It's a slow weekend, but hopefully some Pirates news will give you a break from the Steelers getting beaten by the Raiders.
-P- The Beaver County Times suggests that Mark Cuban won't be able to solve the Pirates' problems just because he's rich. This misses the point, I think - Pirates fans think Cuban will be a better owner not just because he's rich, but because he's demonstrated through his ownership of the Dallas Mavericks that we wants to win. The issue Pirates fans have with the Nutting family and with Kevin McClatchy is not that they're not rich - clearly, they are. It's that they are much more interested in staying rich than in putting a good team on the field or planning for the future.
-P- The Pirates are tied for third among major league teams in number of players heading to arbitration this winter. They've got nine, including Freddy Sanchez and Mike Gonzalez. Jason Bay and Jack Wilson would make it eleven if they hadn't been signed to long-term deals.
-P- Here's a story in a St. Louis paper about Tigers coach Andy Van Slyke's reaction to losing the World Series to one of his old teams. There's nothing overtly funny here, but Van Slyke remains one of baseball's most articulate and engaging interviewees.