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Former professional baseball players Ron Necciai (left) of Rostraver Township and Ken Barbao (right) of Donora were the featured speakers at a special program presented by the Donora Historical Society at the Smog Museum in Donora.

Ron Necciai and Ken Barbao

Necciai, a native of Gallatin and a standout athlete at Monongahela High School, wrote his name into baseball history by striking out 27 batters in a nine-inning game in the Class D Appalachian League on May 13, 1952. He is the only pitcher to accomplish that feat in a nine-inning game on any level of professional baseball.

That standard came in a 7-0 no-hitter while pitching for the Bristol Twins against the Welch (West Virginia) Miners at Shah Stadium in Bristol. Necciai, who later pitched for the Pirates in the Major Leagues, will be inducted into the Pennsylvania Sports Hall of Fame November 8 at a ceremonial banquet at the Woodlands Inn and Resort in Wilkes-Barre.

Like Necciai, Barbao also pitched in the Pittsburgh Pirates' farm system for several years.

A 1949 graduate of Donora High School, where he played baseball and was a standout guard on the Dragons' 1948 football team that posted a 9-2-0 record, Barbao, a hard-throwing pitcher, signed with the Pirates in 1951. A year earlier, he was a pitcher with the Monongahela team that won the Pennsylvania Junior American Legion championship.

Barbao made his debut pitching against a major league team on March 3, 1952 against the St. Louis Browns in an exhibition game at San Bernadino, California. He toiled with Pittsburgh affiliates in Salisbury, NC, Waco, Texas, Charleston, SC, Williamsport, PA and Kinston, NC before returning home in 1957 to join the Donora CIO team in the Mon Valley League.

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