Wednesday, October 11, 2006

2006 Pittsburgh Pirates Award Ceremony: Introduction

While the rest of the world intently watches the League Championship Series, I have to deal with the slight, as a Pirates fan, of Tommy Lasorda not even bothering to pry me out from under my desk, instead concentrating his efforts on the likes of Cleveland Indians fans, who were in the World Series within the last decade and Chicago Cubs fans, who were in the NLCS just three years ago. I won't even get into the one version of the commercial featuring Red Sox fans.

So with a big fuck-you to the FOX network and Major League Baseball's advertising committee, I'm going to devote a special presentation to my own forgotten, tortured baseball club.The 2006 Pirates were essentially out of contention by mid-April, starting 5-18. The gross incompetence didn't end there, however. They lost thirteen games in a row in June, including a three-game sweep by the Kansas City Royals, the only team in baseball that should be considered definitively worse than the Pirates (and that's including most AAA teams). Since they looked like Little Leaguers more often than not throughout the season, it's only fitting that I present the Pirates with awards, Little League-style: everyone gets an award, no matter how bad they are.

Just because the Pirates lost 95 games and haven't have a .500+ season in fifteen years doesn't mean they aren't worthy of the same love and adulation people heap on the Yankees, Mets, etc. Here are 26 players who were on the Pirates 40-man roster at the close of the 2006 season who each have their own unique story to tell.

Without further ado, I open to you the 2006 Pittsburgh Pirates Award Ceremony. I'll probably present a couple or so awards a day, basically as many as I have time to get done. This should hopefully take until the World Series is over and the offseason begins, when we can start disecting all the crazy rumors that have Mark Teixeira coming to Pittsburgh, as well as the more credible ones that involve Dave Littlefield signing Ryan Klesko.

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