Pirates’ ineptness hard to hide

The Pittsburgh Pirates hid the signings of their manager and general manager to new contracts. They misled their fans about the recall of top prospect Pedro Alvarez. They were ridiculed nationally for firing one of their racing mascots.

Celebrating the golden moment in franchise history, they couldn’t even get the final scores of the 1960 World Series correct.

All this represented a single week in yet another miserable first half for the Pirates, one that greatly resembled those in the record 17 consecutive losing seasons that preceded it.

As the Pirates (30-58) jockeyed with Baltimore (29-59) to own the worst record in the majors at the All-Star break, they crammed a full season’s worth of ineptness into only 3 1/2 months.