The most frustrating year to be a Pirates fan

At my age, I’m old enough to remember the Pirates of the early 1970s, who won a World Series and probably could have won more if it weren’t for the Big Red Machine in Cincinnati.

I remember the “We Are Family” squad of 1979 that won the last world championship for the franchise.

I remember the drug trial years, the George Hendricks debacle, the failed Sammy Khalifa experiment, the 1985 campaign when it appeared the team could move, the rotten 20plus year run of losing and the brief return to relevance in the mid-2010’s when A.J. Burnett had his swan song from baseball.

There have been lots of 100-plus loss seasons after that final World Series pennant.

Yeah, I’ve experienced some of the highest ups and lowest downs in the team’s history. So, I guess it is safe to say all of us 60-plus Pirate fans have seen it all.

That said, so far, 2024 is quickly becoming the most frustrating year of my life.

Why? Let me count the ways:

• Even though the Pirates have possibly the best starting threesome in all of baseball with Mitch Keller, Paul Skenes and Jared Jones, they continue to toil several games under .500.

• The ownership and front office continue to have total faith in manager Derek Shelton, who is the losingest manager in team history and continues to embrace the craziest strategies that fail more than they work.

• Other than the Milwaukee Brewers, every other team in the NL Central Division is wallowing in the mud like the Buccos.

• GM Ben Cherington blew the offseason when he apparently was allowed to spend over $30 million on roster additions, but chose to do it in the Dollar General section of free agency instead of shopping in the Dick’s Sporting Goods area of available players.

And I could go on and on. The Pirates are currently three games under .500, yet it appears that one or two moves could quickly change the team’s fortunes.

Either, cheapskate owner Bob Nutting could agree to open his wallet just a little and bring in a couple solid bats to help out the starting pitching or he could give approval to sacking Shelton in favor of a real managerial mind who won’t change the batting order every single day, won’t handcuff his starting pitchers and allow them to go deep in games and will better prepare the team and coaches on fundamentals.

Sadly, I’m kind of resigned neither of these things will happen and a great opportunity will go by the boards.

Shelton continues to run a lineup out there with three, sometimes four – even five – players hitting .200 or less.

How can you expect to win that way?

Cherington said recently that any roster improvements must come from within. That is both scary and sad.

A battle plan routinely failed this franchise since Nutting bought it continues to be the marching order.

Dammit! Apparently, the rest of the baseball world has taken notice of the team’s young 22-year-old arms of Skenes and Jones with more and more games being featured on MLB Network and national sports shows making it a point to include highlights from games that Skenes, Jones and Keller pitch.

Yet the Pirates continue to stand pat by not helping these guys out by improving the lineup.

I’m not an expert, but I will say this: I don’t think there is a team in baseball I would be willing to bet over the Pirates in a best-of-three or best-of-five series. If only Keller, Skenes and Jones actually had a real MLB lineup behind them.

The problem is that neither Cherington nor Nutting are willing to grab available offensive threats – unless of course they comes at bargain baseman prices. And we all know decent to good players don’t come at the MLB minimum.

It’s pretty sad when the fans want to win more than the owner does. But that’s exactly the case in Pittsburgh.

I just have a sick feeling that in September we’ll all be looking back on the biggest “What if?” season in Pirates history.

Recent history has told me I shouldn’t be surprised.

But nearly 60 years of being a fan has shown me how rare it is to have three arms like the Bucs have now. Once they come along you do nothing to help them out other than keep running out the same miserable players in a musical chairs batting order.

Yeah, this is frustration at its highest.

Anyone with any thoughts, opposing views or comments on this column can reach Jeff Oliver by emailing justjto@ verizon.net.