North Shore Nine

As we here at North Shore Nine headquarters prep for spring training and the 2024 season, we have added four new members to the blogging team. Let’s take some time to meet them!

Frank (Twitter – @fgrabski_)
My name is Frank Grabski, a current college student living in the Pittsburgh area. I was born into being a Pirates fan, coming from generations of Pirates fans. In recent seasons, I began following various members of North Shore Nine on Twitter and consuming their content. Upon joining the NS9 discord, I enjoyed talking with other Pirates fans about the team and, more specifically, the state of this offseason. When I saw that NS9 was interested in adding to its ranks for 2024, I saw an opportunity to contribute to a team whose content I enjoy, using their platform to communicate my ideas and opinions about the team.

David (Twitter – @davidstegon)
David Stegon is a third-generation Pirates fan who grew up going to games, including the 1992 National League Championship Series, with his two aunts. He works as a marketing writer in Northern Virginia but would write about the Pirates for North Shore Nine where his articles hope to mesh humor, analysis, and hopeless optimism. He also runs Perfect Perfect: An MLB the Show Substack free for subscribers.

Mike (Twitter – @MZylinski)
Hello, my name is Michael Zylinski a life long baseball fan and a transplanted Vermonter. Growing up in Vermont I fell in love with baseball at a young age rooting for the Red Sox and watching the likes of Wade Boggs, Trot Nixon, Mo Vaughn, Manny Ramirez and Big Papi himself David Ortiz. I moved to Pittsburgh to go to college attending Duquesne University and immediately fell in love with the Pirates. The kinship I felt to the Pirates began as I understood the frustrated fan base growing up a Red Sox fan in the 80s and 90s. Quite quickly, and to the disappointment of my Father, I became more of a Pirates fan than a Red Sox fan. I decide I wanted to write for the NS9 blog as soon as I saw the post that NS9 was looking for bloggers. I view baseball as a season that never ends. So I constantly want to talk about baseball and the Pirates even when many would rather watch football or hockey. Being allowed to contribute to the NS9 blog is the perfect outlet for my baseball zeal, and I hope for nothing more than to help charge up a fanbase that is desperate need of a positive boost.

Zach (Twitter – @k1dspud)
An adopted Pixburger, I grew up in the suburbs of Albany and worked for eight years as an Off-Ice Official with the AHL River Rats team. Sports are a big reason I developed a fondness for Pittsburgh, and taking in the beauty of PNC Park when it opened got me hooked on the Pirates. My family held season tickets for nearly a decade; not only was I there for the 2013 Wild Card game, I chanted “Cue-to” before anyone else in that park. After 23 years of root root rooting for our home team, though, I’m facing a crisis of faith. My “real” job is fully remote, and as I start to explore different US cities, I’ve thought about abandoning the Pirates for another, better team. With this role, I hope I can put words to the thoughts that we have as fans and figure out why we love a team that doesn’t often love us back.