With the All-Star week in full swing in Pittsburgh, let's look at what the mainstream media has to say about the Pirates:
USA Today:
If there is any justice, the weather will be glorious here the next two days. The All-Star Game activities will be scintillating. The local baseball faithful will have a wonderful time on Monday, followed by a thrilling experience on Tuesday.
Because you know what happens Wednesday.
They must go back to being Pittsburgh Pirate fans. Not an easy lot in life.
New York Daily News:
But baseball insiders say the Pirates' biggest errors have been made not on the field but in the front office. The Bucs are a disaster when it comes to player development and scouting. "With certain teams, you know they are bad but at least you can see a plan," says Baseball Prospectus national writer Kevin Goldstein. "You don't see that with the Pirates. They are just spinning their wheels. This is a team desperate for new management."
Yahoo News:
The first was a 1996 poll undertaken by the BBC to determine the top figure in the news for that year. The Labor Party took to the phones like crazy, and the winner was Tony Blair...
But perhaps the best example comes in another BBC poll, when the British radio network sought to determine the most influential philosopher of all time. You might have guessed that Plato would win, but no, he polled only 5.65 percent. Maybe Socrates, but he came in with only 4.82 percent. St. Thomas Aquinas? Nope. He got only 4.83 percent. The winner was Karl Marx, with 27.93 percent. Guess who stuffed the ballot?
That's what happened here in Pittsburgh. The campaign for Mr. Bay began when he was batting .302 at the end of May...
[L]et's remember... that while baseball is the most honest of games, the All-Star Game is not quite.
The Associated Press:
...[T]here is every indication the club is making money, since their payroll of approximately $48 million nearly is covered by TV revenue and revenue-sharing money alone. The club's primary owners, small-town newspaper publisher G. Ogden Nutting and his family in Wheeling, W.Va., are plopping down nearly $90 million to buy a ski resort east of Pittsburgh.
There's a fitting analogy: A ballclub that's gone downhill for years owned by a ski resort operator.
:
Finally, is there any doubt that the All Star extravaganza will be the baseball highlight of the year in Pittsburgh -- where the Pirates just lost 13 games in a row for the first time since 1890? You know you're having a rough year when you start making regular appearances on the wrong end of Jay Leno's shooting range.
