CHICAGO -- Exactly a month from today, the Pirates will be packing their bags in Miami and mercifully concluding this 2010 season already destined to finish as one of the franchise's worst. That destiny alone would appear to set up the coming month as possibly the least relevant, least urgent in recent memory. But is it? (Today)

For anyone caught up in the 50th anniversary celebration of the 1960 Pirates, a weekend of events is on tap -- from Cooperstown to the unveiling of the Bill Mazeroski statue at PNC Park to the opening of an exhibit at the Heinz History Center. First up is Colleen Hroncich at 1 p.m. today at the author series program at the Baseball Hall of Fame and Museum in Cooperstown, N.Y. (Today)

CHICAGO -- The Pirates' 5-3 loss Wednesday afternoon to the Chicago Cubs can be condensed to two essential elements: 1. Neil Walker, visibly approaching each at-bat with a gloriously carefree confidence, homered for the fourth time in five games and went 3 for 5 with a double. (Yesterday)

CHICAGO -- The term is "4-A player," and John Bowker clearly does not like it. (Yesterday)

The attorney for a man accused of killing Los Angeles Angels pitcher Nick Adenhart and two others in a drunken driving crash cannot introduce evidence that the driver of Adenhart's car may also have been drinking, a judge ruled Wednesday. The evidence is irrelevant in the triple-murder trial of Andrew Gallo, 23, an Orange County Superior Court judge said at a motions hearing. (Yesterday)