1975 National League Championship Series

The 1975 National League Championship Series was a best-of-five match-up between the East Division champion Pittsburgh Pirates and the West Division champion Cincinnati Reds. The Red swept the Pirates in three games and went on to win the World Series against the Boston Red Sox.

Game 1
Saturday, October 4, 1975 at Riverfront Stadium in Cincinnati, Ohio

The Reds cuffed four Pirate hurlers for 11 hits in the opener, breezing to an 8–3 triumph. Even Reds pitcher Don Gullett got into the act, getting two hits, one a home run and driving in three runs.

Game 2
Sunday, October 5, 1975 at Riverfront Stadium in Cincinnati, Ohio

The Cincinnati regulars took batting practice in Game 2, banging out 12 hits as four more Pirate hurlers trudged to the mound. Tony Pérez was the big cannon in the Reds' artillery, getting three hits, one homer, as he drove in three runs. The final score was 6–1.

Game 3
Tuesday, October 7, 1975 at Three Rivers Stadium in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania

The only drama of the Series came in Game 3 played at Pittsburgh's Three Rivers Stadium.

The home team sent left-hander John Candelaria to the hill to try to stem the Red tide and the 21-year-old rookie responded magnificently. He yielded a solo homer to Dave Concepción in the second inning, but going into the eighth had a 2–1 lead, the result of Al Oliver's two-run homer in the Pirate sixth inning. Candelearia struck out the first two batters in the eighth. That gave him a total of 14 for the game, a new playoff record. Concepción's circuit clout had been the only Reds hit to that point.

But, inexplicably, he lost his control and walked the weak-hitting Merv Rettenmund, a pinch-hitter. Pete Rose then blasted a home run to put the Reds ahead, 3–2. When Joe Morgan followed Rose's homer with a double, Candelaria left the game. The Pirates tied the game in the ninth when Reds relief pitcher Rawly Eastwick walked in the tying run with two out.

But it all served to merely delay the inevitable. The Reds got three hits and two runs off veteran Ramón Hernández, the third Pittsburgh hurler, in the top of the tenth and then held on to clinch their third pennant of the decade.

Composite box
1975 NLCS (3–0): Cincinnati Reds over Pittsburgh Pirates