Most people are surprised to hear that Baseball is an individual sport.  No other sport has a true one-on-one

situation as Baseball has with the pitcher and the batter.  A baseketball, football or even hockey player can keep

their "awesomeness" going for a full season, yet a baseball player has many ups and downs.  Well, everyone not

playing 1B for the Cards.  Baseball is a game of streaks.  Players get hot, and its a hot streak.  They get cold, and...

you get the picture.  Neil Walker is having one of these amazing hot streaks as we speak;  14 game hitting streak.

Tabata is doing the same.  Soon these players will hit a wall and the dreaded cold streak will start.  It happens.

Now baseball TEAMS also have streaks.  The team will catch fire, such as the Reds, or completely fold up for a

tad, like the Padres.  Even the Pirates had a 12 game losing streak.  But here's something you might not realize;

the Pirates top WINNING streak this season is 3 games.  The last time the team won more than 3 games in a

row was last August 17-22.  I have been a baseball fan for decades, and I've never seen a team not win 4 games

in a row for an entire season.  I believe streaks, the winning kind, are the product of a team learning to win

together.  Youth could be the major reason why a winning streak has not been produced, or maybe even the

obvious pitching deficiencies played a major role.  Momentum should be attained by playing the "core"

regularly, but with the September callups I just don't see that happening.   But its okay.  This is a learning

process with our core.  We have seen some very good play from the youth the last month or so.  Maybe a

streak, the good kind, is around the corner.