OnlyBucs

6B5E4949427B49494245492C0 wrote: The internet increases the negativity when the team does poorly in that it reaches more people faster.



But, when the team's doing well, the internet does the same for positivity.
True. The web of communicating fans is larger than ever. I live in Baltimore. Before the internet, I searched newspapers and magazines for any tidbit I could find about the Pirates. There wasn't much for out of town fans. Even for fans living in their team's area, they might talk with a friend about what they saw in the paper or heard on sports talk radio. But widespread discussions were difficult.



Now fans around the world can discuss their teams with an unlimited number of other fans. We can read all the local coverage and stream the talk shows regardless of where we live. We can discuss it on message boards, social media and even provide comments to newspaper articles. We can praise or gripe continuously with no shortage of formats. And see everyone else's opinions. A complaint that decades ago might have been shared between a few friends can now effortlessly reach hundreds or more and spark endless debate.

Old days- the bar, the office, local talk shows, over fences.



These days- across the globe.



Old days- Channels 2, 4, 11.



These days- Those, cable, internet



Old days- watch maybe 60 Away games. Team was one of the best!



These days? See 162, but don't want to see any. (((



Cycles of life. We're in the BOB Cycle.

012726312737440 wrote:

To me, if a gm can't build a winning team in 4 or 5 years then he is not going to be successful. 
I think the free agency and arbitration systems make that so. A GM only controls his players for a few years so building for a future beyond 5 years is meaningless. By that time some good players will be gone and replacements are needed. The problem a Nutting team has is that it's not realistic to expect to fill every position at the same time internally. You may have a good core but need to add a SP or a good hitter or two. But if a team is unwilling to spend to even do that, there will still be big holes on the team despite all the rebuilding that provided the team's core.

6C715557593C0 wrote:

I don't know, I just find it interesting that there is such angst over the place we are in now.  It makes sense to me given my life's experience with the Pirates.  So I was wondering why some are so down on the Pirates and if age had something to do with it.


I'm not sure about age, but there is an enormous amount of cynicism surrounding this franchise that is both expected and probably justified given the state of the game and its economic structure. Having the appropriate perspective for this club is an acute requirement, since it's unlike most of the rest of the teams in the majors. Whether that fact raises or lowers expectations is for each fan to decide.



After Cam Bonifay's good intentions but bad incompetence, followed by Dave Littlefield's largely opaque but mainly miserly intentions and bad incompetence, the early Huntington years put us on a path that saw its crescendo end in extremely unfair one-game playoff losses and a subsequent loss of faith in the system. The national media said, "The Pirates are back," except we weren't, thanks to a ridiculous, one-game play-in where you'd better start an ace pitcher having a career season or you'll be bounced from the postseason just like that even though you racked up 90+ wins.



Add in 2012's (and to a lesser extent, 2011's) inexplicable collapse, and there were a lot of rugs being pulled out from under Pirates fans. That takes a toll. The mid-decade team certainly had its warts, but Huntington did build a team that deserved better than getting Wacha'd, Arrieta'd and Bumgarner'd in three straight years.



In my view, the time for real pessimism was after they failed to make the postseason in 2016. For a variety of reasons, Huntington sat on his hands while the team went nowhere. Now that we're in a full-blown re-build, I'd say this is definitely a time for optimism. Cherington may put the Pirates' farm system back into the top 5 by the time he's done wheeling and dealing. But of course, we've seen this before. Huntington re-built the moonscape Littlefield left in his wake, and that was an accomplishment. But the fly in the ointment is always getting a top 5 or 10 farm system to graduate out major league winners. Not just stars here or there like Bonds or McCutchen. A conveyor belt of talent routinely filling needs on the big club. We've been looking for that since Pete Peterson took Joe L. Brown's pipeline and sold it for 1979.



So I'm cautiously optimistic about Cherington but sagely pessimistic about the Pirates' chances of ever developing the talent they rotate through the farm. We older geezers have perhaps seen too many Jose Guillens, Chad Hermansons, Bryan Bullingtons and Gregory Polancos flame out to get too excited about individual prospects.



Every expansion team since 1979 has been to a World Series. The Blue Jays (1977) have been to a World Series. The Pirates? They have a wild-card win against a sore-armed Cueto. The Pirates generally don't put up, so they just need to shut up and win a playoff series. Not experiencing this singular thing in 41 years has driven us insane.

210C01101706115152630 wrote:

To me, if a gm can't build a winning team in 4 or 5 years then he is not going to be successful. 
I think the free agency and arbitration systems make that so. A GM only controls his players for a few years so building for a future beyond 5 years is meaningless. By that time some good players will be gone and replacements are needed. The problem a Nutting team has is that it's not realistic to expect to fill every position at the same time internally. You may have a good core but need to add a SP or a good hitter or two. But if a team is unwilling to spend to even do that, there will still be big holes on the team despite all the rebuilding that provided the team's core.




yes. It is great to have a top farm system but that isn't enough. The teams that had the highest rate farm system x number of years ago are often not winners.

370906060C0502010C0C2805120F600 wrote:

I don't know, I just find it interesting that there is such angst over the place we are in now.  It makes sense to me given my life's experience with the Pirates.  So I was wondering why some are so down on the Pirates and if age had something to do with it.


I'm not sure about age, but there is an enormous amount of cynicism surrounding this franchise that is both expected and probably justified given the state of the game and its economic structure.  Having the appropriate perspective for this club is an acute requirement, since it's unlike most of the rest of the teams in the majors.  Whether that fact raises or lowers expectations is for each fan to decide.



After Cam Bonifay's good intentions but bad incompetence, followed by Dave Littlefield's largely opaque but mainly miserly intentions and bad incompetence, the early Huntington years put us on a path that saw its crescendo end in extremely unfair one-game playoff losses and a subsequent loss of faith in the system.  The national media said, "The Pirates are back," except we weren't, thanks to a ridiculous, one-game play-in where you'd better start an ace pitcher having a career season or you'll be bounced from the postseason just like that even though you racked up 90+ wins.



Add in 2012's (and to a lesser extent, 2011's) inexplicable collapse, and there were a lot of rugs being pulled out from under Pirates fans.  That takes a toll.  The mid-decade team certainly had its warts, but Huntington did build a team that deserved better than getting Wacha'd, Arrieta'd and Bumgarner'd in three straight years.



In my view, the time for real pessimism was after they failed to make the postseason in 2016.  For a variety of reasons, Huntington sat on his hands while the team went nowhere.  Now that we're in a full-blown re-build, I'd say this is definitely a time for optimism.  Cherington may put the Pirates' farm system back into the top 5 by the time he's done wheeling and dealing.  But of course, we've seen this before.  Huntington re-built the moonscape Littlefield left in his wake, and that was an accomplishment. But the fly in the ointment is always getting a top 5 or 10 farm system to graduate out major league winners.  Not just stars here or there like Bonds or McCutchen.  A conveyor belt of talent routinely filling needs on the big club.  We've been looking for that since Pete Peterson took Joe L. Brown's pipeline and sold it for 1979.



So I'm cautiously optimistic about Cherington but sagely pessimistic about the Pirates' chances of ever developing the talent they rotate through the farm.  We older geezers have perhaps seen too many Jose Guillens, Chad Hermansons, Bryan Bullingtons and Gregory Polancos flame out to get too excited about individual prospects.



Every expansion team since 1979 has been to a World Series.  The Blue Jays (1977) have been to a World Series.  The Pirates?  They have a wild-card win against a sore-armed Cueto.  The Pirates generally don't put up, so they just need to shut up and win a playoff series.  Not experiencing this singular thing in 41 years has driven us insane.






Loved the content and style. That bolded sentence is a fantastic and eloquent statement on the last 20+ years of Pirates baseball. Nice writing!



I think your very first point is one that I really want to give space for. There are certainly reasons for negativity and cynicism. I don't share it, but I get it. And I think it's totally justified even though I don't share it.

My view is that the whole board is positivity. I am a Pirate fan since 1955. I still have a scrapbook dated 1955 on the front. It is in tatters and I have to be careful about it, but sometimes I take it out and look at it.



At the current time there are some who are content to think that this rebuild will be different than the last 3 rebuilds and that this GM is going to be different than the last 3 GM's. I have no problem with this point of view.



However, others would like to see some indication that this rebuild and this GM will be different that the past 3 other than just spin. This group will cheer for the team as soon as they are given the slightest indication of progress.



Both groups are positive and good Pirate fans.

58434E4F464A452B0 wrote: My view is that the whole board is positivity.  I am a Pirate fan since 1955.  I still have a  scrapbook dated 1955 on the front.  It is in tatters and I have to be careful about it, but sometimes I take it out and look at it.



At the current time there are some who are content to think that this rebuild will be different than the last 3 rebuilds and that this GM is going to be different than the last 3 GM's.  I have no problem with this point of view.



However, others would like to see some indication that this rebuild and this GM will be different that the past 3 other than just spin.  This group will cheer for the team as soon as they are given the slightest indication of progress.



Both groups are positive and good Pirate fans.


For those screaming "I want to see progress now!"- The Pirates would have won 51 games in a full season last year if you extrapolate from their winning pct.



If they win 60 games this year, that will actually represent a monumental improvement. I myself look at this as his first actual year. He was hired late, and then the whole pandemic thing coming on shortly after.



Looking for improvement? If they don't lose 100 games this season, he should be GM of the year. As it is, it's remarkable to think that 60 wins is a 9 game improvement. We've already seen what he can do with Huntington's players.



Let's give him a chance to see what he can do with his players.

I would lump myself in the category of 'older fans' (older, not old) as I will soon be starting the decade of my 70's.



I feel fortunate to have seen Clemente play, and to see the early teams of the 70's (before I moved to Alaska where I didn't see any baseball until the advent of superstations, and then it was the Cubs and Braves).



Although the structure of baseball up through the 60's and early 70's was grossly unfair to players, there was a lot of comfort in knowing that your idols would remain with the team you were rooting for unless they were traded. Free agency, whether it be good or bad for the overall game of baseball, has been particularly cruel to Pirate fans because none of the team's owners ever provided their GM's the resources to bring in new high quality talent through free agency or to retain many of the local stars.



Like most, I have adjusted to the realities of free agency, arbitration, high payroll teams, and the need (particularly for low revenue teams) to look at baseball in the terms of windows of opportunity. The Pirates experienced one of those windows in the late 80's - early 90's, and didn't see another real window until Cutch shined as a superstar. During the many years in between I pinned my hopes on the farm system delivering more talent to add to the core of Kendall-Giles-Ramirez (it didn't), or a pitching staff of Duke, Perez, Snell, and others maturing into a regularly productive rotation (evaporated before it really happened).



So --- with what I take as your basic question. Is my judgment clouded by my age; meaning that I want to see a winner now because I fear my death. No.



I want the Pirate GM to identify and implement a real plan that has a chance of restoring the team to a bundle of winning seasons in which it has multiple chances to win a division series and even a World Series. The GM's job is made nearly impossible by an owner who flatly has refused to spend, even when a reasonable short-term investment of another $15 mil or so could have extended the team's opportunity to win by another season or two. My current hope is that BC can pull this off; be it 2023 or 2024, recognizing that 2021 and 2022 (at a minimum) likely will feature some really bad baseball and lousy team records.



If I were a Yankee, Dodger, Red Sox, or Philly fan, the above Pirate approach would be unacceptable to me because those teams have the financial resources to make both good and bad decisions. But, as a Pirate fan, I know that the owner treats nickels the way other owners treat thousands of dollars, and that the only way forward for the current team is to break it down, acquire as many prospects (and suspects) as possible, and to then hope that a core emerges and leads the team to a streak of winning seasons.

487D6A6A61586A6A61666A0F0 wrote: We're so destitute, apparently, that we can't match the Brewers or Reds payrolls, either.  The money's going somewhere.
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FNB of Wheeling.