DearMarkCuban.com
Parking lot of PNC Park
Pittsburgh, PA

August 14, 2006

 

Mark Cuban
Super-Rich Burgh Native
Dallas, TX

 

Dear Mark Cuban,

You once wrote: "People who don't whine are punching bags. They just go about their days, their jobs, their lives, knowing there is nothing they can do to change a darn thing, so why say a word? They see no reason to whine because they know they are incapable of affecting change."

Consider this the collective whine of the City of Pittsburgh.

I am writing to you about the currently dismal (but I also must say "completely hopeful! full of potential!") Pittsburgh Pirates.

Wait! Don't go away. This isn't the same old, same old. This is the NEW AND IMPROVED same old -- now with 25% more begging.

I know what you're wondering. How can this person suggest that she knows the feelings, thoughts, and wants of an entire city? Well, when you have lived through what will now be 14 seasons of losing baseball -- the last five of them played in a gorgeous park that your tax dollars paid

 

 

 

 

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for with the promise that it would let the Pirates once again field a winning team, only to realize you've been had by money-hungry businessmen -- there are really only a few ways to feel: sad, mad, and bad.

So yeah, I'm speaking for most everyone in the city.

Right now, Pittsburgh isn't really a baseball town. How do you remain a baseball town when you're forced to rally around a team as poorly managed as the Buccos? But we COULD BE a baseball town. Know how I know? Because of the lump that rose in my throat, and in lots of Burghers' throats, when the cheers rose up for Jason Bay and Freddy Sanchez during player introductions at the All Star Game.

We want to cheer for the Pirates. We want to be proud of them. We want to go to PNC Park for the good baseball and the awesome hotdogs -- not just for the awesome hotdogs. At the All-Star game, after 13 years, we finally got another little taste of what it's like to be proud of the Pirates. We liked it -- loved it. We want more of it.

And that's where you come in. The current owners don't care about Pittsburgh. They care about money. You have too damn much money to put it first -- you view money as secondary, and that's an attitude we need.

But this isn't about your money; this is about your passion.

Kevin McClatchy looks at the people of the Burgh and I think he sees mullet-headed, beer-bellied, low-class, blue-collared losers who are so far beneath where he's floating in his $6,000 sweater vest, we look like specks of dust that should be vaporized with some spray.

 

 

 

 

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You look at us Burghers and see hard working, cool, ordinary people who deserve more than "there's always next year" promises.

Maybe, it's time there wasn't a next year for McClatchy and the Nuttings.

Please don't think that, if you buy the Pirates, we're going to give you only a year to fix the team. We aren't the kind of fans that ask for the heads of every owner, manager, player, usher, beer man, and ketchup-packet handler as soon as there's a hint of things not going well. Hell, it took us 13 years to finally be brave enough to whine.

We need your "whatever it takes" philosophy. We need to see you cheering your ass off behind home plate in that red-faced, deranged sort of way you cheer.

And as for the claim that the Pirates are not for sale: You know as well as we do that EVERYTHING is for sale. You just need to make them an offer they can’t refuse.

You know you want it. We want you to have it. So why don’t you go and get it?

Sometimes, it really is that simple.

Peace,
PittGirl

 

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