Tonight the Pittsburgh Pirates clinched their twentieth consecutive losing season in a perfectly fitting fashion, getting no-hit by HOMER BAILEY of the Cincinnati Reds. But I don't want to write about that. In fact, I don't want to think about that. If I could, I would probably employ some crazy Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind type shit and erase the last twenty major league baseball seasons from my memory forever. Actually, make that the last twenty-three because if it weren't for those magical seasons in the early nineties when I was just discovering my love for the sport and the team at the tender and impressionable young age of, like, six or eight or six through eight, I figure I would have never gotten into this mess in the first place and I would have taken my mom's advice and gotten the "prettier" Cleveland Indians hat at Toys 'R Us that time and I would have let my grandma defect to the Florida Marlins with Jim Leyland and Bobby Bo and I wouldn't be sitting here tonight eulogizing a twentieth season that hurts so much worse than any that came before it. And I know the point of that movie is supposed to be that it's better to have loved and lost and blah blah blah but right now I'd zap all that mess right out of my brain and never think about Chad Hermansen or J.J. Davis or Kris Benson or Matt Morris or Derek Bell or Aki Iwamura or Jeff Clement ever again.
What in the hell made me so loyal anyway? What is wrong with me? With us. I know I'm not the only person going through this tonight, this month, this season, this... score (Dammit. Now even time is messing with us). What is my malfunction? What about my particular genetic make-up makes me pre-disposed to subject myself to repeated beatings in the name of loyalty? I'm not even sure if it is loyalty. There's never been, like, a conscious decision or a point where I've had to convince myself to stick it out. It's not a choice. If it were, I'd be the one to blame. (And I'd have jumped ship a long time ago. I'm not that crazy.) But it isn't. I can't even play as another team in video games. I've tried. The Pittsburgh Pirates are, for some reason, ingrained into my unconscious so deeply that voluntary lobotomy may be my only hope.
So what say you, Dr. Mierzwiak? Still taking appointments?
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