Law was on Starkey's Saturday AM show yesterday, as he often is. For a guy I've always felt had something against the Pirates personnally, I'm beginning to believe he is just more objective than me... Go figure.

Anyways. He had an interesting assessment of the Pirates this year. One that is not all gloom and doom. Simply put, he puts the Cubs way out there in the division, and then comes back to the rest. He asserts that while he is not a fan of the Pirates as a good club, he is also not a fan of anyone else in the division other than the Cubs. This includes Milwaukee. He feels that while the Pirates have maintained status quo on the 25-man/starting 9, the others have all dropped back a couple of huge notches. The Astros and Reds in particular.

Law also stated that the Bucs 40-man was better than these clubs in this sense. If the other clubs get into trouble by performance or injury, they have nothing to bring up. The Pirates have, for the first time in years, an impact player in McCutch to call upon if say, Hinske fails, or Moss gets reinjured. He also stated that the Bucs have three players in Alverez, Tabata and McCuth who will be above average starters in MLB, and McCutch will be a star.

That trumps whatever the other orgs have this year. The result could be that, having some young impact players in the MLB (Doumit, Nate) and others coming up, and coupled with the dearth of talent in the NLC, the Bucs could improve their win total significantly this year (10 wins).

I can live with that kind of improvement. Especially if the pitchers continue to grow up.

ZM

Oh brotha, I hate it when I start to feel optimistic.

Theres some interesting long term stuff going on here, first time in a long time when Ill have as much interest in the farm system as the parent club.

Couldn't possibly be any good news, as we have been told over and over that these guys should be fired. They don't know what they're doing. We'll just have to wait to see.

Our competitiveness will be determined by our pitching...period. It is also the biggest if.

If you believe, as i do in 1) Kerrigan, and 2) irony, youll understand why I say I think our front 3 will produce to the point where it will actually rekindle the Bay/Nady or Dunn arguments.

While I can agree with him that the Cubs are lightyears ahead of anyone else in this division, and that the Brewers, Cardinals and Astros have regressed and the Pirates are still abysmal, I actually like the Reds this year, not as much as the Cubs, but good enough for a solid second place. I like Harang and especially Volquez in that rotation, and I like Joey Votto, Brandon Phillips and Jay Bruce in their lineup as well. I'm not seeing what he sees there I guess.

Maybe the absence of... dare I say his name?

You will be sent to an Ecuadorian jungle prison, there to while away your time within earshot of the Venezualean developemental leagues...

ZM

You will be visited by a diseased yak.

Dusty Baker will kill those young guys' arms...ask Someone from San Fransisco or the Cubs