Lost Pirates

Yesterday my beloved Pittsburgh Pirates lost their 82nd game of the season making it official that they will end the year with a losing record. This will mark their 13th straight losing season.

To put this into perspective that last time the Pirates had a winning season was the year of the Barcelona Olympics, Rodney King and Jennifer Flowers. George Bush Sr. was still president. The Penguins won their second Stanley Cup and the Bulls were just beginning their basketball dynasty. Roseanne was the number one TV show, Cheers was still on the air and Jon Secada ruled the billboards charts. Yes, 1992 was along time ago. Heck it was even before Barry Bonds started taking steroids.

By losing again this year the Pirates are now only three seasons off the record for consecutive losing seasons. While usually records are hard to break, I see no reason why the Pirates can't lose four more years. By the looks of things they are committed to an all out effort to break the record.

The Milwaukee Brewers also entered this season losing 12 straight years but they seem to have given up as they have a chance at a winning season this year. Quitters. It takes time and guts to be this bad for this long. Not many teams could do what the Pirates are doing and I respect them for that.

In the late nineties, I thought some of the Pirates moves were curious when they would trade quality players for mediocre prospects. Little did I know that those trades were all part of their master plan to be the worst franchise ever. Which is why I was surprised that they fired Lloyd McClendon earlier this week. He was the perfect loser and seemed destined to help set the record. Maybe he got fired for starting the season at .500 they thought he might actually be too good to manage the team. Apparently, his record of 25 and 52 the rest of the year wasn't bad enough to save his job.

I think the logical choice to replace him is Alan Trammel who has over 100 more losses than wins over his short three year career coaching the Tigers. Or they could wait for some other crappy manager to get fired this year and then overpay him with a five year contract.

Either way it's usually the players that help set records and not the managers. That is why I am confident they can break the record. The roster is loaded with double A talent and overpaid utility players. They have only two good players on the team and I see no reason why they can't trade them during the off season. The Yankees are looking to rebuild and would be willing to trade Kevin Brown and the rights to Drew Henson for Jason Bay and Zach Duke.

So rest assured fellow Pirate fans. All 30 of us can be proud that in a few short years the Pirates will officially set the record for baseball futility. No other fans can say that about their team. and I suspect we will be able to brag about this record for a long time.