Just looking at that line-up makes me pine for the days of Francisco Cordova and Kevin Polcovich.

Quick story for you.  Picture this:  it’s 1992.  Your humble blogger is a junior in high school.  He’s dating a girl whose sister works in the Three Rivers Stadium box office.  It’s the National League Championship series and your Pittsburgh Pirates have battled back from insurmountable odds to force a deciding Game 7.  MLB decides to print World Series tickets a day early because if the Bucs win, the Series begins two days later.  Thanks to my hook ups, I am lucky enough to score great seats for Game 1.

The Pirates lead the entire game behind some brilliant pitching by Cy Young winner Doug Drabek.  Ninth inning.  I’m on the edge of my seat, sweat beads forming on my forehead, World Series tickets clutched tightly in my hands.  The Atlanta Braves begin to mount a comeback.  An easy ground ball is muffed by Gold Glove second basemen Chico Lind.  Stan Belinda enters the game and promptly surrenders the tying run.  Okay, my tickets might still have value, we’ll only have to work a little more.   Then Francisco Cabrerra comes to bat and one swing plunges the Pirates into one of the worst losing streaks in professional sports history.

I still have the tickets.

The mothership of this very site, Fan-Sided Blogs, has decided to branch out into covering Major League Baseball.  Despite the fact Pittsburgh does not have a major league caliber franchise, they still went ahead and launched a brand new site covering the ups and downs (mostly downs) of our hapless Pirates.  If you’re a glutton for punishment, I suggest you click on over to Rum Bunter for great coverage of a terrible team.

Unfortunately, I will not be involved with that site as I’m frankly embarassed by them.  It’s one thing if you try to win and just come up short but they don’t seem to make even the slightest effort to field a respectable team.  I can’t support a team who won’t try to give the city the product it deserves.   Best of luck to Tom, who I’m sure will do an excellent job with what he has to work with.

In other news, 1250 ESPN Radio will be hosting a series of “Lunch With A Legend” events starting next Tuesday, February 24th at Morton’s The Steakhouse on Liberty Avenue.   For $40 you get to have lunch with Pittsburgh Steelers legends Andy Russell and Mike Wagner.  Click this link for the phone number to make your reservations for this pretty cool promotional idea.

Finally, I need your help.  I’ve gotten myself mixed up in a Pittsburgh Sports Blog Smackdown on another website.  Now, I give you guys Ladies Night, M&Ms, and free Croc shoes…   All I ask is that you click this link and vote for my site, Nice Pick Cowher, in their tournament.  Please.  I’m a total attention whore and this kind of thing fulfills me. Seriously, I wouldn’t be able to survive without the praise of others.

Going into this season, the Tennessee Titans were considered an afterthought in a division which contained the perennially powerful Colts and up-and-coming Jaguars.  Although they also made the playoffs last year, losing to the Chargers in the Wild Card Round, people seemed to think Jacksonville was the team primed to make the jump to the next level when Peyton Manning and company began their eventual decline.

The Jags were quickly exposed as an overrated farce of a team while Indianapolis stumbled out of the gate due to injuries to key players.  Meanwhile, Tennessee got off to a fast start and never looked back.  Throughout the majority of the season, the Titans have consistently been ranked the top team in the AFC.  While it was easily justied when they were undefeated, the team has gone 2-2 over the past four games and could even wind up losing the #1 seed in the playoffs if they were to lose this weekend.

While their opponents, the Pittsburgh Steelers, have marched through the toughest schedule in NFL history, a close examination of Tennessee’s year reveals an assortment of creampuffs and pushovers.  Rather than just knee-jerk declaring them the best team in the AFC due to their record, it becomes more and more apparent that this is a team whose reputation is built on a lie.  In fact, going week by week through their schedule, it becomes more and more clear that this team hasn’t beat anybody at all.

1 – Jacksonville W (17 – 10)     Jacksonville (5-9) stinks.

2 – Cincinnati W (24 – 7)       Cincinnati (2-11) stinks.

3 – Houston W (31 – 12)     Houston (7-7) came on late but stunk early.

4 – Minnesota W (30 – 17)     Winning record but Gus Frerotte?  Really?

5 – Baltimore W (13 – 10)    Rookie QB on a team that we beat twice.

7 – Kansas City W (34 – 10)     KC (2-12) stinks.

8 – Indianapolis W (31 – 21)     Manning, Harrison, and Sanders were all hurt.

9 – Green Bay W (19 – 16)     Green Bay (5-9) stinks yet came thisclose.

10 – Chicago W (21 – 14)     Kyle Orton?

11 – Jacksonville W (24 – 14)     See above.

12 – NY Jets L (34 – 13)      Jets are overrated yet blew them out at home.

13 – Detroit W (47 – 10)     Detroit (0-14) really really stinks.

14 – Cleveland W (28 – 9)       Cleveland (4-10) stinks.

15 – Houston L (13-12)        Another loss, this to a non-playoff team.

From what I’m seeing, they have two quality wins (Baltimore and Indianapolis).  The games against the NFC North teams don’t count because that division is the NFL’s version of a Cripple Fight.  Two of them don’t have quarterbacks, the one that does has no defense, and the fourth is the Pittsburgh Pirates of football.  Every other game is either against a bottom 5 team or a loss.  Color me unimpressed.