yes, virginia, there IS crying in baseball

Thirteen. Good ole, unlucky thirteen. That's losing seasons in a row, now. Half my age, to be exact. The salad years of my life. Things used to be a boy from Greenfield (or Squirrel Hill, if you went by zip codes) would waste away his Indian Summer days with his knock-off Walkman, hanging on every trite phrase Lanny Frattare jammed into his microphone, picturing the lush green astroturf, the sun casting a gangly, angular shadow through the concrete mesh of Three Rivers Stadium, the stark clash of the School Bus Yellow Mezzanine seats and the Not-Quite-Burnt-Ochre of General Admission. Picturing his heroes playing small ball- a Jay Bell bunt here, a José Lind bouncer there, 3-6-3 double play. That's alright boys. We'll get 'em next time. The Bucco Express always runs on the fives, and who knows? With The Killer B's coming up, damn near anything is possible.

Yes sir, those were the good times. I remember where I was when Francisco Cabrera singled in Sid Bream to take the pennant in '92. I had a little 5" black and white television that hooked up to an audio cassette recorder. I'd used it mainly to record funny sketches from Saturday Night Live, studying them so as to wow the grown ups with my impression of Dana Carvey's impression of George Bush. That night, I tried to watch the game with my family, but it seemed that was bad luck. So I went downstairs, into our finished basement to watch on the 27" color console. The damn Braves kept chipping away. So up to my attic bedroom I went, rally cap on (although we were ahead), took the pennants off my wall (this one never failed me), and sat and watched Stan Belinda put men in scoring position, or as we came to know it, heartbreak station.

I got an old Hall and Oates tape out of my cassette rack. "Won't be needing this anymore", I said, a hint of bitter resentment in my voice, almost as if to say it was John Oates' fault. I carefully applied two strips of scotch tape over the copy protection tabs and popped it in. I pressed record as Francisco Cabrera came up to bat.

The play-by-play man was from the national broadcast. I wanted so bad to hear Lanny's nasal, yet comforting wail. I still think that if he was calling the game, Orlando Merced's near-homer would have found an extra inch of altitude. There's something about a voice on the TV that wants your team to win. That's the tenth man. Mr. NBC was talking about where Barry Bonds was going to play next year. Next year? NEXT YEAR!? Whaddaya mean next year? The Pirates aren't on his list? Say it ain't so, Barry! Say it ain't so!

The at-bat was likely much shorter than I remember it. In my head, it was one of those classic 15-pitch battles, where the hurler somehow found the power of a windup though pitching from the stretch, and the batter took desperate stabs at perfectly placed sliders, just enough to get a glancing blow, just enough to get one more shot. But really it was just Stan Belinda and Francisco Cabrerra. They'd both be out of baseball before I was out of high school. Either way, I couldn't watch. I pressed and held record and play down (yes, the buttons were spring-loaded in those days), and went into my parent's bathroom across the hall, just far enough away that all the commentary became a muffled murmur, and all I could make out was the surging sound of the Fulton County Stadium crowd.

I don't remember hearing the crack of the bat. I don't remember hearing the Braves fans cheering. I don't remember the announcer's jubilant call of one of the great moments in playoff history. All I remember is somehow knowing that we lost.

"It's so, kid", Barry seemed to say as he signed the contract that killed baseball in Pittsburgh. He always was my favorite. "I bought a new boat", said Bobby Bo, "I named it Met for Life". The knife turned. "I'll stick around, if only to show you all that I never was half the player Barry Bonds was, and not one one-hundreth the player he's going to be. But hey! At least I'm white!" You always could count on Andy Van Slyke.

I lost touch with baseball over the years, but I'm not the only one. Maybe this is the crew that'll really turn it around. Maybe this is the batch of pitchers we've heard about since '96. Maybe Jason Bay is the real deal. Maybe. You know what they say. That's alright, boys. We'll get 'em next time. The Bucco Express always runs on the fives, and who knows? With Jason Bay, Rob Mackowiak and Craig Wilson coming up, damn near anything is possible.

This memoir was inspired by this statistic:
Combined Pirates Records in Ten-Year Stretches
1966-1975: 154 games over .500
1976-1985: 50 games over .500
1986-1995: 5 games over .500
1996-2005: 195 games under .500
via the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette