Halfway to Nowhere

The Pirates' loss last night completed the first half of their hellish 2006 season in neat mathetematical fashion. The team is 27-54, meaning that it has lost exactly twice as many games as it has won, and has lost exactly two of every three games it has played.

That's about the only thing that is orderly about the mess that is the Pirates. Other than the fact that it has no reliable starters, an overworked bullpen, a perennial hole in center field, no established leadoff hitter, inconsistent fielding, an inability to win close games and a comically bad road record, this is a heck of a team.

The Post Gazette's recap of the lost first half pretty much hit the nail on the head in all areas, doling out especially well-deserved criticism to the front office and new manager Jim Tracy. Also rightly singled out was the starting pitching, which has been nothing short of disastrous. What is it with this team? Why can't pitchers perform when they come up with or come to Pittsburgh? In my mind, it all started going bad with Tim Wakefield.

A lot of people probably never knew or have long since forgotten that way back in 1992, Wakefield achieved the status of folk hero with the Pirates. A late-season call-up, he won two games in the playoffs that year against the Braves, pitching especially bravely and brilliantly with his dancing knuckleball in Game 3, with the Pirates down 2-0 and on the verge of being humiliated. Wakefield won that tense game, then picked up another win in a Game 6 blowout that sent the series to the ill-fated Game 7 that the Pirates came within a whisker of winning. Instead, the decline of the Pirates began.

As did the seeming demise of TimWakefield. He lost control of his knuckleball, pitching poorly in '93 and not at all in '94. Suddenly in '95, however, he was rescued from the scrapheap by Boston, where he resurrected his career, winning 130 games going into this season.

From Wakefield on, the story of Pirates starting pitching has been a litany of failed promise and lost opportunity. On the rare occasion that a Pirates pitcher has seemed to fulfill his potential, the team has promptly traded him away. Denny Neagle comes to mind. He was 14-6 in 1996 when the cash-strapped team sent him off to Atlanta. The marvelously talented Jason Schmidt came over in that deal. But of course Schmidt was never anything better than a .500 pitcher for the Buccos, who sent him on to San Francisco, for whom he pitched well in a World Series. Schmidt is still a SF staff mainstay. The cruelty of the loss of Schmidt can be summed up with one name: Ryan Vogelsong, whom the Pirates acquired for him. Ryan Freaking Vogelsong!

But the list goes on and on: Esteban Loaiza, Jon Lieber, Bronson Arroyo, Chris Young, Kris Benson; none were able to prosper until they left Pittsburgh. And the utter ineptitude of the Pirates front office is illustrated by the list of what the team received in return for these pitchers: Arroyo was claimed off waivers. Jon Lieber netted Brant Brown, a name that I am sure is still on everyone's lips. Loaiza fetched Warren Morris and the immortal Todd Van Poppel. Chris Young got Matt Herges to the club, which was great because that gave them a chance to release him before he had thrown a regular season pitch in a Pirate uniform. The only faint glimmer of hope came from the Benson deal, which brought them Jose Bautista (the great Ty Wigginton has gone on to another powerhouse, Tampa Bay). At best, the jury is still out on that one.

Then there are the Francisco Cordovas, Todd Ritchies and Oliver Perezes of the world: one or two decent seasons, followed by flameout. Oh, and the careers that probably will never get off the ground due to arm troubles: John Van Benschoten, Bryan Bullington, Sean Burnett.

If I were Zach Duke, Ian Snell or Paul Maholm, I'd demand a trade right now. It could be dangerous not to.

Well, as Gnarls Barkley says, I could go on and on and on, but who cares? That's all water over the broken levees of Piratedom. But it does make the point that in the end, the biggest, reddest F that could be scrawled on the club report card belongs to the front office. They've earned that honor so many years in a row, it hardly needs to be awarded anymore. This year, the brain bust came up with another classic: the Joe Randa/Jeromy Burnitz two-fer that is the worst piece of free agent foolishness since the Derek Bell signing (the trophy may have been retired with that one, with apologies to Raul Mondesi). (The Buccin' Ear feels like he should make like Bobby on The Sopranos in addressing the Bucco front office: "I'm in awr of you.")

You have to give them this: they're bad at judging talent in their own organization, but on the other hand, they're pretty bad at judging talent in other teams' organizations too.

So tonight begins the Tom Gorzelanny Story. In it, young man arrives in Pittsburgh from Indianapolis full of hopes and dreams that he will be a star pitcher on a Major League Baseball team. The Buccin' Ear doesn't have the heart to write the ending.