Tag Archives: PNC Park

Raising the Jolly Roger

I’ll make this one quick. I don’t have much time to mourn, because it’s midterm week in the Bronx, and I have to get prepared.

It’s been 21 years since the Pittsburgh Pirates have had a winning season, let alone a playoff appearance. I won’t spend much time listing all the things that have happened since then and now, but suffice it to say that it’s been a long time coming.

I wrote for IHeartPGH this summer, hoping to give a die-hard fan’s perspective on the Pirates. I’ll boil down my perspective to this: I want 82. Man, I’ve wanted 82 more than I’ve ever wanted the Steelers to win the Super Bowl, the Penguins to win the Stanley Cup, or just about anything else that I could ever want. In 2013, the Pittsburgh Pirates won their 82nd game on September 9th. I didn’t yell all that loud about it, (except on Twitter) and then, for the first time in my entire life, I started to seriously think about the Pittsburgh Pirates as playoff contenders. And they kept winning games. Between September 9th and September 23rd, the Pirates had won 12 more games. They had guaranteed that Pittsburgh—and, more importantly, that PNC Park—would at last see a playoff game. On October 1st, 2013, they clinched at least two more playoff games in the Steel City, and I only wished that I could have been there. I’ve put everything on hold to watch the Bucs as closely as I could in the past week, and I’ve never been more proud of my team or of my city.

As I’m writing this, Pedro Alvarez has been retired as the last out of the 2013 season, and I’m sad that it couldn’t go on longer, but I can’t deny that I’m at least somewhat pleased with the result. The Pirates have staged an amazing baseball renaissance in the city of Pittsburgh. Frankly, it sucks that the city can’t get more reacquainted with fall baseball, but we don’t have much time to mourn. Baseball’s back in Pittsburgh, and we have to get prepared for 2014.

The 4 P’s of October (Pittsburgh, Pirates, Playoffs, Phil)

It seems as if from a time immemorial my beloved Pittsburgh Pirates have been marginalized to somewhere between the Kansas City Royals and the Rockford Peaches. And, maybe there is no crying in baseball. I think “in” is probably the most important word in our previous sentence, because 20 years, 11 months, 3 weeks, and give or take a few minutes their were tears in a young mans eyes in North Hills of Pittsburgh. And, once again Monday night for completely different reasons those tears creeped back out of those ducts. As I watched the replay of the on the field, post win celebration in Chicago, followed by the champagne showers after Adam LaRoche popped up to short for the Washington Nationals, assuring the Pittsburgh Pirates of their first post season appearance in 21 years, a few little tears of joy, relief, and fear rolled down my cheek.

Entering my house after a long day at work Monday, just an hour or so before the game between the Cubs and Pirates began, I noticed a very long awaited FedEx Express envelope. Inside were my playoff tickets…lots of them…so many of them. 4 seats, 12 tickets per each seat, including the possible tiebreaker game, the Wild Card game, 3 NLDS tickets, 4 NLCS tickets, and 3 World Series tickets. I also purchased 4 extra tickets for the Wildcard game and 2 extra seats for each of the NLDS. 58 tickets in all. This was math, expensive, expensive math.

I have been a season ticket holder since the All Star year and since 2006 have seen some true and fantastical things. For the last 5 years I have called section 26 my home. This section is also home to a true Pittsburgh Pirates legend, Phil Coyne. My 95 year old usher is one of my favorite things about PNC Park, baseball, the Pirates Baseball Club, and just being a human. Here’s a little human interest piece that WTAE did about Phil in July. As a note, he usually wears a Pittsburgh Pirates cap.

So, while I am very happy for the Pirates, their management, owners, the fans that have latched on to this incredibly fun team, all of us long time suffering folks. I’m incredibly happy to have all of those seats and to do the math involved. I’ll be the happiest when I get to shake Phil’s hand as he shows us to our seats during that first playoff game that we have waited for for so long.

Bucs Blog Round-Up

Last week, I made my introduction to the blogging world by posting a bite-sized rant about Pittsburgh Pirates fandom. I regret nothing.

Now, though, it’s time to get down to business. In the grand tradition of Myron Cope, Pittsburgh sportswriters remain some of the most intelligent and opinionated in their field and, with the exponential growth of Internet, so too have Pittsburgh sports bloggers grown, both in number and in opinion. Since Pirates bloggers are perhaps the most opinionated of the bunch, and since good journalism is essential to any good fan’s understanding of their team, I feel obligated to deliver to you at least a sampling of the finest the Internet has to offer, in terms of Pittsburgh baseball.

General Knowledge

Baseball without statistics is like peanut butter without jelly, or a shopping cart without a broken wheel. If you head down to PNC Park and don’t hear about Pedro Alvarez’s slugging percentage in the last 20 day games at home, ask for your money back. What’s that? You don’t know what a slugging percentage is, you say? Perfect. Check out these websites and be enlightened.

Baseball Reference

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Baseball Reference covers all the bases (no pun intended), providing information from a player’s batting average to his place of burial (if applicable). What’s more, the site provides formulas for the more complicated statistics, which can be found by simply hovering at the top of a column. Regardless of what you’re looking for, though, Baseball Reference is the place to start.

FanGraphs

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FanGraphs reads more like a blog than Baseball Reference does, and tends to cover a lot of straightforward baseball stuff (Here’s an article about The Pleasures of Team Allegiance, which probably does more convincing than I could ever hope to). Still, there’s a twist. FanGraphs is representative of the growing camp in baseball journalism that supports a larger integration of advanced statistics, called sabermetrics in analyzing how the game works, (see Moneyball for more information, or the book for even more information) which has ruffled the feathers of baseball “traditionalists” the world over. Stay tuned for news of a new world order, but in the meantime, let’s transition to the main attraction…

Pirates Blogs

This is where we get specific. Any knowledge that you might acquire in the above websites can be used to better understand the blogs that follow, and likewise, you can use stats and facts to keep certain bloggers honest. Not that you’ll need to use your new superpowers on Pirates bloggers—those guys are on your side. Instead, cross-examine scheming Reds and Cubs bloggers, who might be trying to show you up.

Bucs Dugout

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A member of the SBNation network of blogs, Bucs Dugout is managed by Charlie Wilmoth, and covers late breaking news from the Pirates’ front office, (trades, free agent signings, etc.) as well as provides gamethreads for fans to comment on games in progress, and recaps past games. Additionally, the writers at Bucs Dugout often open the floor to fan submitted posts, photos and links.

Pirates Prospects

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Formerly B.U.C.C.O. Fans.com, (where B.U.C.C.O. stands for Bring Us a Championship Caliber Organization), Pirates Prospects is managed by Tim Williams, and is mostly concerned with the MLB draft and Pirates’ minor league system. Williams and company emphasize that the children, and not the current big leaguers, are the future of the organization.

Where Have You Gone, Andy Van Slyke?

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W.H.Y.G.A.V.S.? derives its title from Pat Lackey’s understandable frustration with the team following its collapse in 1992, and the veritable disappearance of superstar players like Van Slyke. Recently, Lackey has had slightly less to be upset about, as the light at the end of the tunnel draws ever nearer, but he, like many other Pirates bloggers remain cautious about getting too excited for the team.

Raise the Jolly Roger

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Brian McElhinny has a phenomenal Twitter presence, and, in addition to writing daily posts about the Buccos, can be seen to tweet the popular hashtag, “#RaiseIt,” whenever the Pirates get a win. Though the call to raise the Jolly Roger has become strongly associated with Pirates’ broadcaster Greg Brown, McElhinny deserves some praise for personifying the enthusiasm that Pirates fans can have for their team.

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All of the bloggers discussed above, plus many other writers, can be found on Twitter, and have been compiled in a Twitter list for your convenience.

City of Champions, or: Why You Should Stop Worrying and Learn to Love the Pirates

If you’re reading this blog, there’s a good chance that you know a thing or two about the city of Pittsburgh. You know that we’re the Steel City, and that we pride ourselves on hard work, especially in times of adversity. You know the skyline—the one that rivals even the tallest of skyscrapers in the biggest of cities—and, if pressed, I’m sure that you even know how to spell “Monongahela.” You know that we’re the City of Champions. You know about the Super Steelers, and “One For the Thumb,” and when we won that fifth Super Bowl, you know that fans and players alike were instantly hungry for a sixth. You know about the Penguins, Le Magnifique, and Sid the Kid. You know that there are people who are willing to lug couches up Centre Avenue so they can sit in the spot where “The Igloo” once stood, and watch the Pens on an enormous TV screen with tens of thousands of other fans who would prefer watching the game in the dark, on a vacant gravel lot, to watching it in the comfort of their own homes.

No doubt, you know about the Pirates, too. You know about Clemente, “We Are Fam-A-Lee,” and you know about Sid Bream’s slide into home in 1992 that sent the Pirates wandering in the desert for the next 20 seasons. Since then, you probably know that the Pirates have become a punch line. You know that we prefer winners to losers, and an inconsistent team equals an inconsistent fan base. A consistently bad team probably deserves a worse one

WWRD: What Would Roberto Do? (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

Naturally, I’ve had my doubts. In 2010, the Pirates recorded a paltry 57-105 record, and I was laughing right along with the rest of them. There didn’t even seem to be anyone within the Pirates’ organization who really cared all that much; why should I?

Clint Hurdle changed my mind. He took over managing the Pirates in 2011, after their dismal eighteenth consecutive losing season, and saw an opportunity within the crisis. Improbably, Hurdle seemed eager to join the organization who owns the record for futility, not only in baseball, but also in all of North American sports. In fact, he called it “the greatest opportunity in the world… [to rebond] a city with a ball club.” With such enthusiasm in Pirates’ leadership, it was hard for me not to follow suit, and now, I would encourage you to do the same. The iron will that was alive in Franco Harris, Mario Lemieux, and Roberto Clemente is alive in the Pirates today, even if they may not have demonstrated it in the win-loss column quite yet. They want to win, and more than anything, they want you to want them to win.

So here’s what I’m proposing. Don’t give up on the Pirates. If, after 20 long seasons, by some miracle, you haven’t given up on them yet, don’t give up on them now.

I always say that one of the reasons that I love the Pirates the way that I do is because the other teams give me high blood pressure. I love the Penguins and the Steelers too, but for different reasons. I get excitement from hockey and football, but I also expect success. When our teams fail, it stresses me out. With the Pirates, it’s different. Excitement isn’t always expected, but it’s always welcome, and losing one game is only a small setback. Baseball is a marathon. There’s room to brush off some of the losses. Especially with twenty years of losing, it’s nice to remember that there’s really nowhere to go but up.

The twenty-year monkey on our backs reminds me of another good reason to embrace the Battlin’ Bucs. When I dove headlong into fanaticism, I did so, in part, because I wanted to be able to say, “I told you so.” Slowly, but surely, it’s occurred to me that hundreds of thousands of voices crying “We told you so,” would be a lot more satisfying (Especially when “you” becomes, I don’t know, Cleveland or something).

I’m not going to talk to you about how PNC Park deserves to have a winner, and I’m not going to spew nostalgia about the good old days, sitting on the porch, listening to the Pirates on KDKA. You know that PNC Park is beautiful, and you know that the Pirates were a pretty good baseball team in the ‘60s and ‘70s. Right now, I’m asking you to make a leap of faith. I’m asking you to commit to a loser right now, which seems counterproductive, but I’m convinced that that commitment will pay off when the Pirates win their eighty-second game. I hope that you are too.

Buccin’ the Trend: Pirates experiencing early ups and downs

[note] Say hello to Andy Barlow – he is just finishing up his Master’s degree at Point Park and he will be blogging about the Buccos for us this summer. [/note]

Every April, the Pittsburgh Pirates pack their bags and leave Bradenton, FL for the friendly confines of PNC Park. A new season always brings hope for the fans, much like myself, who have suffered through 19 consecutive losing seasons. Manager Clint Hurdle, all-star outfielder Andrew McCutchen, and our beloved Buccos began their quest for 81 wins and beyond on April 5th. A record crowd of nearly 40,000 watched the cross-state rival Philadelphia Phillies defeat the Pirates, 1-0. However, the Pirates took the next two games to win the series, both in dramatic fashion!

PNC Park (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

After a tough road trip out west (to Los Angeles, San Francisco, and Arizona), the team returned home to host the 2011 World Series champion St. Louis Cardinals and Hurdle’s former team, the Colorado Rockies. The Rockies are led currently by former Pirates manager Jim Tracy. After losing two of three to St. Louis over the weekend, the first game of the series with Colorado was rained out for Monday evening. After a Tuesday win, the ensuing doubleheader was split, resulting in a big home series win for Pittsburgh.

The Pirates finished April with a four-game series split in Atlanta and entered May on the road in St. Louis. They set a major league record…one that is a tribute to the pitching staff and the defense, but perhaps a detriment to the offense. For the first 18 games of the season, they did not allow more than five runs and, subsequently, did not score more than five runs…in any game! It was the longest streak of its kind in baseball history.

The Pirates are currently 10-14 and in fifth place in the NL Central division.