Pittaro to be Honored at Final Home Baseball Game

Rider University head baseball coach Sonny Pittaro, who is retiring after 34 seasons and more than 750 wins, will be honored by The 'Friends of Rider Baseball' at the final home game of the 2004 season, May 22.  The FORB organization will also honor Pittaro with a retirement dinner Saturday, September 18.
      It was also announced Friday that The Trenton Thunder is inducting Pittaro into the Trenton Baseball Hall of Fame on June 7.
     In an 11 a.m. pre-game ceremony on May 22, Rider baseball will retire two uniforms, Pittaro's and that of former head coach Tom Petroff. Petroff led Rider to the College World Series in 1967 and is a member of both the Rider University and American Baseball Coaches Association Halls of Fame.  Pittaro will officially enter the ABCA Hall of Fame in January 2005.
      The May 22 game against Saint Peter's is the final game of the season and the final game to be played on the Richard F. Daly field.  A new baseball field will be constructed at the back of campus for the 2005 season. A post-game ceremony will also take place to commemorate the transition of the field on May 22.
      More information about the retirement dinner September 18 will become available during the summer. 
      Pittaro will be honored on June 7 by the Thunder, the Double-A affiliate of the New York Yankees, prior to the 7:05 game with Portland. Pittaro will join the likes of Al Downing, Nomar Garciaparra, David Eckstein and Ken Macha in the Trenton Baseball Hall of Fame.
      Under Pittaro, Rider has won nine conference titles, including three Northeast Conference Championships, and three of his last five teams reached the Metro Atlantic Athletic Conference championship game. His 1998 squad won the MAAC-South in its first season in the conference.
      Thirty-eight of his Rider players have gone on to play ball professionally, including James Hoey and Carl Loadenthal of the 2003 squad, and three reached the major leagues; Jack Armstrong of the mid-1980s, Jeff Kunkel, who was the third player chosen in the first round of the 1983 major league draft, and Ed Whited, a 1986 graduate.
      Pittaro completed his reign as the president of the 7,000-member American Baseball Coaches Association in 2002, and currently serves as a member of the ABCA Board of Directors. He served two three-year terms on the prestigious NCAA Baseball Committee, and for 11 years was on the Division I All-America selection committee.
      By a vote of his fellow coaches, Pittaro has twice been named the Diamond Baseball Coach of the Year in the East Region.  He was twice the East Coast Conference Coach of the Year (1986, 1991), and twice honored by the New Jersey Baseball Writers Association as the University Division Coach of the Year (1980, 1984).  In 1994, he was named the Northeast Conference Coach of the Year. In 2001 he was the MAAC Coach of the Year.

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