Welcome Aboard

Let's get a few things out of the way:

The purpose of this blog is for the many, many jaded Pittsburgh Pirates fans to voice their opinions on the franchise. Since 1992, the Pirates have been a much maligned franchise and while some people are still inexplicably optimistic year in and year out that somehow this team will catch lightning in a bottle, most of us living in reality know that just isn't going to happen without some DRASTIC changes to the organization. Also, have you ever tried to catch lightning in a bottle? That's damn near impossible! Odds are something like 1 in 775,000 of getting hit by lightning alone, I am sure actually catching it would be like 1 in 2,000,000. What's ironic is that if you add those 2 up, that is precisely the same odds of the Pirates having a winning season under the current ownership group.

If you know me, and chances are you do because you are just reading this as a favor to me ,you know I love irony almost as much as I love my wife and my dogs. So a little bit of irony is what lead me to finally starting this blog. Yesterday, I learned that the Pittsburgh Pirates organization has had yet another Public Relations SNAFU ( situation normal: all f***ed up). If they could count PR blunders  as wins over the years, we wouldn't have a losing streak in place old enough to legally vote. Yesterday's mishap, however, was the straw that broke the camel's back for me as a (disenfranchised) Pirates Fan.

Upon learning that a local bar in Kennedy Twp, The Stroll Inn, runs a promotion of 5 cents off a pitcher of beer per Pirates loss ( cumulative for the season) employees of the Pirates conjured up the brilliant idea to initiate a company wide boycott of the this little bar in the suburbs. News of the boycott eventually reached the owner of the establishment, Estelle Aversa. who was justifiably angry at the thin skinned nature of supposed professionals.While I side with Ms. Aversa, I would have cautioned her that an organization who can't bother to put a team of professionals on the field shouldn't be relied upon to do the same with their administrative staff as well. Moreover, it was later discovered that team President Frank Coonelly, referred to from here on out as the "Lying Liar", contacted Ms. Aversa. According to her account of the conversation, he was rude, unprofessional, and discourteous to her. He said he supported his employeess' right to freely express their opinions. This is from the same organization that just a year ago fired a Pierogi Racer for making disparaging remarks about the teams' win/loss total via his facebook account.

With that in mind, it occurred to me that the Lying Liar is a hypocrite. Actually, he is a fascist. You are free to speak your mind as long as what's on your mind is something that he agrees with. It reminded me of an early episode of The Office when Michael Scott tells Toby Flenderson: "This is an environment of welcoming, and you should just get the hell outta here." because he didn't agree with his practices. But that is the nature of the beast when dealing with the Pirates,  assume the worst, most inept, idiotic situation will occur and then watch it unfold before your very eyes. With the Pittsburgh Pirates organization, if you hope for the epitome of embarrassment, bottom dwelling, hall of shame level performance, you are in luck because you are going to get it in spades.

This organization can't take a joke because they are one. From top to bottom and every person in between, it's like a comedy of errors day in and day out. The only problem is, to fans who want to be something more than a punchline, this joke isn't funny anymore.