An Open Letter to the Pittsburgh Pirates Offense

Dear Pittsburgh Pirates sluggers,

Good evening.  We get it.  You’re tighter than a Joan Rivers facelift right now.  We would be too.

All season you’ve been a streaky bunch of hitters.  The fact is, the Pittsburgh Pirates don’t score a lot of runs, but another fact is you don’t need to score that many with Charlie Morton pitching his ass off like he did last night.

Fellas…nobody is looking for any of you to hit a dramatic two-run bomb on a 3-0 pitch like Andrew McCutchen did last night.  A big home run, while majestic, is something your team really doesn’t need.

It just doesn’t.

How ’bout a few off-the-end-0f-the-bat flare singles?  That’s something Pirates fans are dying to see.

Look how the San Diego Padres, yeh, the San Diego Padres are an afternoon game away from a four-game sweep today.  We understand that you might lose track of time from traveling so much, so here is the reminder–it’s late September.  It’s time to finish.  Time to get a win over these Friars before the Reds roll into town for the final home stand.  It’s the Padres gentlemen.  Not the Dodgers.  Not the Braves.  The Padres.

The Fathers have won three crucial games against you this week.  The Padres stayed inside the baseball.  Y’know what’s hot?  Flare hits to right field on the first pitch.  Those are as hot as Antonio Brown on the Pittsburgh Steelers sideline.

Winning ugly is the new black.  Swinging out of your Under Armours isn’t.

Winning in late September is smoking hot.  Losing to the Padres is about as exciting as a John Buck post-game interview.

Pedro Alvarez, Neil Walker, Russell Martin, Starling Marte, Justin Morneau, hell…..Insert Name Here….gentlemen, the team does not need any one of you to carry it into the postseason with crushing bombs into the river.

The Pittsburgh Pirates baseball club needs you to work a walk like you used to do.  The team needs you to understand that you have two strikes and when the ball gets away, just sprint to first base because Cutch might crush a homer behind you and its vital that you are on base.

Trust your teammate.  Trust Cutch.  Trust Pedro.  Trust Byrd.  Trust the man behind you to get the job done.  Do your job, but by all means, just get on freaking base.  Get on base by any means necessary.

Today Gerrit Cole goes to the bump.  Cole is going to pitch one hell of a ball game.  It’s a given.

Just like Charlie Morton did last night.  Just like A.J. did.

Yeh, you’re all professionals, you get the picture.  Cole outdueled Yu Darvish, then he got you off the schnide when the team beat the Cubs.  Cole punched out nine Rangers and seven Cubs.

But Cole is going to need a few runs.  Scoring 2.5 runs over your past ten won’t cut it.  Only outscoring the New York Mets in September won’t cut it either.

Ian Kennedy will be on the bump for San Diego, he allows homers, a lot of homers, but please…don’t look at those 25 bombs.  Look at those 72 walks.

Get on base.  Pass the baton.

Win.

We know this sounds so damn easy from low lifes like us.  So perhaps we can offer a suggestion.  Maybe tonight you should go out and pull an all-nighter rather than sending some stupid ass tweets about empty seats.

Perhaps you can get your shit together and just do what you do best.  Nothing more.  The talent is on the scorecard, let it play.  We know each of you gentleman care.  We get that.  Just show it in your approach at the plate.

Good Luck against these daunting Padres fellas.

Love you,

RumBunter