Wednesday, March 12th, 2008 by Adam Wagner
The Pirates are MLB’s joke
The Pirates are so awful at the game of baseball that Major League Baseball is now allowing 60-year old actors to compete against them. This is a whole new low for a franchise that usually uses spring training as a point of false optimism. 2008, however, brings laugher even before the season begins.
Sure, the Yankees have not yet announced what Crystal will be doing on the field (and it will probably be something as minuscule as avoiding falling over while running the bases), but the fact that he is even being allowed to don the uniform against the Pirates should embarrass the organization. Billy Crystal should only be known as a baseball player due to his role in *61, not because someone wanted to get him a nice 60th birthday present.
And the Pirates are being asked to play along with this whole thing, as rookie manager John Russell said that Crystal has been “a great ambassador for the game.” The only way that Crystal has spread the game of baseball is by appearing in the aforementioned terrible HBO movie and that doesn’t really count because nobody actually watches HBO’s original movies much less allows them to dictate whether or not to like a sport.
Crystal’s wife, Janice, said, “He hasn’t been too nervous. … Naturally, when he steps in there and they’re throwing 90 mph fastballs that’s a little different.” As long as Crystal is facing Pirate pitching, he will not have to worry about 90 mph fastballs. That’s why MLB is letting him go up against them, because he might actually get a hit and then all of the entertainment shows would lead off with a ton of publicity for Crystal/MLB followed up shortly thereafter with an interview with an embarrassed Bryan Bullington (or John Van Benschoten or Sean Burnett) trying to act like the hit was good for the game of baseball when really it would just be a blackmark for the Pirates.
The situation is embarrassing for the Pirates no matter what, but if Crystal is successful, it would just be a city-wide disaster. Unfortunately, every Pirate fan can see that coming.
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