DK’s Daily Shot of Pirates: The fans who get heard

DK’s Daily Shot of Pirates: The fans who get heard

There was a paid crowd of 19,379 at PNC Park last night. A lot bigger than your standard Monday night. A lot more focused on seeing Paul Skins than the team around him. Good morning to you. Good Tuesday morning. I’m Dan Kvachovich of DK Pittsburgh Sports. This is Daily Shot of Pirates. It comes your way bright and early every weekday. If you’re into football andor hockey, I also offer daily shots of Steelers and Penguins in the same place that you found this. Pirates three Tigers nothing. Skins unsurprisingly is the stopper after a really rough weekend for his teammates against the White Socks. six scoreless innings, three hits in a walk, six strikeouts. He’s running out of adjectives. It’s pretty early in his career for that to be happening, but I am. Braxton Ashcraft, Dennis Santana, and David Bedar followed up with a zero each. And what do you know, just like that, the team that couldn’t handle the American League’s worst found. I should also mention that Krian Hayes went two for four and that Brian Reynolds had a timely two-run single. This was skins after the game. Yeah, I mean we Yeah, we did a good job. Um at the end of the day, you know, it’s a shut out. I think I heard that it’s like our 11th shut out of the year. Uh something like that. So that’s pretty good. Um Braxton came in, Dennis, Betty came in, did a really good job. So, you know, I was happy with it, but I know I know they were happy with it, too. All due respect to a nice solid W for all concerned, I want to turn the topic today toward those people in the seats. Those of you who’ve been either listening to or reading my work over the years, first off, thanks. Never ever ever taken for granted, believe me. Secondly, you might know that there’s nothing that sticks in me quite like a really broadly held misperception or just a missed fact. You can call that a personality defect on my part or whatever. My parents used to make fun of me for it. But I can’t stand when there’s something that’s out there that everybody or close to everybody is getting wrong. And exhibit A of that might have come over this past weekend when there were these scenes from the ballpark of fans chanting sell the team. There were airplanes flying over well one airplane flying overhead calling for the same thing. And only about 99% of the reaction on social media and by the way from there I would presume 99% of those who didn’t go to the game or never go to the games or in some cases maybe never even go outside to touch the grass. Almost all of the reaction was what are you doing going there? Why are you giving nutting your money? And then they call these people idiots and stooges and morons and whatever else. And they do so without understanding. Well, there’s two key things here. Okay, I’ll dispense with the boring thing first. Whether or not you go to the game and buy a ticket doesn’t have this much, and I’m holding my thumb and forefinger no more further apart than the the depth of a dime impact on Nutting’s finances or the pirates finances. I know that sounds hard to believe and I know that some of the people that are telling you this, including in the media, have only a 1965 level understanding of how professional sports work. It makes almost no difference whether you go to the game or you don’t. Why is that? Look into Major League Baseball’s revenue sharing system. A, half of all the gate gets split between the teams, meaning the two teams that are playing. And B, whatever money you don’t get at the gate, whatever revenue that you are short locally gets essentially, I’m oversimplifying it here, but essentially reimbursed through Major League Baseball’s broader revenue sharing agreement. You know, when you go to the ballpark and you hear them say things like, “The Pirates and Dodgers, thank you for attending.” They’re not saying that to be polite. They’re saying that because the Pirates and Dodgers both, just like the other 28 teams do, get all this money into a pile basically. And whoever does or doesn’t come gets negated in one direction or the other. So, if you want to sound really, really ill-informed, go ahead and keep saying this. If you’re in the media and you want to sound really, really, really unprofessional, meaning unprepared for your job, go right ahead and keep saying this other point, but very much related. If you go to the ballpark and you chant for the Pirates to sell the team or for Nutting to sell the team or you boo or you do like that guy did over the weekend and stand up and yell at Spencer Horwitz for not running out what ended up being a way too easy 363 double play. If you’re one of those people, you’re actually making a difference. You’re making an impact. It might not happen like this the way you’d want it to, but it’s all gradual. You’re going to have to trust me on this one. Based on my conversations and experiences with everybody from the owner of this franchise on down, if they had a pick between you tweeting up a storm from your couch about your mythical boycott versus being in that ballpark to make their lives miserable, or flying that plane to make their lives miserable, you’ll never guess which one they’d prefer. Now, all that said, I’m experienced enough to know that there’s nothing at all I can say, no matter what tones, no matter what support I have behind it, that’s going to change this. It’s a perception that’s just so deeply ingrained that no matter how wrong it is, no matter how many mountains of evidence there are to counter it, it’s going to persist. But, but you, just you, I’m only talking to you right now. At least sound smart when the subject comes up. When we come back, J1 Cube, if you’re looking for a great dining experience, look no further than Northshore Tavern. Located directly across Federal Street from PNC Park, next door to Mike’s Beer Bar, Northshore Tavern is Pittsburgh’s home for Steak on a Stone. Enjoy your steak finished on a hot lava stone in front of you, where you ensure each piece is cooked to exactly your liking. or try their rotating selection of entre, hot sandwiches, salads, and burgers, all while enjoying the ambiance dedicated to the great players and history of the Pittsburgh Pirates all around you. Come see why everyone’s talking about Northshore Tavern and Steak on a Stone. It’s Gun Storage Check Week. Help prevent unwanted access to your firearms. No one wants their unsecured gun to be used in an accident, a suicide, or a crime. Use lock boxes, safes, and locks to secure your firearms. Learn more at gunstoch checkck.org. That’s gunstoch check.org. Brought to you by NSSF, the Firearm Industry Trade Association. And today’s J1Q comes from Charles Allen. It’s also semi non baseball. Coincidentally, Charles asks, “DK, can you tell me why the announcers who call the games are afraid to say how bad the Pirates are?” And this has a really simple answer, but I’m still glad that it comes up because it offers me the opportunity to share a little bit of background here. The obvious, I would hope, answer, Charles, is that they’re employed by the team. If you’re not aware of that, that’s fine as well. There is a perception out there, speaking of perceptions today, that the play-by-play people and color commentators associated with individual teams are employed by that regional network or something to that effect. And it’s not true. It wasn’t true whenever the Pirates and Penguins were having their games broadcast by AT&T Sportset Pittsburgh, which was an independent entity. And it’s not true now that the Pirates and Penguins have created their own network under the umbrella of the Bostonbased Nessa Network. The announcers, everyone you hear on these broadcasts, including the play-by-play man, the voice of the Pirates, Greg Brown, are employed by the Pirates. Their paychecks are signed by the Pirates. That goes for Joe Block. That goes for Bob Walk, John Wner, Neil Walker, Kevin Young, Matt Caps, everybody. Now, I could get snarky on you here, Charles, and ask you what you did for a living and how often it would be cool with your boss if you went and criticized him in public, but I’m not going to do that cuz I’m going to presume that you’d fully understand after I say just that much. Now, I want to add this because I’ve been privileged to get to know some of these gentlemen over the years. Some of them as players. Actually, I take that back. All of them as players at one point or another. Well, hang on. And I don’t go so far back as to cover. So I I take that one back. But the rest of these guys and the ones that you see in the studio settings, Michael Mckenry, Steven Brol, Alex Presley, and I can tell you that when it comes to the base announcing crew, the main guys, and this goes double, maybe triple for Brown, they love this franchise. They want this franchise to succeed. They want this franchise to win a World Series. I’d be remiss if I didn’t include the great Steve Blass in this. One of the best human beings you could ever encounter in life or baseball or any walk. They want to see the Pirates win. If you think, and I’m saying this respectfully to you, Charles, and to anybody else who’s a fan, if you think you as a fan want it more than they do because you’re getting angry and you’re allowed to say what you want, whatever else here, you’re dead wrong. You’re dead wrong. And if and when that day comes that the Pirates turn it around and I’m on record as saying I don’t believe it would take all that much once you get past firing this general manager. What you’re going to hear from those announcers and again Chief Lee Brown, the voice of the pirates won’t be some manufactured stilted awkward emotion or anything. It’s going to come from the heart. They want this and they care about the pirates. They also care about their jobs. I appreciate you, Charles. I appreciate everybody who listens to Daily Shot of Pirates. We’ll be back with another one of these tomorrow.

Ripping fans who show up and voice displeasure? Dead wrong!

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