Former Italian / American Player of the Day: "The Macaroni Pony" Bob Coluccio (1973-1978)

Robert Pasquali Coluccio was born to Italian immigrant parents on October 2, 1951 in Centrali, Washington. He starred in two sports at high school & was offered both college football & baseball contracts.

In 1969 he chose baseball & signed with his new home state baseball team, the expansion Seattle Pilots. 1969 would be their only year of existence, as the team moved to Milwaukee. In 1972 he hit .300 at AAA Evansville getting promoted to the big league team the next year. In his 1973 rookie year, Coluccio beat out a young Gorman Thomas for the last regular outfielder position.

Coluccio was a speedy outfielder, labeled “The Macaroni Pony” by the Brewers announcer Bob Ueker. In his rookie year he hit 15 HRs with 21 doubles, 58 RBIs & 13 stolen bases, although he batted just .224. The next year he played in 138 games with fewer at bats, but his numbers fell off. He hit 6 HRs, with 18 doubles & 31 RBIs batting .223. On the bases he stole 15 bases in 24 attempts.

In 1975 he had one of my favorite looking baseball cards, watching a called strike in his powder blue Milwaukee road uniforms.

After 21 games he was batting .194 & got traded to the White Sox. There he only hit .205 with 4 HRs & 13 RBIs in 161 at bats. He spent all of the bicentennial year at AAA and only appeared in 20 games in 1977 hitting .270. He was traded to St. Louis in 1978 going 0-4 before being traded to the Mets for Paul Siebert after the last day of the regular season.

Retirement: Unfortunately Robert Pasqualli was so done in the majors, he couldn’t even make that bad 1979 Mets squad. In his career he played 370 games over 5 seasons, batting .220 with 26 HRs 38 doubles 33 steals & 114 RBIs. In the 1980’s he moved to Southern California and became a real estate agent in Newport Beach, California.