Good time to be a Pittsburgh Pirates fan

Yep, it sure is a great time to be a fan of the storied franchise known as the Pittsburgh Pirates. Well, it's a great time, that is, as long as you're not too bent out of shape about the whole "no winning season since 1992" thing, and as long as you don't have too much hope for a championship in the near future.

No, it's a great time to be a Buccos fan if you have a sense of history, if you look to the past more than you do the present and the future. Happy days are here again for us long-suffering folks thanks to the ever-awesome MLB Network, which is serving up some nice Christmas presents for Pirates followers.

A few weeks ago, the channel ran "Baseball Seasons: 1971," a fine episode in its documentary series that focused on one of those years the Pirates actually ruled. If you missed this one, be on the lookout, as MLB reruns these fairly often.

Best of all, though, is this Wednesday's 3-hour special featuring a presentation of that 1960 Game 7 telecast recently found in Der Bingle's basement. The show will feature the game and interviewers with some of the participants in front of a live audience in Pittsburgh. It'll be a chance to look back on the days when the franchise was on top, and it promises to be a great nostalgic experience as well as a discovery for those of us (most of us) who never saw that historic game.

Not only is MLB showing that, but the same night, the network will show something called "Bing and Baseball," and really, what more do you need to know? A half-hour program that combines Bing Crosby and the sport of baseball sounds like a classic combination.

Lest I forgot, there's also an acclaimed book about by Aaron Skirboll called "The Pittsburgh Cocaine Seven," which tells the story of how Pittsburgh was at the center of the drug scandals that plagued the game during--uh, well, maybe this won't be a great nostalgic experience, but it's a good book about the Pirates, so that has to count for something?

Pirates fans, enjoy. The rest of you, thanks for permitting me the indulgence of this post. More content coming up later!