EX-PENN HILLS STAR SOARED OVER FOES
One in a series looking back at notable individuals, teams and events in Western Pennsylvania high school sports.
The 1992 WPIAL baseball championships were a little unusual in that they received little to no “pub.” The title games were played when the city’s two major newspapers — Pittsburgh Post-Gazette and Pittsburgh Press — were in the second week of a strike.
But the Class 3A title game in 1992 was extremely unusual for one other reason. It had two players who would go on and play in the Major League Baseball All -Star Game.
Flaherty Field in New Castle was the site where Sean Casey and the Upper St. Clair Panthers played Matt Clement and the Butler Golden Tornado. Casey and Upper St. Clair defeated Butler, 7-2.
Upper St. Clair’s catcher for that game was Mike Junko, who is now the school’s football coach. But who could’ve ever predicted Casey and Clement would be MLB players? Casey, a senior first baseman, hit .419 in 1992 with a schoolrecord 14 doubles and 33 RBIs. But he was considered a marginal Division I prospect. He signed late with Richmond. Clement was a junior, and although he became a MLB pitcher, he pitched a total of nine innings his junior season. He was Butler’s starting third baseman that season and in the title game.
Casey’s career took off at Richmond and he was eventually a second-round draft pick of the Cleveland Indians in 1995. Casey played in the major leagues for 12 seasons with five teams, including the Pirates. He had a career .302 average. Casey was a MLB All-Star three times.
Although Clement pitched only 18 innings as a senior in the 1993 season, major-league scouts saw him throwing more than 90 mph and he was drafted in the third round by the San Diego Padres.
Clement played nine seasons with five teams in the majors and won 87 games. He made the 2005 All-Star Game.
Coincidentally, when Clement was a senior at Butler in 1993, he took a recruiting trip to Richmond and Casey was his host for the trip. The two would eventually face each other on opposite teams in the majors.
“I will always remember one of the first times I faced him,” Clement said. “His first or second at-bat, he hit a home run off me. The next time I was up, I walked. Sean was playing first and you know he always talked a lot. He wasn’t a trash talker. It was always positive. But I get to first and he says, ‘Hey, how you doing Matty boy? Dude, your stuff today is so nasty.’
“I remember plain as day, turning to him and saying, ‘Dude, how nasty can it be? You just hit a home run off me.’”
Clement and Casey have become friends. Coincidentally, 28 years after they met in the WPIAL final, their sons (Mattix Clement and Andrew Casey) met in the WPIAL and PIAA basketball playoffs this season. Clement is Butler’s coach.
“After we beat them in the WPIAL playoffs, and I finally got to the team bus, Sean was there waiting to congratulate me,” Clement said.