Kicked-Ass Royal

At the risk of melodrama, the Buccin' Ear feels it is appropriate to quote the Doors after Monday night's dispiriting 10-6 loss to the Kansas City Royals, supposedly the worst team in baseball. The Pirates, having fallen to 26-46, and effectively banishing any hope for the season produced between mid-May and mid-June, are giving the hapless Royals hope that they may not be, after all, the team that baseball forgot. To describe the MISERY visit of the Pirates to KC, however, as "bleak" would be to lavish it with undeserved praise.

To return to the Doors and their departed frontman, Jim Morrison (not the one who played for the Pirates, however, from 1983 to 1987 -- two 's's), a verse from "The End," a classic from the first album, seems perfectly suited to the Bucs' season:

"This is the end/beautiful friend, the end/This is the end/of our elaborate plans, the end."

Indeed, every season for the Pirates consists of elaborate plans: signings of veterans who will provide "clubhouse leadership," live-armed pitcher prospects whose appendages go dead, renewed vows to start fast and finish strong that vanish beneath flurries of losses, regrets and recriminations. And always the vow to do better next year.

Last night, Kip Wells returned to the rotation for the first time this year after a long rehabilitation stint. Kip, we hardly missed ye. Handed four-run leads early, the Kipster was gone by the fourth, having squandered the lead and rekindling memories of his 8-18 campaign of a year ago. Wells was in midseason form, falling behind hitters and spending pitches as if he was a drunken sailor on shore leave. "Great stuff, he just can't harness it." Where has the Buccin' Ear heard that one before?

Then there is Ryan Vogelsong, who performed the role he has perfected, entering a two-run game and making it a four-run game. Your faithful correspondent challenges anyone to explain why RV is on the staff. He performs a role reminiscent of the firemen in Fahrenheit 451, whose job it was to spew gasoline on to books, the better to burn them. Maybe the Fireman of the Year Award should be named the Bradbury Award. Vogelsong would almost certainly get it.

After shooting their wad after five innings, the Pirates offensive machine quietly retired into the Kansas City night for a plate of barbecue and some jazz: two hits over the remaining four innings to one of the worst staffs in baseball. Jim Tracy may be running out of fingers to point.

And the madness continues. At this writing, Ian Snell, staked to a 4-0 lead, threw five shutout innings before losing it in the sixth. He has been knocked out, and we've got a donnybrook, sports fans, in the sixth, all knotted up at 4 apiece.

As the season continues its descent, and the Buccin' Ear prepares to sign off, the voice of Jim Morrison returns to paint a likely picture of the remainder of '06:

"Can you picture what will be/So limitless and free/Desperately in need/Of a stranger's hand/In a desperate land..."