WATCH: Pirates grounds crew struggles with tarp, leaves 1st baseline exposed to the elements
We all knew the Pittsburgh Pirates were a poverty franchise, but the organization’s response to heavy rain was lackluster, to say the least. The grounds crew just couldn’t get the tarp to cover the whole infield, leaving the first baseline exposed to the rain for wayyyy too long.
The Pirates grounds crew had a tough time getting the tarp over the infield, and that’s putting it mildly:
And an aerial view:
The worst tarp job in history might be a fair assessment, but there’s more to this than meets the eye.
In all honesty, the Pirates grounds crew kind of got shafted by the umpires in this scenario. When Wheeler asked for a new ball, they should’ve called a delay immediately and let the crew get to work. It was dumping buckets out there, and if the radar showed it’d move through quickly,
Instead, the crew chief was putzing around an increasingly soaked infield, thinking, “I don’t think the heavy stuff’s going to come down for quite a while” as puddles formed across the basepaths.
Maybe waiting to call the delay didn’t exacerbate the issue, and the Pirates grounds crew just sucks, but I refuse to believe that explanation. Those guys were undermanned and outgunned in this scenario, and it certainly wasn’t due to lack of effort.
I mean, just look at this guy. He left it all out on the field.
Regardless of the effort, though, the field was totally trashed by the weather, causing a much longer delay. I don’t mind a delay, but I DO mind NBCS Philadelphia refusing to sync the audio and video for their weather delay video packages. That’s the greater embarrassment when compared to the Pirates grounds crew.
Mandatory Credit: Matt Gelb
