Gorzo On The Mic
By Tony DeFazio

Tom Gorzelanny doesn't get it.

"It" has nothing to do with his Double-X sized ERA, or his horrendous walk-to-innings pitched ratio (50 walks in 71 innings at press time), or even the April-May stretch of nine starts in which he failed to get through the third innings three times.

"It" has more to do with a couple of comments Gorzo made during the "Miked-Up Tuesday" portion of a recent Pirates telecast last month.

On "Miked-Up Tuesday," the Pirates' broadcast team conducts an interview with a player directly from the dugout, in the middle of a game. Presumably, this allows the Pirates to give their fans a glimpse into an actual major league dugout, right in the middle of an actual major league game.

For a team second-to-last in the majors in attendance and trying to end a 15-year streak of futility, reaching out to the fans-in whatever way possible-seems like a good idea.

In theory, anyway.

But on a Tuesday late last month, in the middle of their historically bad series with the Chicago White Sox-during which the Pirates allowed 37 runs in three games-the Bucs miked-up Gorzo and turned him loose on the fans watching at home. The 28-year-old lefty, who would take the mound the next afternoon, was asked about baseball's age-old tradition of charting pitches.

Traditionally, the pitcher scheduled to start the next day charts that night's starter, keeping track of each pitch and each result. In addition to providing his fellow starting pitcher-Ian Snell in this case-with invaluable information on a pitch-by-pitch basis, the process also provides the guy keeping the chart with some pretty useful information regarding the very batters he'll face the next day. You know, stuff like which batters are struggling with certain pitches, how certain batters approach specific situations. Information that might come in handy when he faces the same hitters.

In theory, anyway.

On this particular Tuesday, Gorzelanny brilliantly illustrated the difference between mere theory and scientific rule.

Gorzo, looking as bored as a 10-year-old boy watching an Oprah special on manicures, deftly spun such phrases as, "Eh, I never know what Ian's throwing anyway," and, "I don't really learn much."

Really, Tom?

I wonder if Greg Maddux learned anything from charting pitches? Maddux, owner of 350 major league wins, was called "Professor" by teammates, partly because of his obsessive ways when it came to charting pitches.

Incidentally, Gorzo was dead-on with both points - Chicago appeared to have a much better idea of what Snell was serving up than Gorzelanny did, as the Sox torched Snell for nine hits, six walks and seven runs in four innings. And then Gorzelanny went out the next day and surrendered three home runs while losing his sixth of the year.

But, again, it's not even the results that Gorzelanny delivered that mattered most in this situation. It's the message that Gorzelanny delivered.

That message, delivered loud and clear, was, "I don't care."

He never said those words. But he may as well have.

His words, and the attitude behind them, are the type of ho-hum, we-lost-again attitude that have been disgusting fans for 15 years.

I wasn't at the Miked Up Tuesday meeting, but my guess is that's not quite what the Pirates had in mind when they decided to give fans an inside look at the dugout.

It's the kind of thing, in theory, that threatens to turn fans off to the team entirely.

And that's one theory that's quickly approaching rule status.

Tony DeFazio is the editor of the Pittsburgh Sports Report. Disagree with him at tdefazio (at) psrpt.com.