Arkansas Business

This story is from the archives of ArkansasSports360.com.

There's the baseball adage — not always true, but statistically more accurate than not — that a team leading its division by the All-Star break will win said division.

Of course, we're talking here about the Pittsburgh Pirates leading the National League's Central Division, the same Pirates who haven't had a winner in 20 years and the same Pirates who have been the Central Division dregs for much of most people's lifetime. But after collapsing in the second half last year, the year-older Pirates may understand better what it will take in August and September to win a clearly winnable division for them.

Who saw this coming in March? Who saw the trade of North Little Rock's A.J. Burnett from the New York Yankees to the Pirates in the off-season as being anything but a positive for New York?

To say Burnett struggled last season as a Yankee would be like noting MLB commissioner Bud Selig is wishy-washy.

In most years, being traded from the Yankees to the Pirates would be akin to a demotion to Triple-A level. The Yankees' Triple-A teams of the past two decades, and a few other Triple-A farm clubs, often were probably better than the Pirates.

To start off his Pirates' career, Burnett promptly took a spring-training bunt in the face, requiring eye surgery.

So, in spite of all we knew going into 2012, at this seasonal milestone we find the Pirates leading the Central Division by one game, while A.J. Burnett is the ace of the Pirates' staff with a 10-2 record and a 3.83 earned-run average.

J. Brady McCollough of the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette had this excellent Sunday piece on A.J.'s first three-months-and-change with the Pirates, before Burnett went out and dominated San Francisco for his 10th win of the year.

Getting away from the fishbowl that is New York has been the perfect pitching antidote for the laid-back Burnett. His 34-35 record and 4.79 ERA in four seasons (paid at $17 million per year, too) left not only the New York fans, but the what-have-you-done-for-me-lately New York media on his case through the end of last year.

Now in quieter Pittsburgh, the new-and-improved Burnett is back to sporting facial hair (with the Yankees, that was a no-no), and he's found teammates that think like he does away from the ballpark, as McCollough's feature points out.

He may have been the first player Yankees fans wanted out of the Big Apple, but his Pittsburgh teammates view him in a different light. In Pittsburgh, where the fans are blessed with one of the neatest stadiums in the country (imagine everything you love about Dickey-Stephens Park here, times about 6), he's looked at as a veteran leader (and, speaking of that, it's hard to believe A.J. is already 35 years old; seems like just a short while ago we saw him starring for the North Little Rock Colts American Legion team coached by his dad).

With Pittsburgh, Burnett is with a team that has flown under the radar so long, nobody's bothering to track it anymore. So, there the Pirates are, in first place, led by a feisty manager in Clint Hurdle, a bona fide star in Andrew McCutcheon (watch him tonight in the All-Star Game from Kansas City) and a revitalized 6-foot-4 veteran pitcher who appears to be happy again and has regained control of his blazing fastball. After he departed with the lead Sunday in his 10th win of the season, Pirates fans gave him a standing ovation.

McCollough says it nicely via a comment from Hurdle:

Pirates manager Clint Hurdle calls Burnett and the Pirates a marriage that is working for both sides. He sees the budding relationship between Burnett and the fans as a key.

"Hey, who doesn't like to be rooted for?" Hurdle said. "You know, Norm always perked up when he walked into Cheers."