In 2015, the Professional Disc Golf Association’s world championships will be here in Pittsburgh:

July 25 – August 1, the tournament will be played at Deer Lakes, Knob Hill and Moraine (state) Parks, as well as Slippery Rock University.

I’m very bad at Disc Golf.  It’s fun, but I just don’t have much aim.  While playing Ultimate in college (as one does), I was much better at catching than throwing, not that I was that great, but I made a few good plays between classes.

LaMarr Woodley is the new owner of the Pittsburgh Jack Rabbits, our PBA team which will be competing against, among others, Jerome Bettis’ Motown Muscle.

The announcement of the logos can be found here, although I may also be rooting for Chris Hardwick’s Atom Splitters, as I’m a huge fan of the Nerdist industries.

It’s still the holiday season, so I don’t feel too bad posting this so late, but check out a fantastic poem over at The Pensblog.

And then cry because we still don’t have hockey.

I’m late to the game on this one, and there isn’t much time left, but I’m hoping that there will be some sort of last-minute push to put this over the edge: a Kickstarter project to support the all-volunteer Steelers Drum Line.

While it’s not official (yet), you’ve probably seen them on the North Shore before home games.

If you have some money you can throw in, it would be appreciated.  Besides, we can’t let Baltimore have something that we don’t!

Find out more and pledge here.

A few weeks ago, news broke that McClatchy, former owner of the Pirates, came out after being away from the organization (and I think the city) for years.

The New York Times has an extensive story on the subject, and it includes this bit:

And pro sports offers a frontier on which there’s considerable good to be done

While that is true (the sentence is referencing the generally homophobic culture of sports, albeit one that is slowly changing), I think lately we’ve seen a big shift in the thinking, or at least public face, or sports.  Homophobia seems to be disappearing (with some kicking and screaming), but I’m not convinced that a retired owner of the Pirates is really going to do that much good in that arena.

That being said, apparently McClatchy and his family own the third largest newspaper corporation in the country, and combined with other connections, there is real possibility to do real good.

“So I’m curious to see how the public, particularly in Pittsburgh, responds,” Zeigler said, wondering aloud if they’ll blame McClatchy’s private burdens for his team’s performance.

Again, I’m not a huge baseball follower, no doubt in part of being exposed to the Pirates and their now epic fall clinching them 20 losing seasons in a row.  But from what I saw on Facebook when this broke, was it pretty much was well known anyway, and people find all kinds of things to blame the Pirates losing streak on, usually the owners and management, but not because of who they love, instead it is them doing a crappy job running a professional sports team that got us into this mess.

Does this change much?  I don’t really think so.  The Pirates are still in the midst of the longest streak of professional sports losses, and doing so in a spectacular fashion.  Pittsburghers don’t need to hear much more than that, and that is a credit to them.

To see the amazing new video from Benstonium about the epic 20-season streak, click here.

In case you missed the announcement, Pittsburgh Dad will be running special new episodes on the jumbotron at Heinz Field during home Steelers games this year.

Already, people in the comments on youtube are hoping he discusses why it’s called a Jumbotron, but there is no jumbo on it.

Also, the videos should also eventually be posted online as well, as revealed in the comments on youtube as well.

Secondly, before each game, Saint Vincent College, home of the Steelers summer training camp (and my alma mater), will be airing some sort of special video as well.  Hopefully I’ll be able to be able to see it online sometime.

Orpik’s “You Can Play” ad ran during a recent Pirates broadcast and The Pensblog picked it up.

I think it speaks volumes about how far society (or at least how awesome Pittsburgh is), that the conversation quickly turned to Pringles, juggling, and other random bits of news, the commentors having written off those who had some sort of problem with the ad campaign.

Hot on the heels of the Pirates “It Gets Better” video, which I wrote about here, Brooks Orpik is teaming up with the “You Can Play” campaign.  Pensblog broke the story here:

“What matters to me and my teammates? A player with a hard slap shot. A player with awesome puck-handling skills. A player who can shoot. A guy who can help our team win”

Patrick Burke founded the campaign after his brother died and it’s been making a lot of traction as the playoffs continue.    The Post-Gazette interviews Orpik here, and he really does seem like a class act:

Orpik said the reaction he has received since his video was released last week “has been nothing but positive.” But he knows negative reaction might be coming from those fans who have no idea what the words “tolerant” and “accepting” mean. “If I do hear anything negative, it’ll probably be from people who have a problem with themselves and don’t like who they are.”

Check out the video here, and the comments from the Pensblog fans in the youtube comments make it just as much fun as the sad comments on the Pirates video.

The Pirates are the first of the three main sports teams in Pittsburgh to make an “It Gets Better” Video, which aired in PNC Park before a recent game.   Check out the video here.

The Pirates are also working on programs to support local LGBT organizations, and President Frank Coonelly had this to say:

We feel it is important to get the message out that there is no place in our society for bullying anyone for any reason,” he said. “The organization is pleased to utilize our resources to help call attention to this subject and to encourage those that have been a victim of bullying to come forward and seek help.

Pittsburgh City Paper covers the story here, and my favorite comment comes from YouTube, looking at the irony of the most-loosing professional sports team saying that “It Gets Better.”

Already got fireworks for the two run homer, and more coming up after the game.