League Champion “Whiz Kids.” They won the title on the last day of the regular season, defeating Brooklyn in extra innings. They were swept in the World Series by the Yankees.

Seminick played 11 years with Philadelphia and three-plus seasons with Cincinnati. In his 15-year career, he batted .243 with 164 home runs. An “Andy Seminick Night” was held in Philadelphia in 1956 between games of a Phillies-Reds doubleheader.

After retiring as a player, Seminick started a coaching career in 1957 with the Phillies’ organization. He coached for two years and then became a manager, leading nine minor-league teams from 1959 through 1973. Ninety of Seminick’s former minor-league players reached the majors, including Hall of Fame third-baseman Mike Schmidt, Greg Luzinski, and Bob Boone, key players in the greatest era for the Phillies in the 1970s and early 1980s.

At the time of Andy Seminick’s death in 2004, then-Phillies president David Montgomery said of him: “As big and tough as he was as a player, Andy was as nice a person you ever wanted to know.”

1939 Waynesburg College Football

Special Honoree

The team played in the first American football game ever televised, against highly regarded Fordham, Sept. 30, 1939 at Triborough Stadium at New York City’s Randall’s Island. Fordham won the game, 34-7, after Waynesburg took the lead in the game.

Bobby Brooks scored on a 63-yard run on the third play of the game for Waynesburg to shock the preseason national champion favorite Rams. The attendance was announced at 9,000. NBC’s television signal carried a 55-mile radius. People in just a few homes in New York, those with special sets, actually had the opportunity to watch the game. A good, 14-inch television, the Clifton, sold for $600 at the time.

The Yellow Jackets dressed 42 players, including Mo Scarry and John “Jack” Wiley The estimated televised audience was 500 The team, which dubbed itself the “Wolfmen,” in reference Frank Wolf, head coach, stayed over in Harrisburg before arriving in New York a day before the game The game was nearly knockoff the air in the fourth-quarter when Fordham’s John Stefanic was knocked out of bounds and plunged into the camera, nearly overturning it NBC invested, it was said, $100,000 in the project – with little return.