By Ron Cook, Pittsburgh Post-Gazette
It's true, everything really is relative.
"What are we? Four games under .500? That's nothing," Pirates shortstop Jack Wilson was saying the other day.
"I've been on a lot of teams here that would have loved to be in this position at this point of the season. Last year's team. The year before that. The year before that ..."
OK, enough already.
We get the idea.
Wilson has played on a lot of dreadful Pirates teams.
Would you believe a collective 170 games under .500 in his eight seasons?
With New York Yankees captain Derek Jeter in town for a three-game series starting tonight at PNC Park, this seemed like a good time to ask Wilson -- the longest-tenured Pirates player -- if he feels cheated by the baseball gods. Jeter, also a shortstop, has won four World Series rings and been to the playoffs every year since joining the Yankees in 1995. Wilson hasn't played on even one winning team.
It just doesn't seem right.
Does the great Jeter really have to be so greedy?
"That's a dream career right there," Wilson said of Jeter's Yankees days.
"But my life is great, too. It's pointless to think what it would be like if I was somewhere else. I'm not there. I'm here. Does the losing suck? Sure, it does. But I love what I'm doing. I feel like I'm blessed beyond belief."
The money is a part of it. Wilson knows it's foolish to say otherwise. This is a guy who couldn't afford to get his teeth fixed when he joined the Pirates in 2001. Now, he's making $6.65 million this season as a part of the three-year, $20.2 million extension through '09 that he signed before the '06 season, although he says, "We still shop at Wal-Mart."
But there's more to it.
Pittsburgh Pirates' Jack Wilson (2) slides safely into third ahead of the relay throw to Toronto Blue Jays third baseman Scott Rolen, left, in the first inning of a baseball game at Pittsburgh, Sunday, June 22, 2008. Wilson advanced from first to third on a single by Pirates' Nate McLouth.
(AP Photo/Gene J. Puskar)
Wilson said he loves Pittsburgh. "When I first came up, they took me in here and they've been with me ever since." He said he's happy to be raising his young family -- son Jacob, 6, and daughters Jaidyn, 2, and Jersi, 9 months -- at his in-season home in the North Hills. He said he likes playing with his teammates, especially good pals Freddy Sanchez and Jason Bay. And he said he still believes the Pirates are going to win one day, even if a lot of us don't see it happening in our lifetime.
"If you don't trust in your teammates and think you can win, why come to the field every day?" Wilson asked. "Why even get up in the morning?"
That unshakable belief is why Wilson said he wasn't heartbroken when he wasn't traded to the Detroit Tigers last year. You might be thinking what I'm thinking: All the players say they want to stay with the Pirates, yet all would just about kill to go to a team that has a better chance of winning. But Wilson said he proved his commitment by signing his new contract and giving up his right to become a free agent after last season.
"It looked like that trade was going to happen. The Louisville people even sent me bats with Detroit Tigers on them," Wilson said.
"I was OK with it if it happened. I'm a believer. Whatever is God's plan for me is God's plan. My goal at that point was, if it happened, I was going to show the Tigers why they were right to want me, and, if it didn't, I was going to show the Pirates why they were right for keeping me. I ended up having a pretty good second half."
This season hasn't been so kind to Wilson. The Pirates might be having a decent year by their horrendous standards -- they are 36-40, in fourth place in the National League Central Division and trail the first-place Chicago Cubs by 12 games -- but that's still brutal baseball. On top of that, Wilson missed most of April and May with a calf injury.
"I'm just so happy to be playing," he said.
Pittsburgh Pirates' left to right, Freddy Sanchez, Jack Wilson and Nate McLouth celebrate their 5-4 win against the Baltimore Orioles in a baseball game Sunday, June 15, 2008 in Baltimore.
(AP Photo/Gail Burton)
Wilson doesn't plan on playing much longer. He said he sees himself "shutting it down after I get in 10 years." That would take him through the '10 season, when the Pirates have an $8.4 million option on him.
"Everything changes when you have kids," Wilson said. "You have a new reason for playing and a new reason for getting out.
"Having three little ones is a very tough road for my wife. I want to help her raise our kids. I want to see them grow up."
The Pirates had better hurry if they're going to win a championship in the Wilson era. He said he often has thought about how "phenomenal" that would be. He was here in January '06 for PirateFest and saw the energy generated by the Steelers before they beat the Seattle Seahawks in Super Bowl XL. He saw the same enthusiasm this spring during the Penguins' run to the Stanley Cup final.
"It would mean everything if we could do it," Wilson said. "All the games, all the seasons that have gone wrong ... everything would be fixed. All the bad stuff would go away. I could say we seriously accomplished something huge."
A guy can dream, can't he?
In millions and millions of ways, one championship for Wilson would trump Jeter's four.
Hey, it's all relative, right?
Ron Cook can be reached at rcook@post-gazette.com.
First published on June 24, 2008 at 12:00 am
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