Peter Diana, Post-Gazette All-Star Freddy Sanchez accommodates a fan along the rail yesterday. So what if he was wearing a Giants shirt. This is the All-Star Game. Click photo for larger image.

Roy Oswalt, the Houston Astros' fireballing gem, was asked yesterday to try to imagine how frustrating it must be for Pittsburghers to put up with so much losing baseball for so long.

And he paused to interrupt.

"When was the last time they won?" he wondered aloud. "I think it was when Phil Garner was playing here, right?"

In the World Series sense, that was right, way back with Willie Stargell's Family in 1979.

"Oh. ... It's been pretty bad for a while, then, huh?"

The guy has no idea.

Never mind the agony of falling short with those three division championship teams.

And set aside, even, the current Pirates having the worst record in the game, well on their way to a 14th consecutive losing campaign.

Just think of it this way: Until tonight, when the 77th All-Star Game will decide home-field advantage for the World Series, it will have been nearly a decade since the most recent Major League Baseball contest in Pittsburgh with actual playoff implications.

The previous one: Sept. 22, 1997, at Three Rivers Stadium.

Jason Schmidt went seven strong innings that night, and the Pirates edged the St. Louis Cardinals, 3-1, to remain within 3 1/2 games of Houston for top spot in the Central. But that memorable outfit, dubbed "The Freak Show" because of its $9 million payroll, fell short in the five road games that followed.

Since then? More misery in Three Rivers and an even deeper, darker hole at PNC Park. From the time the Pirates' new home opened in 2001, fans have stepped through the gates to cheer on a home team with a winning record for a total of 29 games, never later in any season than May 15.

Ask some of the sport's best, brightest and most influential players, and they will express some empathy for the franchise and those who still follow it.

But their dominant message yesterday was this: The Pirates have no excuses.

"I'm sure it's frustrating for everyone here," New York Yankees third baseman Alex Rodriguez said. "But with the system we have in place right now, every team has hope. If you look at what revenue sharing has done, if you look at the way Oakland, Minnesota and now Detroit operate, you can get to where you're a player or two away, or a good decision by the manager away. Good baseball decisions can be made in Pittsburgh, too."

Rodriguez, the game's highest-salaried player at $25 million, plays for the highest-salaried team. The Yankees' payroll is $194 million, roughly quadruple the Pirates' $48 million. Only three teams -- the Colorado Rockies, Tampa Bay Devil Rays and Florida Marlins -- are lower.

As many All-Stars pointed out, though, the Marlins, Rockies and others in the Pirates' range are in contention.

"I don't see it as hopeless here at all," Yankees shortstop Derek Jeter said. "There are teams that have won without a big payroll. Look at the teams that have beaten us. The 2003 Marlins didn't have a huge payroll. Neither did Anaheim."

Florida's payroll was $49 million when it beat the Yankees in the World Series, Anaheim's $97 million in eliminating them last season.

"Just because we have money doesn't mean we're going to win," Jeter continued. "You have to do things the right way. I'm unfamiliar with the Pittsburgh organization, but I know they have a great stadium and some great players, and I'm sure things will turn around."

Tom Glavine, the New York Mets' starter whose prominent role with the players' union has been instrumental in keeping baseball the only major sport without a salary cap, pointed to the top of the Pirates' hierarchy.

"I don't know the ins and outs of what's going on here with the ownership group, but you have to take a look at that and see if that's a source of the problem," he said. "You have teams over the past few years that weren't doing well before, but they're doing well now. You have to ask that question: Have the economics of those other teams changed so dramatically? Or have the people who run those organizations done a better job of putting a team together?"

He sharply rejected the idea that the economic system prevents the Pirates from competing.

"You can't get a whole lot more parity in baseball than we have this year. There are some pretty even races across the board. It can be done. Obviously, it's not easy, but I don't care what anyone says, you're not going to have a system that allows everybody to have the same opportunity that the Yankees have because the Yankees are in a unique market."

The parity argument can swing in each direction: The past four World Series have had the maximum eight participants, and the National League has sent a different team each of the past eight years. At the same time, the teams with the 10 lowest payrolls last year produced only two winning records, five of the six last-place finishes and zero playoff games.

For the Pirates, that would be zero playoff games since Oct. 14, 1992, in Atlanta against Glavine's Braves. (Yes, that game.)

"I'm sure the people of Pittsburgh are hungry for playoff baseball," Glavine said. "I'll bet, if you ask people, they'd tell you they'd rather have a playoff game here than the All-Star Game. But you know what? I think there are a lot of us around baseball who would like to see the Pirates get back to where they were."

Barry Zito, staff ace in Oakland, has seen his Athletics prosper despite payrolls close to the Pirates'. Their innovative general manager, Billy Beane, was the subject of "Moneyball," the most heavily discussed baseball book of this generation.

"People always want to point to payroll as a reason they're not winning, but you could also point to someone poor and say they'll never amount to anything," Zito said. "There are teams that have overcome it."

He credited Beane.

"Billy is a huge example. If you manage the team right, come up with your own ideas or just have a great eye for talent, you'll be able to sign guys no one ever heard of. We've done that all the time, and they actually help us in the playoffs. Payroll's an easy thing to point the finger at, but it's a scapegoat."

A.J. Pierzynski, outspoken catcher of the Chicago White Sox, said a losing culture can be blamed, too. He said he and teammate Rob Mackowiak, formerly of the Pirates, often discussed the difference in the atmosphere that built the White Sox into a champion last year and the one in Pittsburgh.

"Rob would always say how bad it was, how hard it was to come to the park," Pierzynski said. "The park is beautiful, but you don't get big crowds and you don't come to the place with the sense you're going to win every day ... it's tough. You feel sorry for the players, for the fans, for everyone because you'd like to see everyone have a chance."

Asked if the game's economics are to blame: "I don't think so. Florida wins. When I was in Minnesota, everyone said we were a Class AAA team, and we went to the ALCS. You just have to develop talent. ... And you do have to spend at least a little money."

"There's still hope here," San Diego Padres closer Trevor Hoffman said. "Detroit looked pretty bad not that long ago, and Jimmy Leyland comes in and puts his stamp on things, and look where they're at."

Other players wondered, simply, why the Pirates were not doing more with what they have.

"I don't really understand it," Milwaukee Brewers closer Derrick Turnbow said. "You look at that lineup, at their pitching, and they've got a lot of talent there with Jason Bay, Freddy Sanchez, Jose Castillo and some others. You'd think they're going to turn it around."

"I know they expected more this year than what's happened so far, but it takes a while to come out of that mind-set where you just expect things to go wrong," Astros outfielder Lance Berkman said. "They've got talent, and they've certainly got young pitching."

The Pirates have other intangibles, too, he added.

"It's a good sports town. Look at the way they support the Steelers and Penguins. And, really, they still support the Pirates. I know their attendance isn't through the roof or anything, but people still come out. And this is one of the three or four best ballparks I've ever seen, so there's no reason they shouldn't be able to build something here."

For now, though, the city and the Pirates' two All-Star participants will have to settle for tonight.

Asked how he will approach a truly meaningful game, Bay answered bluntly, as always: "For Freddy and I to be part of what will be a playoff-type atmosphere ... it will be different."