[ifspuds]

In a departure from my usual narrative, I was chatting with a friend about Time Warp today and I got to looking into how long the Pirates have been together.

The Pirates "got good" in 1962, but the team's been together mostly since 1963. I got to looking at who's been around since 1963 and it's pretty amazing. These are the starters since 1963 with their total years of Pirates service (full seasons only, not counting injuries), with current starters listed in bold.

SP: Levi Sellers (1958-current)
SP: George Adkison (1962-current)
SP: Hipolito Castillo (1962-current)
SP: Jack Hassery (1963-current)

RP: Lynn Willmon (1963-current)

C: Henry Cruz (1967-current), Joey Rustin (1964-1966), Doug Provenzano (1963)
1B: Al Mahoney (1965-current), Charlton Brown (1963-1964), Fletcher Jones (1965-1968)
2B: Alberto Val (1960-current)
3B: Ben Trome (1961-current)
SS: Tim Crusher (1963-current)

OF: Cap Marcrum (1963-current)
OF: Asa Booker (1960-current)
OF: Melchior Cifuentes (1969-current), Al Mahoney (1965-current), Linwood Felice (1963-1970)

So the top 4 SPs, the top RP, 3 of the 4 IFs and 2 of the 3 OFs have been together continuously (barring injury) since 1963. Mahoney joined the crowd in 1965 and Cifuentes in 1969. When TWB sportswriters of the modern era start whining about how there's no loyalty in baseball any more and free agency has ruined team continuity, they're going to point to the Pirates as what the "good old days" looked like.

I thought I'd also look at how many of these players are "homegrown" (shown in bold). My definition of homegrown is someone who spent the significant majority of their minor league career in the organization or made their major developmental leaps while a Pirate. So, for example, George Adkison is counted as homegrown. Even though he was good coming out of the draft, he was not the player he eventually became. Feel free to argue with my "methodology", such as it is.

SP: Levi Sellers - drafted in 1957 (CIN, 1/12), traded to PIT 7/1/57. Took major developmental leaps as a Red.
SP: George Adkison - drafted in 1961 (KCA, 1/9), traded to PIT 4/10/61.
SP: Hipolito Castillo - drafted in 1960 (PIT, 2/1, 17th overall)
SP: Jack Hassery - drafted in 1960 (PIT, 1/1)

RP: Lynn Willmon - drafted in 1959 (NYA, 2/9, 25th overall), traded to PIT 3/2/59.

C: Henry Cruz - drafted in 1956 (BAL, 1/8)
1B: Al Mahoney - drafted in 1959 (MIL, 1/8), traded to PIT 4/10/61.
2B: Alberto Val - drafted in 1957 (CLE, 2/7, 23rd overall), traded to PIT 3/2/1959
3B: Ben Trome - drafted in 1958 (PIT, 2/9, 25th overall)
SS: Tim Crusher - drafted in 1961 (PIT, 1/6)

OF: Cap Marcrum - drafted in 1962 (PIT, 1/1)
OF: Asa Booker - drafted in 1954 (MIL, 1/3), traded to PIT 4/1/60.
OF: Melchior Cifuentes - drafted in 1961 (CLE, 1/11), traded to PIT 6/1/64.

8 of 13 players homegrown, 5 of them drafted by Pittsburgh. I'm going to go out on a limb and guess that, for an online league especially, it's pretty unusual to have a team built in this fashion that's become this successful. Would any readers care to comment on that assertion?