Brissie attracted the attention of Connie Mack and the Philadelphia Athletics in 1941; however his father insisted he finish school.

On December 2, 1944, his unit suffered an artillery barrage, and a shell exploded which shattered his left tibia and shinbone in 30 pieces.

At the Army field hospital, doctors told Brissie that his leg would have to be amputated due to the severity of the injury.

The A's called him up to Philadelphia and on September 28, 1947, he realized his "life's ambition" of pitching in the major leagues.

During the course of the game, Ted Williams hit a ball up the middle of the field, striking Brissie's leg and causing him to collapse on the mound.

"I hit a ball back to the box, a real shot, whack, like a rifle clap,” Williams recalled in his memoir My Turn at Bat (1969), written with John Underwood.

Subsequently, he served on the President's Physical Fitness Council, worked as a baseball scout and for a South Carolina state worker training agency.

In 2010 Brissie, along with Yogi Berra, Jerry Coleman and John "Mule" Miles was honored in a ceremony at Washington, D.C.'s Nationals Park.