Who Are These Guys?

You can argue the 2006 Pirates are bad, but at least over the past couple of weeks they haven't been boring. Just when it appeared their current road trip was ready to turn into another fiery crash, the team produced two consecutive victories in San Francisco on Friday and Saturday, one of them -- gasp! -- a one-run triumph, just their seventh in 25 opportunities.

That victory, 3-2 on Friday night, followed another one of those soul-sapping losses that has been a Pirate trademark this year. In that one, Zach Duke was staked to a 3-0 lead, but couldn't hold it, leaving in the seventh with the score tied. After going ahead 4-3, the bullpen coughed up a run in the eighth and lost the game in the ninth. This time the victim was Matt Capps, who wild-pitched in the winning run. A runner was at third in part because Jose Castillo dropped a pop fly during the inning.

However, much as they did two weeks ago after giving up four runs in the ninth to blow a game to Houston, the Pirates shook off the disappointment of Thursday's game with the win on Friday, which featured a strong performance by fifth starter Victor Santos. Santos had pitched credibly last Sunday against the Padres (five innings, one run), but got no run support as the Pirates were dominated by Chris Young. He was better against the Giants, giving up just two runs in seven innings. This being the Pirates, the ninth naturally bordered on disaster. Mike Gonzales, continuing a recent trend, walked a tightrope, loading the bases with two outs. He's sometimes fallen off that perch, but this time he got a strikeout and a save.

That set the stage for Ian Snell, who has been the team's most pleasant surprise recently, on Saturda . Following up his excellent start on Monday against Colorado, Snellover came a wild start and threw seven shutout innings in a 2-0 win (the runs coming on homers by Castillo and Jose Bautista), raising his record to 7-3. He's shaved about a run off his ERA (4.75) in a couple of weeks, has two of the three wins on the road trip, during which he has given up two runs in 13 1/3 innings while striking out 15, and he is riding a five-game winning streak. Not bad for a guy who was a key disappointment over the first five weeks of the season.

The great pitching of the last two nights has rendered moot the fact that the team hasn't hit very well (except for Sean Casey, a veritable Jamey Carroll who had consecutive four-hit performances). The Pirates are 3-3 on the road trip with a chance to -- dare we say it? -- win a road series and post an overall winning record on the trip.

Who are these guys?

Part of the answer is we don't know, and that's not necessarily a bad thing. The shape of the team is only beginning to emerge from the chaos that produced the dismal opening month and first half of May. Snell, Duke, Gonzales, Freddie Sanchez, Castillo, Ronnie Paulino and, to a lesser extent, Paul Maholm, Nate McLouth and Bautista are among a group of players making a bid to join Jason Bay and Jack Wilson as the core of what could be a reasonably competitive team. Any Pirates fan understands the Buccin' Ear's use of the italics. The Bucs have been down this rebuilding road so frequently in the past decade and a half that it would be ludicrous to make too much of their recent modest success. Two seasons ago, the team won 10 games in a row in June and seemed poised on the edge of success. The hot young pitcher of the time was Sean Burnett, who hurt his arm shortly after the win streak ended and has never pitched in the Major Leagues since.

The fluid situation also casts light on a few players who may not be part of the picture in the future. Topping this list in terms of importance is Oliver Perez, currently the anti-Ian Snell, a guy who can't seem to get this act together under the glare of the spotlight. People assume that because he had one good season, in 2004, that his presence in the rotation is a given. Not so, in the Buccin' Ear's eyes. His situation reminds me of one faced by the Rockies a few seasons ago. Mike Hampden and Denny Neagle were cementing their reputations as expensive busts, and debate raged about whether one or both of them should go to the bullpen. The Rockies could at least argue -- although unpersuasively -- that their price tags and past successes earned them additional shots at improving. Perez has not earned this kind of respect, and team would do a great deal for its reputation among fans by pulling Perez from the rotation if he can't achieve consistent success beginning now.

Then there are Jeromy Burnitz, Joe Randa, Ryan Doumit, Craig Wilson and Humberto Cota, all of whom might not fit into the picture at all. Of these, Wilson might fetch the most in a trade, although his power at the plate might keep him around (and the fact he can play more than one position). But the team doesn't seem to care for him much, and he strikes out way too often to fit in with the current shape of the club's lineup. Burnitz, who stranded an appalling 19 runners across two games Thursday and Friday, is now basically a platoon outfielder, an expensive luxury the team can't afford (ditto third baseman Randa, who won't return to the starting lineup when he gets off the DL), and will be gone by season's end, if not before. Doumit, a flop at the plate and in the field this year, is currently shelved with an injury, and Cota rarely plays, with Paulino emerging as a contributor at the plate, albeit one who needs much seasoning behind the plate.

The picture, we can hope will continue to clear favorably for the team as it heads into the last week's before the break. At least a couple of rays of light have emerged from the unrelieved gloom.