1992 And Counting: What am I doing?

I’m not Bill Simmons funny or Bob Costas intellectual. I’m not Jim Nantz formal and I’m not Al Michaels brilliant. Instead, I’m just a 19 year old college freshman obsessed with A) trying to get paid to do something with sports and B) waiting for what would be the final piece of my sports dream: A Pittsburgh Pirates World Series.

Now that I have your attention with those last four words here is the gist of it: I have been a baseball fan as far as I can remember. My dad would play games with me in the backyard, I’d watch he and his friends play pick up games as I was little, and I distinctly remember the black eye he had when he got nailed one night. He really cultivated my love of the game with these games and baseball cards, so naturally it became the sport I wanted to play most.

I just wrote my baseball life story here, realized it was far too self absorbed and that because human’s attention spans have dropped to 800 words, there was no way I could even get to the actual reason I started this blog. Sparknotes version: I love baseball, played it for a bit, cursed as a Pirates fan.

Honing in on that last point, I came to the realization that in life, you do not always have the chance to do what you love and make a living off it. I have been blessed that broadcasting seems to be going places for me but if baseball is my true love, why not just write about it when we all have access to blogs and information at our fingertips.

So with all of this, I say hello to 1992 and counting, a blog dedicated to Pittsburgh Pirate fans, written by a fan, that will more than likely challenge the patience of a fan. I was born September 19, 1992. For you conspiracy theorists, I already checked: Pirates 3 Phillies 0, Doug Drabek with the W. But the moral of the story is that I have not lived through a Pirates winning season.

We are facing a time when entire generations of die hard sports consumers only know the Pirates as basement dwellers and cannot even fathom that a year like 1960 or 1979 even took place. I have been counting down the games every year to see if it will finally break the curse and lead to something else. It has not happened yet, so why not write about it.

I am sure I am not the only one who had a nice collection of Kevin Young cards and bobbleheads, thought Pat Meares was the real deal, and still to this day miss going to the ball park to see Todd Ritchie pitch. I was one of the many who adored Jason Kendall and Brain Giles before their mass exodus and never understood why guys like Rob Mackowiak were considered future stars.

I love comments, I love responding to comments but I hate trolling. Please I just want this place to be where baseball fans like myself can have some fun and talk about America’s pastime, that too much to ask for?

Regardless, I just really want to start talking sports and stop talking me.

Let’s Go Bucs!