PSR Showdown
Do Pirates Fans Have Reason For Hope in 2008?
By John Perrotto
Beaver County Times

NO

The Pittsburgh Pirates say they can be competitive this season. Of course, everyone says that when their record is 0-0.

It is next to impossible to think the Pirates can break their string of 15 consecutive losing seasons this year. The roster is nearly identical to the one that went 68-94 last season and it is totally unrealistic to expect a 14-win improvement needed to crack the .500 barrier.

Certainly, the new management team of President Frank Coonelly, General Manager Neal Huntington and manager John Russell will be an improvement over the previous troika of Kevin McClatchy, Dave Littlefield and Jim Tracy. It would stretch the bounds of human reason to think they would be any worse.

However, regardless of how they might spin their prospects for the 2008 season, the Pirates have a major rebuilding effort ahead. The previous management left an organization that was rotten to the core with little talent at the major-league level, hardly any prospects at the minor-league level and absolutely no concrete plan on how to get better.

At least, the Pirates seem to have a plan in place now.

Coonelly was instrumental in persuading owner Bob Nutting to increase the scouting and player development budgets. Huntington performed a badly needed house cleaning in the front office and among the major-league field staff while also showing great self-discipline in not selling low on the trade market or throwing big money at low-level free agents in the offseason.

Yet, the Pirates are so far away from being a respectable organization that there are no quick fixes. They are going to need a series of good drafts and a better effort signing top players in Latin America just to get the talent level flowing again.

Perhaps I'm being the eternal optimist but I do have faith the Pirates finally have the right people in place to get their perpetually listing ship righted. However, there is no conceivable way it can happen as soon as this summer.

Instead, we'll have to use a familiar refrain: Wait 'til year.

Or, more likely, a few more years after that.