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10/14/2009 3:33 AM

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Even though the Pittsburgh Pirates stopped playing their bush-league brand of baseball a week and a half ago, they're still getting my goat.

Let's turn the clock back to spring training. I was glad to learn that the ball club had hired sportswriter John Perrotto to run piratesreport.com, which ostensibly is a comprehensive online news source for the team.

John's new job seemed like a natural continuation of his two-decade stint as Pirates beat writer for the Beaver County Times. In fact, John said in a radio interview after landing the dot-com job that a key to him accepting was that he'd have the freedom to be objective in his reporting.

That, he was.

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What did that get him in the long run? Well, even the most sycophantic scribe couldn't have pulled much of anything positive from the Pirates' putrid stumble through the 2009 season, what with the 99 losses and the trading away of anyone who makes over major-league minimum.

So last week, the team decided to part ways with Perrotto, giving the old "want to go in another direction" excuse.

That direction might go something like this:

"Bob Nutting is a baseball genius, a generous man and someone who cares deeply about Pittsburgh sports fans, not the bottom line."

Geez, I'm surprised a bolt of lightning didn't just hit me ...

Anyway, please take that last quote and turn it around 180 degrees. Then repeat after me: I will never spend another penny on the Pirates. I will never spend another penny at the parking lots near PNC Park. I will never visit www.piratesreport.com unless it's to lodge yet another complaint about Perrotto getting the ax.

I've seen John every couple of years through journalists' gatherings and when he's come to talk to the Pittsburgh Society for American Baseball Research chapter. He's a great writer, has a tremendous appreciation for the national pastime and is a heck of a nice guy, to boot.

I was rooting for him with piratesreport.com, and I really hoped the team was serious about the objectivity factor.

But given the Pirates' track record in bollixing up just about everything since the early '90s, it came as no surprise to learn they showed Perrotto the door.

So, if any aspiring baseball writers are still around, there seems to be a job opening, one that apparently requires a fertile imagination.

As for John Perrotto, he's much too talented to stay on the sidelines for long. And the guess is that he'll land where he can truly be objective.

And then he can rip the Pirates some more new ones.

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