Wednesday, June 22, 2011

It's okay to be enthusiastic about the Pirates, but don't you think we should temper the expectations just a bit?

Going into today's game with the Baltimore Orioles, the Pittsburgh Pirates are 36-37 and only 4-games back in the National League Central division.

For most of the season, when the Pirates just hovered a few games under .500, there was cautious optimisim and surprise that the Buccos--a team that lost 105 games last season--were doing so well. But then something happened: the Pirates won 4-games in a row and actually stood 2-games over .500 at 35-33 and then suddenly everyone lost their minds.

Last week during the Pirates' interleague series against the Cleveland Indians, Greg Brown was scoreboard watching and keeping us up-to-date on the 1st place Brewers' games at Fenway park against the Boston Red Sox. The Brewers didn't do so well in Boston, but it didn't matter because the Pirates were swept right out of Cleveland.

Off topic just a bit, I'm convinced if the Pirates hadn't had to subject themselves to interleague play over the years, their 18 years of losing never would have reached this season. They are just God-awful when they play any team from the American League. Coming into today's game, they are 76-127 all-time. Needless to say, I hate interleague play and dread it each time the Pirates have to enter into it. It always seems like they are on somewhat of a roll when the interleague portion of their schedule comes around and then they wind up going in the tank and never recover. Hopefully, that won't happen this year. They did okay against the Tigers in their first interleague series before getting swept by the Indians and if they win today, they would take 2 of 3 from Baltimore.

About those Pirates fans losing their minds over the team's mild success. Keep in perspective that is just that--mild success.

Pittsburgh wouldn't even be in the discussion for a division title at this point in the season if the NL Central wasn't so average. In-fact, when you look around the standings in MLB, there are only 2-teams more than 10-games over .500. Not too many people running away with their respective divisions.

That being said, since the team is so close in the standings, people want them to go out and get a bat to compensate for the team's awful offense. On Pirates' message boards everywhere, the mantra is, "anytime you have a chance to win now, you do it!" Another one is: "Let's see if "Bad Deal" Neal Huntington is a buyer and not a seller at the deadline."

I don't agree with the notion that you must win now if you have a chance--at least not in this case. For a team like the Steelers with a franchise quarterback and a dominant but veteran defense, yes, you should try to win and make the playoffs as many times as you can right now because you don't know when the next Ben Roethlisberger--or Troy Polomalu for that matter--will come around again. For a team like the Pirates that must play "the game" differently than a lot of teams in Major League Baseball, they must continue to stock their farm-system with as much talent as they possibly can. It would be a mistake to mortgage a promising young pitcher from their system in-exchange for an Xavier Nady-level player to come in here and add some punch to the offense. And make no mistake about it, the Pirates wouldn't fetch much more than that type of player for a prospect. The time to mortgage a bit of the future isn't when a team is around .500 and putting lineups out on the field with players named Brandon Wood and Michael McKenry. No, the time to take a chance is when you're 10-games over .500 and are a bona fide pennant contender.

It's nice that the team is doing well, but let's not get ahead of ourselves. Let's remember that the Pirates were expected to repeat their horrible record from last season.

Just enjoy the surprising year and remember that anything approaching 80-wins from this team would be a drastic improvement and something Pirates fans can hang their hats on.

This isn't the time to go trading the future for the present. The present is nice, but think of it as a Thanksgiving day turkey. I'm sure you're all very hungry, but the turkey isn't done yet, and if you eat it too quickly, you could get sick.

What the Pirate's lineup needs now is Pedro Alvarez, not Xavier Nady.

Wednesday, June 15, 2011

Pitt and Penn State to resume rivalry in 2016. No, you're not seeing things

I was listening to the radio on the way home from work last night and I couldn't believe my ears. Pitt and Penn State will actually play eachother in football in 2016 and 2017. It will be a home and home with the first game played at Heinz Field.

According to the Pope of college football, Beano Cook, Penn State had an opening on its schedule after Miami opted out of their two-year deal with the Nittany Lions.

The Pitt fans that I've talked to are pretty excited about it. I know I am. The only thing I regret is that it won't happen for five seasons. On the other hand, Penn State fans have been spewing their usual bs: "It's just another game to us." "Pitt needs Penn State more than Penn State needs Pitt."

If you really think a Pitt/Penn State contest is just another game, you're either in denial, full of crap, or just plain ignorant to the history.

Well, if Pitt is "just another game" for Penn State, it's one of several. The one thing JoePa hasn't been able to find in the Big Ten is a natural rival. Ever go to a party and you feel like you really don't fit in? They might deny it, but that's probably how Penn State feels in the Big Ten. Yes, the Nittany Lions are passionate about their rivalries with Michigan and Ohio State, but those two schools are really only interested in eachother. Yes, the Michigan State game has become the forced end-of-season rivalry, but again, MSU is probably more interested in its battles with Michigan and Notre Dame. Now that Nebraska has joined the Big Ten, they're trying to create a Penn State/Nebraska rivalry. And the same arrogant Penn State fans who say that the Pitt rivalry is a thing of the past are trying to justify the convoluted Nebraska rivalry by citing some exciting games between the two schools dating back to the 80's and 90's.

Maybe the Penn State fans get their arrogance from the school's athletic director Tim Curley who didn't seem to be nearly as excited about the renewal of the rivalry as Pitt AD Steve Pederson. Curley said he didn't see the two schools playing beyond the 2017 season. He acted almost as if Pitt was just another school that he contacted to fill the scheduling void.

The fact that it will be the first time the two programs meet on the gridiron in over a decade and a half is criminal, but to not work towards trying to make it a yearly-event is an injustice to college football. The rivalry never should have stopped in the first place, and if wasn't for the grudge that Joe Paterno had against Pitt, it probably never would have.

As I said, I'm excited. I don't know what the college football landscape will be like in five years, but I hope both Pitt and Penn State are good so the hype will be intense. Actually, I hope Penn State is in the middle of a 4-56 slide and Jay Paterno is the head coach and Pitt kills them in both games by a combined score of 120-3.

That's how I feel about Penn State football. Whatever animosity that exists between Pitt and WVU fans, it's ten-fold between Pitt and Penn State. And that's what makes a great college rivalry.

So, Penn State fans, you can continue to walk around with your blind-arrogance and state your usual bs about the game not meaning anything to you--although you guys are also saying that the game at Heinz Field will be mostly PSU fans even though they supposedly don't care--but Pitt has always been your best dance-partner and they always will be no-matter how long you go between dances.

It's just too bad we have to wait five years to dance a couple of numbers.

Tuesday, June 7, 2011

Some random sports thoughts

*The Pirates drafted right-handed pitcher Gerrit Cole out of UCLA with the number one overall selection in Monday's draft. Since the Pirates have a lot of critics, many were questioning the selection of Cole instead of third baseman Anthony Rendon from Rice. Rendon was considered the consensus number one selection for the longest time before he suffered a shoulder injury and some teams at the top of the draft became a little leery. The Pirates weren't the only team to pass on Rendon as the Washington Nationals drafted him 6th overall. Personally, I would have rather seen them take a position player after drafting so many pitchers last year, but who can really argue with the selection of Cole? His fastball has been clocked at over 100mph. You can't coach velocity and Cole will join Jameson Tailon and Stetson Allie as young pitchers with very high upside in the Pirates' farm system. Cole is represented by Scott Boras (who else?) but it's a good sign that the Pirates are going for top-of-the-line pitchers and no longer picking guys like Brian Bullington at the top of the draft. Finally, when it comes to baseball drafts, "the best player available" is always the way to go because it's not like the other major sports where players can come in right away and help a team. It normally takes at least a couple of years to make it to the big leagues. No sense worrying about positions. You just don't know the make up of your ballclub two or three years down the road.

*Is anyone else as sick of hearing about the Buster Posey injury as I am? For those of you who don't know, Posey, the San Francisco Giants all-world catcher, was injured and knocked out for the season last week after a play at the plate with Scott Cousins of the Florida Marlins. Cousins tagged from 3rd base on a shallow fly-ball and collided with Posey at the plate. Cousins scored the go-ahead run in the top of the 12th inning and Posey suffered a broken leg on the play. Almost immediately, people from the Giants organization, and a lot of folks around baseball, started to argue that a rule-change was needed for plays at the plate. Of course, this should be no surprise. In today's day and age, everytime something like this happens, everyone wants something done about it. Cousins has now received death-threats from Giants fans and even the Giants general manager vaguely threatened Cousins with retribution before later apologizing for his comments. However, Posey wasn't the first catcher to ever suffer an injury after a play at the plate. Ray Fosse was an all-star catcher with the Cleveland Indians who was injured after a collision at home plate with Pete Rose in the 1970 All-star game. That was over 40 years ago and they never bothered to change the rules for plays at the plate. Times are different today, however, especially if a star player goes down with an injury. This sort of thing has been done in other sports, too. For example, when Terrell Owens was injured by a horse-collar tackle in the 2004 season, the NFL outlawed that type of tackle. One has to wonder if there would have been a rule change if a little-used possession receiver had suffered an injury and not TO. Anyone who has followed the NFL over the last half-decade knows that the horse-collar tackle is a very difficult rule to interpret. Can you imagine how hard it would be for MLB umpires to interpret any sort of new rule for collisions at home-plate? What Scott Cousins did to Buster Posey has been going on in baseball for over a century. Like I alluded to earlier with the TO injury, I wonder if anyone would have said a word if Ryan Doumit or Chris Snyder were lost for the year with an injury after a collision at the plate? I doubt it.

*So Jim Tressel is out at Ohio State and Terelle Pryor has decided to leave, too, and enter the NFL Supplemental draft (provided there ever is another one). This all comes after allegations that Pryor and many other Ohio State football players sold their own merchandise for tattoos (and maybe even drugs depending on who you believe). Tressel came under fire because he knew about these incidents and tried to cover them up. There are other rumors that Pryor accepted free cars from an Ohio dealership. This is nothing new. Just last season, the Auburn football program was in the news for similar transgressions, and USC is currently suffering the effects of some illegal acts during the Pete Carroll era. What really makes me laugh is when people act so shocked that these things are going on in big-time college athletics. Didn't anyone ever see the movie "Blue Chips" with Nick Nolte and Shaq from the 90's? This stuff has been going on forever. Coaches get fired, players get suspended, and programs usually suffer the long-term ramifications, but why don't boosters ever really suffer for their actions? They always seem to get off scott-free even though their influence over programs is normally what causes the mess. In the real world, drug-dealers are the ones given the harshest penalties, but in the world of the NCAA, programs suffer while the boosters never get touched. I'm not saying schools, coaches, and players don't deserve their share of the blame. They do, because it takes two to tango, but I'll bet if a real message was sent to alumni and boosters with deep-pockets, a lot of these rules-violations would stop. But that's just my opinion.

*Finally, I'll leave you with some of the stuff I've been writing on Behind The Steel Curtain.

Ever get to witness a no-hitter in person? My brother and I came this close but were defeated by "Fireworks Night."

Are there teams you that you used to be indifferent towards or even admire but now cannot stand? Well, I have my share.

Still having trouble getting over Super Bowl XLV? I am, but you'd be surprised by how many people still consider Super Bowl XXX an even tougher loss. I continue to be amazed at how many people were devastated by that loss. I feel like I'm in a very small minority of Steelers fans who really considered 1995 to be a magical ride despite the ending.

Speaking of Super Bowl XXX, I wrote a couple of things about the Steelers of the 90's. One was of my memories surrounding the Steelers loss to the San Diego Chargers in the 1994 AFC Championship game.

Lastly, I give some love to the Steelers teams of the 90's.

That's about all I have for today. Happy Wednesday!

Saturday, June 4, 2011

That magical .500 mark

The Pirates just won their 2nd game in a row and 4th in 5 games with their 6-3 win over the Philadelphia Phillies tonight before a record crowd at PNC park and are now 28-29.

The shame of it is, if they wouldn't have blown a 7-0 lead the other day to the New York Mets, they would be 29-28 right now.

Of course, that's the "glass half-empty" way of looking at it. A more positive attitude would be acknowledging the resiliency of the young-Buccos who could have wilted after such a tough-loss with the very powerful Phillies coming to town.

Tomorrow, it's another shot at that elusive .500 mark. A sweep over the Phillies, with their throng of fans invading PNC Park, would be pretty sweet.

Go Bucs!