A farewell to Bucs Dugout

I wanted to say goodbye. If you woke up this morning and decided to peruse this site looking for updates on Bryan Reynolds’ excellent year, Ke’Bryan Hayes analysis, or an existential probing of what it means to be a Pirates’ fan, then I am sorry to disappoint. After all, my chief concern all these months was to avoid disappointing our readers. But if you’ve clicked this article by accident or by chance, I hope you’ll continue reading just a bit further.

Our job here is to provide analysis and news, and I hope I’ve satiated that cavernous appetite to some extent. Writers on these team sites are paid meager wages for work that requires planning, research, and execution – a lot of it. We put a lot more effort in than simply scraping together some words on a page, then slapping our name to the top of it.

I say that because, as life often does, I have been pulled in a different direction. While the name on the top of the page might not matter to readers, which is perfectly fine, it matters to the writers, who have grown with a community by spending many hours crafting pieces for the masses.

As Walt Whitman said in Song of Myself, “I contain multitudes.” I, too, contain diversities and proclivities and such. Though that particular phrase has been consigned to the social media scrap heap, resurrected daily to serve as inspiration – or something else, who can say? – for daily bloggers whose pages have garnered nary a view, who likely haven’t read Whitman themselves, it nonetheless suffices across an array of human experience, including the present one.

Having written on-and-off for my own startup sites, as well as a list of others, since 2016, my time is drawing to a close. Writing for these sites means a lot for the writers, giving them an opportunity to share in a community of something they care about. I have been no different.

Through highs-and-lows, praises and critiques, I hope that I’ve given all of you a product which at least sparks interest or curiosity. Though my work is occasionally unorthodox for this particular site, I hope it was not met with only jeers and scoffs, though I suspect my detractors are lurking at every turn.

Regardless of sentiment towards my work, I’ve enjoyed creating it; and I’ve enjoyed giving it to you to either deride, laud, or simply forget. The choice is always in the hands of the receivers and never the giver. Once a piece goes live, its destiny can never be predicted.

But that’s making this all seem a bit grander than it is, don’t you think? It’s perhaps a bit over the top? After all, we’re only writing about sports. We all know there exists more pressing issues and concerns in the world, and probably even in our own hometown.

Still, it feels apt to make it a spectacle. That’s what sport is, isn’t it? One giant spectacle of folks convening from all walks of life sharing a common interest, a common bond. Perhaps that’s what I’ll miss most about contributing to SB Nation: Though we may frequently disagree, our disagreements are founded on the ideals of oneness.

So I hope that our disagreements have had meaning. They have for me. Whether you loathed my work, loved it, or, more likely, don’t know who I am and had to check the byline at the top of the page, I’ve greatly appreciated my time here, and with all of you. One final farewell: Goodbye, readers, and thank you.