Darrell Sapp, Post-Gazette Reliever Ricardo Rincon throws against the Marlins in May 1997. Click photo for larger image. First in the series: '97 Pirates had some fun with run for division title More Pirates Coverage: Pirates minor-league report Stats Geek: Pirates' rotation at top as good as any in NL

The upstart 1997 Pirates opened the season April 1 in San Francisco on a cool, sunny afternoon.

Expectations were not high. The year before, new owner Kevin McClatchy had decided to rebuild, slashing the payroll from about $21 million to $9 million and retooling the roster with young players.

"If somebody had asked me if I thought we'd finish [only] four or five games under .500, I would have said, 'No, I don't think so,' " manager Gene Lamont said.

The opener was the first game of an eight-game trip that, so many people believed, would result in a 1-7 or 2-6 mark out of the chute and immediately relegate the Pirates to their expected status of irrelevant.

"They're announcing our lineup and they'd say a name and people would say, 'Who?' " Tony Womack said. "They'd say another name and people would say, 'Who?' "

The Pirates won the opener, 5-2. Kevin Elster, signed as a free agent after a rollicking stint with the New York Mets, had a two-run double in the seventh inning. Matt Reubel got the win in relief. John Ericks earned a save.

"This was a big win," Ericks said.

It was one game, someone noted.

"Still, it's a big win for this club -- after all that's happened here," Ericks said.

The Pirates wound up 4-4 on that trip, with Ericks getting a save in each victory.

As the team headed home, Womack had a sense of good stuff to come.

"We had a manager who believed in us, and guys wanted to prove they belonged in the big leagues," he said. "To tell you the truth, I think we all wanted to see how far we could take this. I think we took on some swagger."

Swagger?

"We had to let the baseball world know, 'Yeah, we're a bunch of no-names, but we have swagger,' " Womack said.

Perhaps they did.

Early on, those Pirates began winning games in unorthodox fashion. Or just plain crazy fashion.

Take the game April 15.

The Pirates entered the bottom of the ninth inning tied with San Diego, 2-2. They loaded the bases with one out on singles by Jason Kendall, rookie Jose Guillen and pinch-hitter Kevin Young. Sterling Hitchcock then hit Womack with an 0-2 pitch, and it was over.

Four days later against Cincinnati, they again won with a run in the ninth -- produced with two walks, a wild pitch and Young's sacrifice fly.

On April 24, they scored twice in the ninth at Chicago on Kendall's double and a throwing error to win, 4-3.

On April 28 at Philadelphia, they scored six runs on only three hits in the 12th inning to beat the Phillies.

On May 2 in Atlanta, they got a run-scoring single from Mark Johnson to take a 3-2 lead in the top of the ninth inning.

Moments later, Rich Loiselle, who became the closer that night because Ericks had a season-ending neck injury, faced a first-and-third, one-out jam.

Not to worry.

Pinch-hitter Andruw Jones lined to Loiselle, who caught the ball, then made a poor throw to first base. Young managed to catch it and step on first, doubling up Jeff Blauser.

Game improbably over.

"That's how beautiful it was for the young Buccos," Womack said. "We'd lose a game, then pull one out, and we'd think, 'Dude, we're not as bad as people thought we'd be.' "

By May 9, they were four games over .500 at 19-15 and in first place by a half-game.

Already, the Cubs, who began the season 0-14, and the Reds, who stumbled from the gate 7-19, were nonfactors in the division race.

The Pirates would battle St. Louis -- and to a larger extent, Houston -- the rest of the way.

And even at that early juncture, Astros manager Larry Dierker was a bit discomfited by what he saw from the upstart Pirates.

"There's a certain momentum you can gain from maybe coincidences at first," he said. "It could be a rally in the ninth, a big hit, whatever, that make you believe. You can't describe it. It's not speeches. It's sort of a clubhouse and dugout atmosphere."

Whatever it was, the Pirates had it.

"We had heart," Steve Cooke said. "We played with reckless abandon. We didn't care what other people thought."

"Everybody was just trying to prove they belonged in the big leagues," Young said. "Everybody was hoping they could [just] stay around for another two or three months. There was really a team concept. Everybody contributed on that particular day.

"Guys could relate to guys. The wives could relate to each other. And we played every game like it was our last game."

On May 16, Elster played his last game of that season.

He had been a rock defensively at shortstop and a force offensively with seven home runs and 25 RBIs in 39 games. And he began the practice of putting "I Only Want to be With You" by his friends, Hootie & The Blowfish, on the clubhouse boom box after every win.

But on May 16, running out a sacrifice bunt in the seventh inning, his left wrist was broken in a collision with Florida first baseman Jeff Conine and he was lost for the season.

A stocky little shortstop named Kevin Polcovich -- "He was probably 5 foot 7-- with heels on," Dale Sveum said -- succeeded Elster and became the poster guy for that team and that season.

Polcovich, actually 5 feet 9, 182 pounds, was the Pirates' 30th-round pick in the 1992 draft -- or 29 rounds after the Pirates took Kendall with their first pick.

Polcovich had spent five-plus seasons in the minor leagues. That spring, he was a bagger at a grocery store and sold shoes at a sporting goods store in Bradenton to make extra money after going through workouts and playing in games. He began the '97 season with Class AA Carolina, backing up Chad Hermansen at shortstop.

"I wasn't even on the radar screen," Polcovich said. "How I popped up is still a mystery."

When Hermansen struggled defensively at Carolina, Polcovich got to play enough that he batted .320 and earned a promotion to Class AAA Calgary, where he hit .306.

So when Elster went down, Polcovich came up. He made his major-league debut May 17 against Jim Leyland's Marlins.

"I was in awe, star-struck by how intense the lights were," Polcovich said. "It took me four or five days to settle in and keep some food in my stomach."

Polcovich, too, would suffer a season-ending injury that year. But before that happened Aug. 29, he batted .273 and played solid defense and helped the Pirates stay afloat.

Oh, they would slump. A bad patch of 11 losses in 15 games left them 36-43 and in third place three games behind a week before the All-Star Game.

But then they stunned the Chicago White Sox by sweeping three games at home.

In the opener, Jon Lieber struck out Albert Belle four times to the delight of Pirates fans, who knew that -- at $10 million per year -- Belle was making more than the entire Pirates roster.

The White Sox scored two runs in the three games.

Then the Pirates, helped by Turner Ward's arrival from Calgary, went to St. Louis and swept four more games.

Amazingly, they arrived at the All-Star break 43-43 and in first place by a game over Houston.

"I think at that point we all started believing that, 'Hey, something special could happen here,' " Sveum said.

Said Young: "All that grinding and grinding and grinding and you look, 'Hey, we're in first place. Pretty cool.' "

For those Pirates and their fans -- with the Astros due in town right after the break -- it was about to get even cooler.