Remembrances: "Chico" Was the Man at St. Viator
Beloved Baseball Coach Bill Pirman Passed Away Saturday
A lot of uninteresting nicknames have an ‘R” or “Y” thrown in at the end of a name.
Then there are colorful monikers like the one for Bill Pirman. Or Chico, as everyone at St. Viator and many others knew him.
How he became Chico was a story he once shared. It was tied to his trademark use of one-liners, which became known as “Chico-isms,” and one of the most memorable collapses in Major League Baseball history.
One of his baserunners made a daring move and Pirman shot out, “Who do you think you are, Chico Ruiz?” Ruiz was a Cincinnati Reds infielder whose only claim to fame was inexplicably stealing home, with Hall of Fame slugger Frank Robinson at the plate, in a 1-0 win over the Phillies in mid-September of 1964. The game was the start of one of the greatest collapses in sports history as the Phillies famously blew a 6 1-2 game lead with 12 to play and the National League pennant.
Pirman laughed as he recalled how his players started shouting, “Hey Chico. Chico. Chico.” The nickname stuck and so did Pirman at St. Viator. Pirman, who devoted a half-century of his life to the Arlington Heights Catholic high school, passed away Saturday.
“When you think of St. Viator baseball the word Chico always pops up,” said Mike Manno, who played three years for Pirman, took over for him as head coach and had him on his staff when they won a state title in 2017.
“A great coach and a dear friend,” said Frank Mariani, who coached the Palatine American Legion team for three years with Pirman when their sons Bubba and Pete played together and led the team to a state tournament.
“He is on the Mount Rushmore of St. Viator coaches,” said Lions athletic director Jason Kuffel, who played and coached for Pirman. “Chico was a man that always put his players first and saw in them what they might not have seen in themselves at first.”
Pirman won 343 games in 23 years as Viator’s varsity head coach from 1983-2005. He won two division titles in the rugged East Suburban Catholic Conference in 2001 and 2002 and his 2003 team compiled a then-school record 24 wins and ended a 25-year regional drought.
Pirman spent 13 years as a freshman coach before taking the varsity job and was Manno’s freshman coach for 15 years through the 2020 season. The St. Viator Athletic Hall of Fame member also won the school’s Pat Mahoney Dedication to Coaching Award in 2020, was named the Illinois High School Baseball Coaches Association Man of the Year in 2019 and was inducted into the East Suburban Catholic Conference Hall of Fame in 2007.
Manno, who is in his first year as Nazareth’s athletic director, said loyalty is one of the biggest traits he gained from Pirman in the 36 years they knew each other. Pirman had a spot on the Viator baseball staff as long as he wanted it before he decided to step away prior to the 2021 season.
“He really enjoyed the baseball aspect of it and didn’t have to worry about all the other BS of running a program,” Manno said of Pirman continuing to coach the freshmen. “When we won state in 2017, I felt like it was a gift we gave Bill. He was St. Viator baseball and he stayed in the program. Just to see the joy on his face, I can’t even describe it.”
Pirman played baseball and football at Fenwick and played baseball for two years at Morton College in Cicero. He graduated from Loyola and to his Master’s from DePaul and came to Viator in 1970, where he was a teacher, dean, equipment manager and athletic director.
Kuffel, who graduated from Viator in 1999, recalled the belief Pirman showed in him when he promoted him to the varsity as a freshman.
“That has carried with me ever since and is how I attack anything that is put in front of me,” Kuffel said. “Chico gave me an opportunity to start my coaching career in the summer after my senior year, for which I spent the next five years coaching with him, where he gave me the reins during the summer to learn on the job.
“He always instilled confidence in me, from a 15- year-old boy to when I took over as athletic director five years ago, knowing what was ahead of me from his time as the school's second athletic director after legendary Fr. Pat Cahill.”
When Pirman decided to step down as head coach at the end of the 2005 season he wanted Manno, one of his starting outfielders for three years, to be his successor. When Manno won an unexpected regional title in his first season, Pirman gave him a big hug and told him to enjoy a special moment he experienced only once in his career.
“Him mentoring me to build this program - he was like a father figure,” Manno said. “It was an easy transition for me. He allowed me to grow on my own and he didn’t force feed how he did things. But any time I needed advice I always called and asked him what he’d do in this situation.
“I was like one of his young sons trying to make his dad proud, trying to build upon what he did for the program.”
Pirman was also a bit like the jovial uncle who didn’t take himself too seriously.
After he decided to hand the reins to Manno, Pirman joked, “I told them they can put me out to pasture and leave me alone but they can’t shoot me.”
Manno said when Pirman was honored by the IHSBCA, he gave a short speech and cracked, “When you’re this old this is why you get awards.”
Former Daily Herald sportswriter Mike Spellman, who passed away in 2015, was a standout catcher at Viator and did a great impression of Chico. John Leusch, another Viator grad and Herald sportswriter, said Pirman would go over the ground rules with his classes at the start of every school year.
“It became commonplace at the end-of-the-year banquets where players would stand in front of everyone, prepare their voices to sound like Chico and just start ripping off one line after another,” Kuffel said. “The end-of-the-year roast, that he always took in great laughter.”
It underscored how much Chico and St. Viator meant to each other.
“He just loved people and kids, loved teaching the game and loved being around St. Viator,” Manno said. “He’s the Pat Mahoney of St. Viator. He embraced everything about it.”
