This Post Is A Hodgepodge of Somethingness

Nope, I couldn't resist capitalizing on what was the buzz talk in Pittsburgh sports this week, BoSox announcer Dennis Eckersley's pronouncement that the Pirates lineup is a "hodgepodge of nothingness."  What I found out to be most entertainting about the whole affair was the reaction from Pirates officials over the whole thing.   The next afternoon I hear Bucco Chief Propaganda Minister Greg Brown with the afternoon guys on The Fan.  The tap dance Brownie was doing around it would have made Gene Kelly turn green with envy.  Then on Friday afternoon GM Ben Cherrington had a meeting with the local press to explain the progress that he has made with the overall organization since he and his team have been here.  That may be true from an organizational standpoint, but we sure haven't seen any results on the big league level as yet.  GMBC then went on to say that he wasn't going to comment on what Eckersley had to say, but if that were the case, then why hold a press briefing on some random Friday afternoon in August?

Anyway, on to other things.....

Here's the thing about baseball.  You know that your favorite team - the Pirates in my case - stink.  No need to go over all the reasons for that is there?  You know that they are going to lose 100 games  this season.  However, that doesn't mean that if you choose to go to one ball game on a nice summer's evening that the Pirates won't play well and win that particular game.  And even if they are playing a team that is only marginally better than they are, the Cincy Reds in this case, it doesn't mean that you won't see a well played and entertaining game.

And that is exactly what happened last night at PNC Park.  Very good starting pitching from Graham Ashcroft and Bryse Wilson, a couple of nifty defensive plays, and a couple of home runs which put the Reds in front 3-0 through five innings.  A run in the sixth and two in the seventh for the Pirates tied the game.  The Reds went ahead  4-3 in the eighth and the Pirates walked it off with two runs in the bottom of the ninth when Michael Chavis' bases loaded single scored the winning run.

Fun, exciting, a Pirates win, and it was all over in two hours and forty-eight minutes.   It can be done.

I haven't written about the Steelers 32-25 win over Seattle in last week's first exhibition game because, well, I just didn't get around to it.   Unless you've been living under a rock in Pittsburgh, or just really don't care about the Steelers, you know by now that the highlight of the game was the performance of the three quarterbacks.  Mitch Trubisky leading a 90 yard opening drive for a touchdown.  Mason Rudolph dropping a dime to rookie wideout George Pickens in the corner of the end zone.  And, of course, the second half, two TD pass performance of Kenny Pickett, including one that won the game with :03 left on the clock.

This all led to an interesting narrative on the talk shows and in the press.  For the first half of the week it was "Why are the Steelers continuing the charade with Mason Rudolph?  For his sake and the sake of the team, trade him now for whatever kind of low round draft pick you can get and turn things over to Pickett as the back-up to Trubisky."  By Thursday, however, the narrative changed, and the theme then became "Are the Steelers and the fans being unfair to Mason Rudolph?  Doesn't he deserve better?"

This is why I can only take sports talk radio in small doses.

Anyway, in a few more hours, the Steelers take on the Jax Jags in their second exhibition game of the season.  Trubisky will start, but by all accounts, Pickett will get the bulk of the QB playing time, including time with the first teamers, or "the varsity", as Mike Tomlin puts it.

For the first time in almost twenty years, the quarterback situation is making Steelers practice games interesting things to watch.

I am about 90 pages, or a little less than twenty percent, into this latest book by David Maraniss, "Path Lit By Lightning", a biography of Jim Thorpe.  Like Mariness' biographies of Vince Lombardi, Roberto Clemente, Bill Clinton, and Barack Obama, this book is meticulously researched and well written.  You learn a lot and are entertained while doing so.  I will most certainly be writing more about this book once I finish reading it.