Breaking Baseball News!

Opening day is a few scant hours away, and the Pirates were just eliminated from the post-season.

Sigh.

Looks to be another pop-up to shallow left field kinda season for the Buccos, my favorite baseball team by default. It's a step up from the foul-bunt for third strike season we had two years ago, and the double play to end the eighth last year, but it's still going to result in the same thing: a losing season.

Sigh.

A few years back, Reggie Sanders joined the Pirates and was on pace to hit 274 home runs through the first week of the season. That was the last time we Pirate fans were allowed to muster even pretend-hope expressly for the purpose of humor. Yeah, shit's been dark, dark, dark since the Killer B's left for greener pastures. My way of dulling the pain is delivering three can't miss, 100% guarunteed predictions* for the season ahead, and stake my first born child** on them. Here goes!

Zach Duke on the DL by July
Word from Pirate City in Bradenton is that Zach Duke has looked very "meh", which isn't a good sign. Good arms in the Pirates organization tend to have great rookie seasons, a meh sophomore spring, then blow their elbows out. Watch for The Dukie to rip apart his arm when the weather gets warm, and don't expect it to heal until he's eligible for free agency.

Brad Eldred's 401K plan
A friend of mine labeled recent Pirate free agent signing Jeremy Burnitz a bunch of big swings and misses. With Burnitz to mentor him, Pirates 1B and power prospect Brad Eldred should easily reach the 401K milestone, and by that I mean he will strike out 401 times. Watch some tape on the kid and you'll see I'm only 10% kidding.

Pirates Win NL Central
Every team plane will crash, killing every professional baseball team before the All-Star break, with the exception of the Pirates. The lose in the wild card round to the pesky AAA-come-Major League Dodgers, who in turn lose to the pesky AAA-come-Major League Nationals, who in turn lose to the pesky AA-come-AAA-come-Major League Devil Rays (the team plane crashed again when the AAA guys were called up). I think I've said this before on another blog, but whatever. I stand by it.

So there you have it. That said, I've still got some team spirit around here somewhere. After I do my taxes, I'll see if I can find it, put it in the laundry, and if it doesn't shrink too much, I'll bring it out.

*guarantee is not a guarantee. **i reserve the right to substitute a child of equal or lesser value