An open letter? Weak.

I try to make it a personal policy to not respond to brainless pieces writing about the Pirates that would require me to put in ten times more thought and effort than the original writer did, so I’m going to leave the PG Editorial Board’s “Open Letter to Bob Nutting” alone because you all already know how I feel about this kind of thing. Frankly, if they’re not going to think before they write about the Pirates, I’m not going to think about them period.

What I will do, however, is post Craig Calcaterra’s (formerly of Shysterball Fame, now writing for NBC’s Circling the Bases blog) mini-rant on “open letters” from a couple of weeks ago.

You wanna say something to someone, write them a letter. You want to tell your readers or viewers what you think of someone else, tell them what you think.  Open letters are lazy-ass gimmicks which allow the writer to smugly pretend that they’re giving someone advice when he’s really being a passive-aggressive condescending prick. They’re the literary equivalent of “hey, I’m just sayin.'”  How about this: just say it.

Ah. I feel better now.

UPDATED TO ADD: This link from Traco Bucco in the comments just blew my mind.

UPDATED AGAIN: Please, please, please read Charlie’s post on this. It’s fantastic.