An impromptu trip to Pittsburgh last week brought many ups and downs. After spending a few days worrying in a hospital waiting room began to take it's toll and I needed an escape. Enter the Church of Baseball.
A Sunday afternoon baseball game was the perfect escape from the worrying. Getting lost in the crowd, hearing the crack of the bat and feeling the sunshine on my face is a cure only baseball can provide. And all for less than $20.
I decided late Sunday morning to head down to PNC Park and watch my Buccos take on the Colorado Rockies. I found a ticket on StubHub for $8, drove down and parked for $5 and even splurged and spend $3 on a water and some peanuts outside the stadium.
When the final out was recorded the good guys won 5-3 and I left a happy boy. Next to Mom getting better and out of the hospital, the afternoon was the highlight of my trip back to PA.
Best view in baseball.
Pretty good seats for $8.
Root for the Pirates.
I always tip the sax player on the Clemente bridge.
What I looked like the last time the Bucs were winners.
Raise the Jolly Rodger! It's over. The Pirates will have a winning season. Finally!
The evening of October 14, 1992 still torments me. Being a baseball obsessed 13-year old boy, I tried everything I could conceive of to convince my mom to let me stay up for the entire NLCS Game 7. It didn't work and I was sent to bed with the Pirates leading the Braves 2-0. Thoughts of seeing a Bucco World Series appearance danced in my head and there was no way I could sleep. When the coast was clear I turned the television back on and watched in horror as the series collapsed. I cried myself to sleep.
I never imagined that the next 21 years the Pirates would be so crappy. One losing season after another. In those two decades since the Bucs had a winning season I graduated high school and college, got married, moved out of PA and traveled around the world twice. Throughout the past 21 years I've remained optimistic every year. At least until around June when the Pirates ship would start slowly sinking into the depths of another losing season. I'd receive text messages on my phone informing me of yet another lose and yet another season where my favorite team would be the laughingstock of the baseball world.
During these bleak times I've never abandoned the team. I could have jumped on the Red Sox or Yankees bandwagon, Lord knows the Pirates traded enough of their talent to both teams over the years every trading deadline. I never stopped wearing my Pirates gear. Never stopped going to the games when I lived in Pittsburgh to see a horrible team play in a beautiful cathedral. I never stopped root, root, rooting for my hometeam.
Perhaps the most amazing thing about this streak ending is how it is happening. I've always envisioned the Bucs would end the streak with a victory on the last day of the season and everyone would celebrate inside PNC Park. Fortunately that is not the case. This team is striving for way more than that and hopefully will break another streak that has been going the entire time I've been alive; 34 years since the last World Series title.
