BRADENTON, Fla. -- Evan Meek, a flame-throwing prospect who has as much chance to crack the Pirates' bullpen as a dozen other pitchers, is consumed by something else at this early hour.

He has just stepped out of the clubhouse, moving in tune with an iPod that has its volume set at 11, and is scanning the scene. To his left is Pirate City's still-empty half-field, with four buckets of balls placed on each base line with precise symmetry. Straight ahead, the sun climbs toward the spotless sky and sprays its rays on the four equally empty full fields. The dew-sprinkled grass provides the frame's bottom, the outfield's palm trees the top.

Pure baseball.

"This is so beautiful!" Meek fairly shouts over his music, to no one in particular. "Why can't every day be like this?"

Others had a similarly sunny disposition on the first full-squad workout of spring training yesterday ...

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The refurbished Pirate City clubhouse has a divide, though not set in stone, of established players on one side and non-roster invitees on the other, with a hallway bisecting the two. There was not much crossover in the first few days, but shortstop Jack Wilson seems unaware.

About a half-hour before the team's 9 a.m. meeting, the Pirates' most tenured player works his way around the non-roster room to shake each hand and introduce himself.

"Just saying hi," Wilson explains.

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The meeting in the cafeteria includes speeches from general manager Neal Huntington, manager John Russell and other team officials. By all accounts, the essence of the message was singular and simple:

The Pirates can compete.

"I think we're a complete ball club, and I told the players that," Russell said. "We're not so much the power-hitting team that's going to hit a bunch of home runs, but we can handle the bat, we can pitch, we can play defense. It's a matter of putting it all together. The pieces are here, and I think a lot of the guys are starting to believe that. That's a good first step for us."

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At 10:03, the player leading the loud parade of cleats from the cement sidewalk onto the field is outfielder Nyjer Morgan, and stretching begins.

At 10:17, Bill Mazeroski walks out, bat in one hand, golden glove in the other.

"The official beginning of spring training," Chuck Tanner declares from a nearby stool.

Kent Tekulve, Steve Blass and Manny Sanguillen are around, too, joining current player Doug Mientkiewicz as one of an astounding five people in camp who have been on the positive side of the final play of a World Series.

Anyone seen Omar Moreno?

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The players split into three groups, with the most active collection being the infielders on the half-field.

While Russell's coaches run the rapid-fire drills of grounders and relays, Russell stands off to the side, leaning against a chain-link fence next to Mazeroski.

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As the pitchers wind down the long-toss used to stretch their arms, prospect Ronald Belisario has some fun: He comes set and throws a circus-type pitch to his partner, Hector Carrasco. About midway toward Carrasco, the ball makes a violent shift to the left, as if it were a bank shot in billiards.

Everyone who sees it laughs, especially Carrasco after lunging to catch it.

Knuckleball?

"Just a splitter," Belisario explains later, grinning.

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The main event is the first batting practice session thrown by pitchers, and the highlights there play out simultaneously on adjacent fields: Jason Bay on one, Adam LaRoche on the other.

No two bats are greater variables for the 2008 Pirates, with Bay coming off a down year and LaRoche eager to bury his history of slow starts.

Early signs are positive.

Bay looks tentative initially but, soon enough, is driving the ball with authority and to all fields. He worked all winter to strengthen his knees and avoid more knee trouble, and it is evident in his deliberate, full-body stroke. No torso-only reaching on this day.

"Once I got going, it felt pretty good," Bay says. "Actually, it was a little surprising to feel like that on the first day."

LaRoche looks just as smooth, clanging one Matt Capps fastball off the 410-foo sign in left-center.

But it is early.

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Not 15 seconds has elapsed from the time a sweating Ian Snell has finished his bullpen and batting-practice pitching when a dozen of the 500 or so fans on hand approach the chain-link fence to seek his autograph.

"Mr. Snell!"

"EEEEE-an!"

He signs for each and thanks the fan who tells Snell, "I traded for you on my fantasy team."

Russell, well aware Snell has just pitched, walks by and feigns being displeased, "Go bunt!"

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No pressure, kid.

Andrew McCutchen, the Pirates' top prospect, is in the cage when Russell and Huntington assume the standard evaluating position -- one leg up on the horizontal bar -- right behind him. Not far behind them is team president Frank Coonelly.

McCutchen screams the next pitch for a liner that nearly knocks over the L-shaped screen protecting Elmer Dessens.

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The instruction takes all forms.

Hitting coach Don Long pulls aside Ronny Paulino, whose way-open stance is being closed under new management, after an unproductive round and reminds him that his natural path toward an outside pitch is to the opposite field. Paulino's next round includes a poke into right.

Bullpen coach Luis Dorante, responsible for the catchers, stands silently behind Ryan Doumit watching nothing other than his footwork the staff has been trying to correct. He does this for 10 minutes.

Through all this, Russell and bench coach Gary Varsho move like metronomes from field to field.

Some of it happens out of sight.

Pitching coach Jeff Andrews spent part of the morning -- and much of the past few days -- preaching to Jonah Bayliss to believe in his fastball after he lost command of it last summer. Now, when Bayliss throws his batting practice, Andrews watches from afar.

"I was very happy with what I saw," Andrews offers later.

What about that ball Ray Olmedo sent into the trees?

"Well, the hitters do know what's coming this time of year."

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What does it mean to be a baseball veteran?

Mientkiewicz and Chris Gomez are facing away from the cage while prospect Steve Pearce is taking his hacks, when they hear a blunt-sounding thud off his bat. Each whips his head 180 degrees out of concern.

"That was thumb-ish-esque," Mientkiewicz says in coining a new term for the sound of a ball striking a hitter's thumb.

The ball cracked the bat but missed Pearce's thumb.

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Last player is off the field at 1:40 and, two hours later, nearly everyone is off the complex except the construction workers finishing off the new Pirate City headquarters.

Not Nyjer Morgan.

The rookie who refers to PNC Park's center field as "Morgantown" is, for reasons only someone of his playful personality can grasp, trying on a shortstop's glove from an impromptu display rack set up by the specialists from Rawlings.

"First-ever lefty shortstop!" Morgan yipped. "Are you ready?"