Pirates fans have to have their fun wherever they can get it, and in the past, oh, 18 years or so, most of the fun has been about the misery of others: the Astros' often-terrible farm system, the Brewers' 2009 rotation, the Reds careers of Eric Milton and Jimmy Haynes, Kip Wells' season with the 2007 Cardinals ...
↵Well, I won't lie. None of those things were really that satisfying. Or even all that bad for the teams involved. It's always the Pirates who have it the worst. But at least we have the Cubs.
↵Leave it to the Cubs to have a scuffle in the dugout during a game. In the first inning. Of Spring Training. Spring Training games don't matter in the standings, but they matter when you're trying to make the team, and that's why Carlos Silva was upset after the Cubs committed three errors in the first inning with him on the mound. He had words with third baseman Aramis Ramirez, and the two were swiftly separated. Silva didn't speak to the media, but Ramirez pinned the problem on Silva:
↵↵↵‘‘He’s fighting for a spot right now, so he wants to do good. It matters for him,’’ Ramirez said. ‘‘It might not matter for somebody like [Matt] Garza or [Ryan] Dempster, but he has to do good to get in the rotation. And obviously he didn’t do it today.’’
↵So when Silva went off, was Ramirez playing the part of peacemaker?
↵‘‘I’m not a troublemaker — put it that way,’’ he said.
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Of course, Pirates pitchers would have a pretty legitimate beef with their fielders as well, but at least none of them are picking fights over it. Silva is a pitch-to-contact guy, so he depends heavily on his defense, but that's no excuse for getting into it with a teammates. Ironically, Silva came to the Cubs in a trade for the notoriously angry Milton Bradley - it can't feel good when you trade Milton Bradley for a guy, and then that guy starts a fight in the dugout.
↵The Cubs had another dugout incident last season, when Carlos Zambrano walked around the dugout ranting and eventually began arguing with Derrek Lee.