The last breather
This is the final off-day of the 2012 season. The next time the Pirates don't play a baseball game, the season will be over and we'll all be sitting around picking up the pieces of this wreck. This is the fourth consecutive Thursday the Pirates have not played. The first Thursday was the Pirates' first off-day after their 22-games-in-22-days slide that started this whole collapse. This is the Pirates' record on each of those Thursdays:
- August 23: 67-57
- August 30: 70-60
- September 6: 72-64
- September 13: 72-70
Things are not progressing in the right direction.
As an Orioles fan that grew up in Pittsburgh, part of my attention is going to be on the Buccos for the rest of the season. The O's just snapped their 14 season losing streak today with their 81st win and it feels amazing. I really hope the Pirates can turn this season around, get hot, and make the playoffs. Even if they miss the playoffs, I sincerely hope the Buccos can break the streak.
Let's go Bucs!
as this turbulent season starts its last leg everyday i wait for the pirates lineup. After seeing the names my first reaction is how is this team possible going to win today? Lately when the game is over i have the feeling that we let another on slip away. i don't know how i can go from not thinking we have a chance to wondering why we didn't win. That in a nutshell describes this season, where the blame goes i guess depends on what the expectations where to begin with. Are we simply a 82 win team or do we have the ability to do much better. Obviously help is on the way with the minor league system finally have some talent, but lets hope this team turns it around one more time and finishes strong. By the way have been enjoying your work.
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Pat,
First, just want to thank you for this wonderful blog - it's allowed me to re-kindle my love from my boyhood for the Pirates. Although things are definitely not heading in the right direction, and the Bucs are likely to end up out of the dance, I am grateful that they are at least in the conversation after so many years in the wilderness. Hopefully, they'll be able to pick up/develop the additional talent they need to make the next step sometime in my lifetime. Keep up the good work, and hang in there.
Jim D.
I'm going to say the one nice thing about the Pirates I can think of, and even this is a backhanded compliment at best: our expectations after the All-Star break were too high. This was never a good baseball team; it was never even really an above-average baseball team. The Pirates got to 67-57 mostly on the strength of ridiculously (and unsustainably) good performance from their bullpen (which has now snapped back and beyond) and a majorly unsustainably strong performance (read: BABIP) from McCutchen. Desperate to root for a winning team as we are, we joyfully overlooked this and chose to believe the Pirates were good.
Looking back now, I saw the Pirates in March as about a 75 win team, and they'll end up winning around 77-79 games. This team does not have enough talent to compete, and we were fooling ourselves into thinking it did, a month ago.
