At Grantland, Jonah Keri previews the Pirates' 2012 season. It's not as depressing as you might expect.
↵↵↵The Bucs are a still a long shot to contend this year. But you'll see good baseball again in Pittsburgh in the not-too-distant future. And once the Pirates graduate all that young talent to the majors, they'll have a chance to stay good for a while. Patience.
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Of course, Pirates fans have heard that many times before, and while the Bucs are currently being run better than in the recent past (and that's not really meant to be a compliment to the Pirates' current management team), most other credible national analysts (and to be clear, Keri certainly falls into the "credible" category) aren't as sanguine about the Pirates' future as Keri evidently is.
↵Elsewhere, Keri points out Pedro Alvarez's importance to the 2012 Bucs, and he's right to -- if Alvarez is good, the Pirates will probably be downright watchable. If not, not so much.
↵For more on the Pirates, check out Bucs Dugout.