The Pittsburgh Pirates....playing competitive baseball!?

Neil Walker and Andrew McCutchen celebrating something good.  Look for this to happen  more often.

   As I talked with my good friend Michael Allen as the Stanley Cup Final came to a close yesterday, it hit me: I'm currently without the NFL, NBA, and NHL and two of the three could lockout next season.
   "I guess it is time to focus all my attention on baseball now.", Michael said somewhat reluctantly. His favorite team is the St. Louis Cardinals (big budget team, cares about winning championships), so I imagine it is pretty easy to get hooked right back into one our country's beloved pastimes.
   For Chad, not so much. I cheer for the Pittsburgh Pirates and I usually catch about 10-15 of their games a year. The Pirates are a team that have terrible ownership that refuses to spend money on the team and takes advantage of great fans in Pittsburgh by holding them hostage for a competitive baseball team since the day I was born. (Whew, that felt great.)
   I have always been a Pirates fan, except from age 14 to around 17: I flirted with a division rival, the Cincinnati Reds on and off after being influenced by my uncle one summer I went back to visit my family in West Virginia.
   My family on my Mom's side always messed with me about cheering for the Reds. I will never forget my Uncle Matt jokingly calling me a "traitor" and trying to make me feel bad about switching to one of the enemies.
   When it got to be my junior year in high school, the Reds and I went our separate ways. It just never felt right. It is the only "team-hop" in the history of Chad and I learned a lot from it. The split was mutual. The Reds went on to post a 91-71 record and went to the playoffs for the first time since 1995 and I got a girlfriend. Everybody won.
   Then, I switched back to my first love, a team that sells tickets that would be affordable for hobos. I remember going to many Pirates games as a child, especially when they moved into their new ballpark in 2000 (PNC Park). I remember going to one game at Three Rivers (old stadium) and even a double-header with my Dad and Uncle Mike vs. the Cardinals. PNC is so nice, there is an Outback Steakhouse inside and it was more fun to go and walk around then watch the Pirates lose.

Believe it or not, Barry Bonds was a Pirate, pre-steroids. Just look at his arms.

   Last year, the Bucs posted a league-worst 57-105 record, continuing the streak of almost twenty seasons without a winning record.
   It would be easy to complain about the Pirates and their ownership and how much I would like for someone else to buy the team, but that will never do anything. Even though I flirted with the enemy, (guilty as charged), I found my way back to the team I once loved and will forever love, no matter what record they have.
   The Pirates won their thirty-fourth game last night against the lowly Houston Astros. This gives the Bucs a winning record this late in the season for the first time since 1997 (I was six years old). Andrew McCutchen is  emerging as a All-Star caliber player and could be a dark-horse for the National League MVP. Kevin Correia was the first NL pitcher to eight wins this season. Good things are happening for a team where "good" is something that is usually never found close to the ballpark.
   The Pirates' wheels could fall off tomorrow and they could go on a ten-game losing streak, I would not be surprised. I also would not be surprised if a young group of talented players stepped up and made a run at a Wild Card spot, either.
   The Pirates are 4 games back from a division lead and 1.5 games behind a familiar face in the Cincinnati Reds. Call the Reds the "one that got away" and try to make me feel stupid for switching back to my true favorite team because Cincinnati could win a World Series in the next few years. I will never feel bad because the Reds, Cardinals, Brewers, Cubs, and Astros  all have something in common: They suck. Lets Go Bucs.

      It Will Happen Again.