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  • Four Under The Radar Pirates I Am Super Excited To Watch In 2025

    Spring training is getting pretty close. Pitchers and catchers for the Pirates report on February 12th, and it won’t be long until we are seeing both old and new faces playing in Grapefruit League games down in Florida. Here in Pittsburgh, it is a little hard to get as psyched as we should be about…

  • Here’s How I Would Handle The Trade Deadline For The Penguins

    The trade deadline has started rather early this season. Last night, hockey fans were treated to a true blockbuster deal, when the Colorado Avalanche sent Mikko Rantanen to the Carolina Hurricanes for a package that included Marty Necas and Jack Drury. But while the NHL’s trade deadline isn’t until March 8th, this season offers a…

  • 2025 Is A Make Or Break Year For Henry Davis

    Over Ben Cherington’s six-year run as general manager of the Pittsburgh Pirates, his club has picked first overall two times. His most recent one, Paul Skenes, was a home run pick. Skenes, the NL Rookie of the Year in 2024, has already established himself as one of the best pitchers in all of baseball, and…

  • Three Potential Solutions To The Tristan Jarry Situation

    Saying this year has not gone to plan would be quite the understatement for Tristan Jarry. From a season debut that saw him get lit up for six goals against the New York Rangers, to being sent to the American Hockey League on a conditioning stint, to having career lows across the board, to now…

  • The Philip Tomasino Trade Is Kyle Dubas’ Mantra At Its Finest

    Pittsburgh Penguins general manager Kyle Dubas has a pretty difficult job. Some of that is self-inflicted.  By trying to execute the “rebuild on the fly” technique as he presides over the team, Dubas is holding himself in a pattern that is often sought after, but rarely actually able to work — keep the team competitive…

  • How Lucky We Are: Five Thoughts On Steelers’ Wild Card Loss

    I’m breaking the rules one more time. Yes, this has the Five Thoughts name and yes that is technically a lie, but the only way I can figure out how to write my genuine, honest thoughts on this game is to kind of just ramble along. I changed up the format one other time during…

  • Saturday Will Be The Most Defining Moment Of George Pickens’ NFL Career

    It’s been a trying year for Steelers wide receiver George Pickens. Now in his third NFL season, the former second round pick by Pittsburgh had racked up 850 receiving yards through 12 games and was on pace to hit a new career high. Then, a surprise hamstring injury struck Pickens, sidelining him for three weeks…

  • Bungled: Five Thoughts On Steelers’ Week 18 Loss

    Ok, um. I’ll be honest, I don’t really know where to start. I don’t really know what to say. But, that’s sort of what I do around here, so, I guess I’ll have to figure it out. 1: On The Way To One-And-Done The Steelers played some of the most uninspired games of football I…

  • The Two Best Goaltenders In The Penguins Organization Don’t Play In Pittsburgh

    Goaltending has been a frequent topic of discussion surrounding the Pittsburgh Penguins. Ever since Matt Murray’s demise and subsequent trade in the 2020 offseason, the Penguins have suffered instability and poor play at the position. It has cost them on several playoff runs (think 2021 and 2022), and is one of their biggest weaknesses this…

  • The Brotherhood And The Burghers: The Story Of Pittsburgh’s Players’ League Team

    Baseball was in a tense place in the late 1880s. The older National League and the upstart American Association had been competing for eyes, money, and players ever since the latter was formed in 1882. Though the more established NL had the long-term upper hand, the AA remained a thorn in the side of the…

  • Is Jesse Puljujärvi Getting Screwed Over By The Penguins?

    Jesse Puljujärvi’s career is quite illustrious. From being a fourth overall pick in a highly energetic Canadian market, to getting banished to the south in Carolina, to a rocky journey in Pittsburgh, the latest step in Puljujärvi’s NHL journey is being placed on waivers by the Penguins. In 21 games for the Penguins this season,…

  • Steelers’ Return Game Has Been Season-Long Issue

    When the NFL announced the implementation of the new Dynamic Kickoff, the Steelers were one of the first teams to respond accordingly. Shortly after the rule change, which brought touchbacks to the 30-yard line and made any kick that landed in the new “landing zone” have to be returned, the Steelers signed Cordarrelle Patterson, one…

  • Nightmare On Rooney Avenue: Five Thoughts On Steelers’ Week 17 Loss

    A lot of people outed themselves as drug users when they picked the Pittsburgh Steelers to beat the Kansas City Chiefs. Whatever they were on, I need some desperately after whatever I just watched on Christmas Day. I’m only half kidding, because while I did not think the Steelers had high chances of winning this…

  • What Are Reasonable Expectations For Andrew McCutchen In 2025?

    What has been long expected is finally official: Andrew McCutchen is back. He and the Pirates have agreed to a one year deal worth $5 million. His extension with the Pirates is identical to the deal he signed when he first re-joined the Pirates in 2023, and the one re-upped with the team last year.…

  • Ravaged: Five Thoughts On Steelers’ Week 16 Loss

    We knew that this stretch of games towards the end of the season was going to be brutal. In particular, a three game run in Philadelphia, Baltimore, and then at home to face Kansas City was a cruel and unusual punishment for any NFL team to endure. The Steelers are 0-2 in that stretch so…

  • Bryan Rust Is The Penguins’ X-Factor

    After a very rough start to the season, the Pittsburgh Penguins have started to right the ship as the NHL season nears the halfway point. After starting the season 3-7-1 and still being a measly 9-12-4 at the end of November, the Penguins have dragged themselves from the basement of the league standings and now…

  • Penguins Reunite With P.O. Joseph

    In a reunion I don’t think anyone saw coming, the Penguins have re-acquired defenseman P.O. Joseph from the St. Louis Blues. Going back to the Gateway to the West is the well-traveled future considerations, which is sure to get any Blues fan up out of their seats. With Marcus Pettersson now on Injured Reserve, the…

  • Playing A Sicko-Style Game With The 2020 Pittsburgh Pirates

    You can’t find a fanbase that is more traumatized than that of the Pittsburgh Pirates. Years upon years of helpless losing, watching star after star leave, and squandering what little opportunities they had will do that to anyone. So when it was announced that the Pirates were bringing back a blast from the past and…

  • Eagle Eyes: Five Thoughts On Steelers’ Week 15 Loss

    Yesterday wasn’t the ideal start to the toughest three game stretch any NFL team will face this season. The Steelers haven’t won in Philadelphia since 1965, and that streak lives on as the Eagles disassembled Pittsburgh, 27-13. For the Steelers to win a game like this, they needed a defensive masterclass and to limit the…

  • Some Thoughts On The Spencer Horwitz Trade

    Last night, the Pirates gave us a shocker when they announced that the team had acquired Spencer Horwitz from the Cleveland Guardians. Horwitz, who was picked up by the Guardians just hours prior, spent last season with the Toronto Blue Jays. The deal, which involved three pitchers going back to the Guardians, saw the Pirates…

  • Elvis Alvarado Is A Low Risk, High Reward Signing

    Fans are getting restless. They are tired of the Pirates being all talk and no action. General manager Ben Cherington today said all the right things about improving the team and having higher expectations, but the team still sits with no real additions made. So understandably, there wasn’t an enthusiastic response when news broke that…

  • Why Roki Sasaki And The Pirates Are A Match Made In Heaven

    Alright, humor me for a few minutes. I know the likelihood of this is incredibly small. But if you can’t ever get excited about something like this why even live at all? So, allow me to tell you why Japanese star Roki Sasaki and the Pittsburgh Pirates are a match made in heaven. Sasaki is…

  • Slim Pickens: Five Thoughts On Steelers’ Week 14 Win

    The Cleveland Browns have not swept the Pittsburgh Steelers in a season since 1988. That streak will last at least one more year, as the Steelers enacted revenge from their Thursday night loss two weeks ago and beat the Browns 27-14. Now at 10-3, the Steelers will head into the NFL’s daunting four-game stretch to…

  • Replacing Aroldis Chapman Is Difficult, But Not Impossible

    On Tuesday, free agent reliever Aroldis Chapman and the Boston Red Sox agreed on a one year, $10.75 million dollar contract, ensuring that the former Pirate isn’t coming back to Pittsburgh in 2025.  His new deal with the Red Sox — his seventh major league team and fifth in the last four years — was…

  • Shootout: Five Thoughts On Steelers’ Week 13 Win

    Only the Pittsburgh Steelers could score 44 points in a game and still have their fans biting their nails in the final minutes. In a game that we definitely all saw coming, the Steelers won a complete shootout in Cincinnati with the Bengals, capping off the highest scoring NFL game this season, 44-38. It was…

  • A “Get Right” Game For Tristan Jarry

    I know, it looks lazy to have similar titles for the last two articles on this site. But allow me to explain. Wednesday night, I said that if, and a big emphasis on if, there was a chance for this Pittsburgh Penguins to claw back to relevancy this season, they needed to build on their…

  • If There Was Ever A “Get Right” Game For The Penguins, Thanksgiving Eve Was It

    Through injuries, subpar play, questionable coaching decisions, unreliable goaltending, and so many other things you could say, the Penguins entered their Thanksgiving Eve matchup with the Vancouver Canucks with only seven wins on the year. They’ve looked disastrous in almost every game they’ve played. They’ve showed no fight, no pushback, and no real way to…

  • Penguins Bring In Philip Tomasino In Change Of Scenery Deal

    It wasn’t the type of trade that perhaps a lot of Penguins fans have been hoping for, but the team has made a move. Earlier today, the team announced that they have acquired forward Philip Tomasino from the Nashville Predators in exchange for a 2027 fourth round pick. A lot has gone wrong in Nashville…

  • Two Truths And A Lie: Five Thoughts On Steelers’ Week 12 Loss

    Alright, let’s get the lie out of the way early. There will not be five thoughts in this edition. At least, not in the traditional, numbered format. There will be many thoughts, probably even more than five. But to be perfectly candid, it would drive me insane to have this be titled differently than every…

  • The Penguins Prospect I Am Most Excited About

    Even if very slowly, the youth wave is starting to form here in Pittsburgh. The opening night roster did not have a large youth presence; only Rutger McGroarty and Valtteri Puustinen really fit into that category to start the season. But as the season has dragged along, the Penguins have promoted several young players from…

  • The Wizard Of Boz: Five Thoughts On Steelers’ Week 11 Win

    It’s wild that it took us all the way until Week 11 for the first divisional game for the Pittsburgh Steelers this year, but after nine games on the ledger, a date with the Baltimore Ravens finally broke that streak. And it lived up to the name of AFC North football. By that, I mean…

  • Penguins Give Vasili Ponomarev Deserved Chance

    The Pittsburgh Penguins announced a series of roster moves earlier this morning. Heading back down to the American Hockey League is Joel Blomqvist, the defenseless rookie who has not experienced much help from the team in front of him. But, coming up from Wilkes-Barre/Scranton are Matt Nieto, arriving from his conditioning stint in the AHL,…

  • Willowing In Washington: Five Thoughts On Steelers’ Week 10 Win

    Heading into Sunday afternoon in Washington, Mike Tomlin was in an advantageous position. Since taking the head coaching gig of the Pittsburgh Steelers, Tomlin was 13-4 coming out of the bye week and 25-6 all-time against rookie quarterbacks. But this was no typical game coming out of the bye week. And there was no ordinary…

  • A Look At Tristan Jarry’s AHL Conditioning Stint

    Tristan Jarry is officially back. In a duo of roster moves announced yesterday afternoon, the Pittsburgh Penguins recalled Jarry from his conditioning stint in the American Hockey League, as well as starting forward Matt Nieto on a conditioning stint as the latest step in activating him from Long Term Injured Reserve. Jarry, as we all…

  • What Are The Pirates Getting In Trey Cabbage?

    The offseason has officially begun, and the Pittsburgh Pirates are starting things off with some underwhelming moves. In their second addition of the break, the team claimed outfielder Trey Cabbage from the Houston Astros. Now, before I do a deep dive into Cabbage’s work and what I believe a potential Pirates tenure could look like,…

  • Penguins Honor Fleury, Who Steals The Show In Wild Win

  • Belittlement: Five Thoughts On Steelers’ Week 8 Win

    Phew, we made it. I’ll be honest, that game was a lot closer than I would have liked it to be, but in the end the Steelers took care of business in Pittsburgh, and belittled the New York Giants 26-18. Pittsburgh moves to 6-2 on the back of their 22nd consecutive Monday Night Football win,…

  • Revisiting The Last Time The Penguins Beat The Oilers

    Well, last night was another ugly loss, as the Penguins fell to the Oilers in Edmonton 4-0. Oilers netminder Stuart Skinner pitched his first shutout of the season against an uninspired Penguins team that was thoroughly outplayed in every facet of the game. It was Pittsburgh’s seventh loss in a row against Edmonton, with the…

  • Steelers Should Be Aggressive In Cooper Kupp Sweepstakes

    The Steelers have to make a move at wide receiver. It’s something that literally all of us have been pounding the table for before the season even began. It has been an endless cycle of receivers that we have glommed onto and hoped that they could come to Pittsburgh and help solve our offensive problems.…

  • Beanie Baby: Five Thoughts On Steelers’ Week 7 Win

    A primetime matchup. A halftime ceremony. Steeler legends in town. A former president in a suite. Career firsts on the offense and the defense. And the biggest decision of the season looming over the dark Pittsburgh sky. This game truly had everything. And at the end of the night, it had Najee Harris celebrating in…

  • Why Sending Rutger McGroarty To The AHL Will Benefit Him In The Long Run

    When Rutger McGroarty was in a dispute with his draft team, the Winnipeg Jets, he made his beliefs very clear. McGroarty believed he had the ability and the skill set to make the jump from college hockey straight to the National Hockey League.  McGroarty wanted to follow the same path that several of his University…

  • Jesse Puljujärvi Making A Strong Early Impression

    Last week, in one of my Take Four appearances for The Pitt News, I wrote that this is a make or break year for Jesse Puljujärvi. I very much believe that. The 26-year-old is heading into his eighth NHL year, and in the second of a two year contract he signed with the Penguins last…

  • Miracle In The Desert: Five Thoughts On Steelers’ Week 6 Win

    After tough losses in back to back games, the Steelers rebounded yesterday in Vegas with their biggest win of the season. The Steelers hung 32 points on the Raiders, their biggest offensive output since Week 16 of last year. In many ways, this game was an anomaly: the Steelers defense was over-delivering for even fans…

  • After Solid NHL Debut, Penguins Should Get Joel Blomqvist More Involved

    The only positive to come out of last night’s 6-0 shellacking at the hands of the New York Rangers was that it was the first of a back-to-back. There was no time to dwell on a nightmare start to the season (one that tied the worst home opener loss in franchise history), because the Penguins…

  • Uninspired Penguins Get Shelled In Home Opener

    Opening Night is awesome. It’s a new season, played on the ultimate fresh sheet of ice. The excitement and energy of the upcoming campaign always has the building buzzing. If only that energy was seen on the ice… As soon as the puck dropped on the new season for the hometown team and the visiting…

  • Ghosts: Five Thoughts On Steelers’ Week 5 Loss

    That’s the longest we’ve stayed up to watch a Steelers game in…well I don’t even know how long. But we probably would have been better off just going to sleep before 1AM anyways. After a late game drive that saw the Steelers go on top 17-13 in the fourth quarter, the defense could not hold…

  • A Primer To Follow Pirates Prospects In The Arizona Fall League

    Fall ball is officially here! Action in the Arizona Fall League kicks off today, as some of baseball’s best prospects meet out west in the sport’s off-season showcase. The Pittsburgh Pirates will have a big presence in Arizona this year, as some of their most discussed prospects will be suiting up and getting reps in…

  • Penguins Lose John Ludvig On Waivers

    It was a busy day on the waiver wire yesterday. In a day where 25 players were placed on waivers, the Pittsburgh Penguins made sweeping cuts to their preseason roster, waiving 6 players in the hopes of assigning them to their American Hockey League affiliate in Wilkes-Barre/Scranton. That list coming out of Pittsburgh was headlined…

  • The Only ‘Clear Evidence’ That Ben Cherington Has Is That He Has Failed

    Though I’m sure there can always be some eleventh hour change of heart by the very top of Pirates brass, it sure seems as though both general manager Ben Cherington and manager Derek Shelton are staying.  At least, that’s the outlook that was given by the Pirates today at Cherington’s end of year press conference.…

  • Giving Out 2024 Pittsburgh Pirates Awards

    A few days ago, I listed out my five contenders for the most random Pittsburgh Pirate of the 2024 season. There’s a pretty good list this year on tap for this award, which you can read all about here. But now that the season is officially over, I want to give out some much more…

  • Inept In Indy: Five Thoughts On Steelers’ Week 4 Loss

    This was a game of endless miscues. Frustrating, inexcusable, game-deciding miscues, and as a result, the Steelers will lose their first game of the season, falling to 3-1. The failed comeback attempt, led by Justin Fields and a surging offense, was admirable, but it quite frankly did not need to happen. Pittsburgh’s prized defense folded…

  • Who Was The Most Random Pirate In 2024?

    Random and obscure players have always been some of my favorite athletes to discuss. To me, part of the joy in writing about sports is getting to explore and cover the careers of the players who aren’t the biggest names on any given roster. If you’ve followed the Pirates for a while, you’ve been subjected…

  • Whatever You Think About The Rowdy Tellez Situation, The Fallout Was Entirely Avoidable…And That’s The Real Issue

    Yesterday was quite the day to be on Pirates Twitter/X, as the fallout from a shocking decision left this fanbase and the media very divided. The Pirates had announced that they were designating center fielder Michael A. Taylor and first baseman Rowdy Tellez for assignment. The minor league season is over, which means their seasons…

  • This Is Justin’s Job Now

    The Pittsburgh Steelers are 3-0. They sit atop the AFC North and have won all three games in a variety of different ways. Though their defense has been the dominating factor in all three, their offensive work has varied. Week 1 saw Chris Boswell turn into Superman and go 6/6 on field goals, half of…

  • Electric Feel: Five Thoughts On Steelers’ Week 3 Win

    What. A. Win. Though the final score only shows a 20-10 win for the Steelers in their home opener against the Los Angeles Chargers, this was an amazing win by Pittsburgh to improve to 3-0 on the season. Yesterday might not have been the “breakout” game for the offense as a whole that Arthur Smith…

  • Five Bold Penguins Predictions For The 2024-25 Season

    Hockey is almost back! The preseason for the Pittsburgh Penguins got underway last night, with the Penguins sending a chunk of their training camp roster up to Buffalo for the first preseason game of the year. It’s been a long offseason, and a very interesting one for the Penguins. They were busy in the trade…

  • Pirates Recall Triple-A Team’s Pitcher Of The Year

    It’s another moving day for Jake Woodford, who found himself designated for assignment again by the Pirates before tonight’s game. Woodford was recalled from Triple-A Indianapolis after his previous DFA’ing to pitch last night’s affair in St. Louis, where inn 4.2 innings he surrendered 4 earned runs and a homer. In his place, the team…

  • Would The Pirates Try Henry Davis In Right Field Again?

    It’s becoming a big question as we start to figure out what this Pittsburgh Pirates roster looks like in 2025.  Where is Henry Davis going to play? Though Davis has been largely awful, especially in the batting department, during his brief stints as a big leaguer, there’s no doubt that the former first overall pick…

  • Mile High Mania: Five Thoughts On Steelers’ Week 2 Win

    In a sloppy, gritty, penalty-filled affair in the Mile High City, the Steelers should consider themselves lucky to have escaped with a 13-6 win against the Broncos. It wasn’t the Russell Wilson revenge game we all had circled on our calendars, as he was hampered by that calf injury and was declared the emergency third…

  • If Billy Cook Isn’t Playing Every Day, What Was The Point?

    Friday night is always a good night for a visit to the ballpark. No matter how good the team is performing…and they aren’t performing well.  The Pirates fell to 70-77 in their series opener against the Kansas City Royals. Luis Ortiz was lit up in the second inning as the Royals hung 6 on the…