The Giants batted around in the 2nd without making an out. Two bad they didn't make any productive outs in scoring their seven runs. And after all that, after the Marlins show they can't get an out, Alou has Neifi Perez sacrifice. Of course, they don't score another run after the bunt. :-)

On another note, Brian Dallimore got his first major league hit, a grand slam off the glove of left fielder Wil Cordero. Shades of the ball going off Canseco's head.

Through three innings, DougWaechter is perfect, and Randy Wolf has not allowed a hit. Through four, Javier Vazquez is perfect with four strikeouts.

Update: These three are over. I saw Vazquez give up a HR, then I switched to the Tampa Bay game and saw the replay of Waechter giving up a single.

Update: Durazo takes Waechter deep to give the A's a 2-0 lead. Too bad Durazo didn't make a productive out. :-)

Two 1 on 1 matchups tonight. The Angels head to the land of 10,000 lakes to face the Twins. Not a great pitching matchup (Ortiz vs. Silva), but the two teams are tied for 2nd in runs scored (Twins have played 1 fewer game) behind the Tigers (who would have thought I would have written that line this year).

The Rangers are tied with the Angels for first place in the AL West, and they'll host the AL East leading Boston Red Sox. Boston leads the American league in ERA by over a run, but the surprising Rangers are fourth. The Sox weak link in their rotation, Bronson Arroyo goes tonight, in what may be his last start now that Kim is back from his injury. The Rangers send Ryan Drese to the mound. Drese is giving up a lot fewer hits than he has in the past; it's not clear why. I would have thought that Soriano at 2nd and Young at short would be a worse defensive arrangement for the Rangers, but maybe getting youngsters taking Palmeiro's and Gonzalez's spots has tightened things up.

Enjoy!

Bryan at Against the Grain brings strikeouts into the unproductive outs argument.

Strike outs are the worst thing a hitter can do, because even if you ground out weakly or hit a soft-fly you have somechance of getting on-base. Watch a game and see how many jam-shot singles there are. Not every hit is a line-drive. Strike outs are an evil byproduct of drawing walks, because just by nature the more pitches you see the more times you're going to hit with two strikes. So strikeouts aren't as bad as old-school baseball guys may have believed, but they are still probably a lot worse than many SABRmetricians or SABRquixotics or whatever you want to call them believe.

The thing that's bothered me for a number of years is that strikeouts appear to matter much more to a pitcher than a hitter. In other words, high strikeouts are one indicator that a pitcher is very good, but high strikeouts are not an indicator that a batter is very bad. I believe the basic reason for this is power; it's hard to hit HR off good pitchers, but players who strike out a lot tend to hit for power, too. As I've written before, I believe there are situations when trying to put the bat on the ball is much for important than trying to hit one out of the park. But in general, it's okay for hitters to swing hard, even if they miss a lot, because the results when they don't miss are so impressive.

I attended last night's game with my old friend Jim Storer and two of his New Haven cohorts, Ken Papa and Dave Spiro. I've known Ken since Jim's days at UConn Law School, but Dave I just met recently. Last night was Dave's first visit to Fenway. He really loved the park. His first reaction to seeing the Green Monster was "Bucky Dent." He found that the park had a certain mystique, that it smelled of baseball. He loved long ramps leading to the seats and the support columns of a bygone era of stadium design. He was truly impressed with the fans. In the eighth inning of a blow out, everyone was still in his or her seat. I think Fenway has a new fan.

The Red Sox pitching was most impressive yesterday. Everyone threw strikes. Kim, Wakefield, Williamson, Embree, Timlin and Foulke all seemed to be of the same mindset; let's go after these hitters. Even Manny Ramirez is playing like a man on a mission. And the fans love it. I used to get the feeling that there was an arms length relationship between the Red Sox and the fans, but in the two games I attended yesterday, I felt like there was a giant mutual hug, as if the fans the players were one. That's very different and very good.

I also want to commend the crowd before game 1. As I recorded here:

Someone did a very poor job of planning the logistics of this day.

It took me about 35 minutes in line once I got to the ballpark to get my tickets. The cause appeared to be a computer problem. But the crowd at Window 1 never got unruly. People waited patiently, and even started self organizing. There were four windows for tickets, based on the first letter of your last name. As people realized this, they would let others move in and out to get to the correct queue. No one pressed, no one cut. Finally (after I got my tickets, of course), the Red Sox just let everyone in. They probably should have done that at 1:15.

Daniel Shamah writes:

Hope you're enjoying the game. Buster Olney posted another article on ESPN.com about so-called "productive outs." I've noticed in every game ESPN calls, they not only talk about this bogus stat, but they make a point of talking about the Marlins won the Series with "productive outs." John Kruk went so far as to say he thinks Juan Pierre is MORE valuable than Bonds, because he starts rallies with bunt singles. Nevermind that Pierre and Castillo combined for a whopping 3 runs scored in the Series, and two of those came in the first game; Jeff Conine outscored them himself. Their bias against the patience/power combo that the A's and Yanks employ is ridiculous; you'd think they could find one analyst who disagrees. Or at least give Neyer some airtime on BBTN.

Anyway, I vaguely remember you had a posting on productive outs when ESPN first released them a year ago. And if I remember correctly you shredded their value as an offensive metric. Think you could post it again, or at least email a link to the piece? I remember enjoying it a lot.

This is the Olney article to which Daniel refers. The basic argument is: here's a stat, this team is good at it, this team won, so it must be important to be good at that stat.

My previous posts on this subject:
Outs, Productive Outs and the Unproductive People Who Write about Them

Productive Outs Definition

Significance

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I'm off to Fenway for the DRays-Red Sox double header. Look for audio posts from the Back Bay.

They were down and out. They weren't hitting. Their pitching was weak. They were overrated, overpaid and just plain evil. And at the bottom of their weakness, they had to face Oakland's three aces.

Well guess what. The Yankees slump seems to be over. Jose Contreras pitched a good game last night. And today, the consistently good Kevin Brown faces Barry Zito, coming off a very rough outing against Anaheim. Zito gave up 9 runs in four innings to the Angels on the 23rd.

Jeter remains in his slump, but that's okay. The Yankees can survive with one of their great hitters in a slump. A-Rod, Giambi and Sheffield are all hitting better, to go along with the continued good performance of Posada. That gives them plenty of offense for most situations. Meanwhile, the A's have been outscored by their opponents, which does not bode well for them if that keeps up long term.

Enjoy!

Nice job by the Philadelphia bullpen tonight. Myers had a rough start giving up eight hits in four innings. But Madson came on for four innings and only allowed 1 hit, while Wagner pitched the 9th for his 6th save. Combined they gave up 1 hit, 0 BB and got four strikeouts. Thome had 3 hits and his OBA is up to .462.

The Brewers Bill Hall lays down a perfect squeeze bunt to defeat the Reds in the 10th 10-9. The Reds were up 9-0 in the third, but Wilson, Reith and Jones combined to give up nine to the Brewers by the eighth. It's the largest comeback in Brewers history, according to the broadcast.

Schilling did exactly what the Red Sox are paying him to do; he shut down the DRays for 7 1/3 innings with eight strikeouts and no walks. The Red Sox limited him to 106 pitches which I think is a fine idea. Schilling is getting old, so extra rest won't hurt. And he threw 75 of those 106 pitches for strikes. Pitching performances don't get much better than that.

I had the Game of the Day assigned to me to score this evening. I'm very impressed with Mike Maroth. He's working quickly, going after hitters, and getting a lot of weak fly balls and pop ups. He's quite a contrast to Colon, who slows the game down to a crawl when men are on base. Maroth is averaging just a shade over 12 pitches per inning in this game, and has thrown 52 of 74 pitches for strikes through 6.

The Yankees picked up where they left off last night, scoring runs on singles and walks. Three singles, two walks and a sacrifice fly gives Contreras a 3-0 lead in the 2nd.

Hee Seop Choi just hit a three-run HR in the top of the 9th to give the Marlins a decent cushion in Coors field, 9-4. Choi is doing exactly what you want a first baseman to do. He's getting on base (.409 OBA), and he's hitting for power (.673 slugging pct). He's been almost exclusively platooned against righties, but his ninth inning shot was off Brian Fuentes, a lefty.

You can read all the opening day impressions here.

Bill Young attended the Expos real home opener on April 23rd and sends this report.

I did it again, I went to yet another last first game of the Expos. They held their real, albeit unofficial, home opener on Friday, April 23. (The official home opener, so-called, took place at the beginning of the month in Puerto Rico, but that's another story)

If not for bad luck the Expos would have none at all this year. They are off to their worst start ever, they have just completed a 20plus-game road trip to begin the season (unofficial - El Selig would maintain that San Juan was home), they have lost starters Vlad Guerrero, Javier Vazquez and Michael Barrett from last year's team, and when they finally get to open in Montreal - traditionally a festive time for the faithful - they find themselves a) competing directly with the first game of a Canadiens semi-final game against Tampa (fortunately in Tampa), b) being bounced by the local Sports Channel; it was to televise the game but for obvious reason chose to do the hockey game instead, c) starting three substitutes because the regulars - Carl Everett, Peter Bergeron. Nick Johnson - were on the DL , d) and acing the Phillies and Bobby Abreu, one of the all-time Expos killers. Not an auspicious beginning. (and as a final indignity - they are home for only three games before flying to the west coast to face the Padres and the Dodgers)

Nevertheless there were 30,000 or more of us at the game, a great many sporting Habs jerseys. There was vintage - Recchi's number 8 was the oldest I saw; there was current - Kovalev's 27 was the newest. And there was, as always, a sense of anticipation. If nothing else, the Expos are back in town. Can summer be far away?

The opening ceremonies followed a Survivor theme, based on the TV show, and although no one was voted off this time, the event was awash in symbolism. The beating of the drums and the flashing of the strobe lights, as much as anything, paid tribute to this little band of survivors - players and fans, and some media types - who have taken the hits and continue to persevere, even in the face of Major League Baseball's current promise to toss the whole bunch off the island (of Montreal) by mid-summer.

The crowd was noisy and happy but you could tell that expectations were low. And so when the first two Phillies got on base and Bobby Abreu followed with a home run, as did next batter Jim Thome, the whole thing pretty well began to lose its business. The Expos did get one back in the first, but when the scoreboard flashed the first hockey score: 2-0 Tampa, it was clear: this was not going to be one of our better nights.

When Bobby Abreu knocked in a fifth run in the second inning the die seemed cast. The Expos did rally nicely for four runs in the sixth, but the euphoria was short lived. Abreu led off the seventh with a double and then scored the go-ahead run, on a wild pitch and a force out at first. His was the only hit of the inning.

The Phillies scored two more; the Expos got one back in the ninth. Twenty-two hits, ten pitchers and it ended up with the good guys on the short end of an 8-6 score.

But still the miracle of Montreal lives on - not so much as a reflection the Expos' winning ways (remember last season: in mid-September the Expos were tied with the Marlins for the wild card spot. They got that close) but in the fact that they are still playing at all.

Those of us who made it to Opening Day have stopped worrying about the "what ifs" of tomorrow. We'll settle for the "what is" of today. And that, I believe, is that the Survivor theme was all about.

Oh, for the record, the Expos lost on Saturday, 6-0.

The Cleveland Indians blew an 8-2 lead, allowing seven runs over the last three innings, including five in the ninth to lose to the White Sox 9-2. David Riske was the biggest culprit, allowing three runs on three hits and a HR in 1/3 of an inning. Betacourt, with the help of a fielding error, finished the job and blew the save. Riske is the only Indian with a save, but his ERA is now over 12.00.

Ronnie Belliard has become a great leadoff man for the Indians. He's been on base four times for the Indians today, and his OBA now stands at .511. It's a huge leap for him; his career OBA was .348 coming into today. He's drawing walks like the 2000 Belliard, which is just what the Indians need at the top of the lineup. Seems he found what was lost.

The Angels continue their series with the Tigers, sending Bartolo Colon to the mound against Mike Maroth. Maroth lost 20 games last year, but is 2-1 with a 3.86 ERA to start the season. He's striking out more and walking fewer than he has in the past. And there's some evidence his defense is playing better behind him. He's already had four DP's turned behind him. Last year, for the full season, he had only 18. Looks like Dombrowski's moves to strengthen the team up the middle has paid dividends.

Colon is pitching very well. His only weakness so far has been the long ball, allowing five HR in 27 innings. However, he's been keeping runners off base (.279 opposition OBA), so four of the five HR he's allowed have been solo shots. The Angels offensive injuries didn't hurt them last night, and we'll see if they can keep up the barrage against Maroth.

Enjoy!

The Hardball Times now has some interesting pitching stats on their site to go along with their batting stats. I like that they are listing DER for each pitcher, so you get a feel for how much the defense is helping or hurting the hurler.

Mike Piazza tied Carlton Fisk last night for most HR as a catcher. Appropriately, he did it in the place where he became famous, Dodger Stadium, against a former battery mate, Hideo Nomo. And more importantly, the HR gave the Mets a lead they would not relinquish. Congratulations to Piazza on the milestone!

There was a dearth of offensive catchers in the 1980's. That seemed to change with the arrival of Benito Santiago in San Diego, Ivan Rodriguez in Texas and Mike Piazza in Los Angeles. Piazza has been the best hitter of the lot, and helped restore catcher offense to a level not seen since the 1930's.

Congratulations to Chad Moeller who hit for the cycle tonight. He did it as part of a 9-7 slugfest win for the Brewers, who are now 11-10.

The White Sox have three HR, the Indians have five singles, and it's 4-3 Chicago in the 2nd.

John Lackey is shutting down the Tigers so far tonight, and he's doing it throwing strikes. Through three innings he's only allowed 1 hit, and has thrown 24 of 33 pitches for strikes. At this pace, he'll pitch a sub-100 pitch complete game.

The Yankees look like they finally have something going. After Chavez hit a solo, opposite field HR in the top of the 3rd, Matsui, Clark and Cairo put together three consecutive hits to plate two runs. Jeter bunts Cairo to third (Jeter was bunting for a hit), so the Yankees have a chance to pick up another.

So many to choose from today. The Tampa Bay Devil Rays go into Boston only three games under .500 and 4 1/2 back of the Red Sox. Abbott faces Wakefield tonight; both have identical 2.37 ERAs. Wakefield has walked more batters, but we'll see if impatient hitters on the Devil Rays wait him out.

We'll see if Mike Mussina can shake off his poor start against Tim Hudson and the A's in the Bronx. Hudson has been good where Mussina has been bad. Hudson has issued 4 walks and 1 HR. Mussina has walked 13 and given up five dingers. Hudson, Mulder and Zito are pitching for the A's in this series. They're not the kind of pitchers you want to see when your team is trying to break out of a slump.

In the NL, Philadelphia at St. Louis features Eric Milton going against Cardinal ace Matt Morris. Milton so far has been one of the good off-season pickups. He's walked 4 and struck out 14 over 17 IP. Morris had a rough opening day but has pitched well since.

Phoenix is the site for another good matchup as Sergio Mitre faces Brandon Webb. Of course, last night's game was supposed to be a good matchup, and Zambrano got creamed. We'll see if Mitre fares any better.

Enjoy!

I find it rather depressing that four of the top five headlines on ESPN's home page are about legal issues rather than sports. I wish the sports outlets would leave those stories to the news stations on concentrate on what is happening on the field.

San Francisco defeated Atlanta last night 3-2. The pitching staff made the most of the meager offense the Giants batters supplied. Schmidt pitched okay, but the bullpen was near perfect. Four hitless innings, allowing only 2 walks while striking out three. Jim Brower's performance stands out, as he retired all six batters he faced, throwing 26 pitches, 18 for strikes. A needed win for the Giants.

Half of the Braves hits came from Marcus Giles, who continues to be on a tear. He was 3 for 4, and is now batting .387 with a .424 OBA.

Carl Pavano had an interesting win vs. the Rockies last night. He had no strikeouts, which means that all his outs came on balls put into play. In Colorado, of course, it's dangerous to have batters making contact. I count 13 fly ball outs in the game, so Pavano wasn't exactly keeping the ball on ground. It worked last night, however, and Carl is now 2-0 with a 3.33 ERA. The Marlins have the best record in the majors, as well.

Last night's 2-hitter by Ted Lilly is the kind of performance I expect to see more of from the lefty. When he has his control he's highly effective. It looks like he'll always give up long balls, so he really has to keep people off base so the homers are too costly. He did that last night.

Everytime I see a Toronto boxscore with H. Clark at the top of the lineup, I flashback to my early days watching the Yankees when Horace Clarke led off for the Yankees, and I cringe. Clarke's career high in OBA was .339 and his career OBA was .308. My 8th grade Algebra teacher described Clarke as someone who needed a chest protector to play 2nd base. Howie Clark, the Jays right fielder tonight, appears to be a bit better. He's two for two tonight, giving him a .444 OBA on the season. Just what you want from your leadoff man. He also hit his 2nd HR of his short season.

Correction: It was a double, not a HR.

Austin Kearns has come out of the Cincinnati-Pittsburgh game after being hit by a pitch on the wrist. The Reds lead 2-0 in the third.

Update: Kearns has a broken bone in his hand just above the wrist.

The game of the day happens to be showing on ESPN2 this evening. The Chicago Cubs head south west to visit the Arizona Diamondbacks. Carlos Zambrano will toss for the Cubs, and he's been the staff ace early on. He's allowed a 1.29 ERA so far, mostly because he's kept the opponents power down. Batters are slugging just .293 against Zambrano. Randy Johnson goes for the DBacks. He's had a couple of rough starts so far this year, but he's struck out 32 in 28 2/3 innings, so he still has his good stuff. A great game for a Monday night. Enjoy!

John Carney has a little movie comparing Cubs and White Sox fans. I found it entertaining, if a little biased. :-)

The Hardball Times has its first page of statistics posted. Instead of putting up the usual numbers you can find anywhere, they are posting runs created and gross production average. One stat I really like is line drive percentage. Liners tend to fall in as base hits, so a good hitter should have a high percentage.

Full Disclosure: The stats on The Hardball Times site are supplied by the company I work for, Baseball Info Solutions, and I had a hand in writing the code that prepares those reports.

The season is about three weeks old (I guess I'm counting the first Monday as true opening day here), and what impresses me is how tight things are. It's common to have a team get off to a fantastic start and leave others in the dust, but that hasn't happened in any division. The biggest division lead right now belongs to the Dodgers; they lead San Diego by 2 1/2 games. The biggest deficit belongs to the Expos at 7.5 games. But there is no team that is so far out that they could not turn their season around with a good hot streak.

One big reason for these close races is that few teams appear to be doormats this year. The Reds, Brewers, Pirates, Padres, Rockies, Rangers, Tigers, Orioles and Devil Rays are not push overs this year. Even Kansas City, starting 6-11, has really just gone through a streak of bad luck, as they've only been outscored by five runs.

And what was that about 1/2 the teams not being able to make the playoffs? This was bud after the 2000 World Series:

''At the start of spring training, there no longer exists hope and faith for the fans of more than half our 30 clubs,'' Selig said. ''It is my job to restore hope and faith. I can assure you this system will be changed.''

The change was to institute a luxury tax, which only the Yankees appear to pay. The tax was designed to put a drag on salaries, but it appears that what it really is doing is supplying teams with cash that they have used to improve their rosters! So one could argue that the Yankees, by spending all this money on high priced talent, are making the majors more competitve, not less.

The Baseball Crank describes the day he met Ted Williams (including a picture to prove it.

John Thomson is proving to be another great Braves pickup. Seven innings, seven strikeouts and two walks. He allowed eight hits, but he spread them out and only one (the Pierre triple) was for extra bases. He now has a 2.67 ERA and left the game with a 6-2 lead.

The Marlins bring in lefty Tom Phelps to face lefty J.D. Drew. It should be a good matchup, but Drew smacks the ball to dead center for a bases clearing triple, then scores when Castillo boots the relay throw. Drew puts the Braves up 6-2 in the 7th.

I like Juan Pierre, and I thought it was a good move when the Marlins acquired him, but mostly for his defense. I don't think of him as a great leadoff hitter; he's not Henderson or Lofton in their primes, but he's not Omar Moreno either. However, it seems whenever I watch Juan he hits. He just got a two out triple and scored on a Castillo single. He's 3 for 3 with a run scored tonight. And he's a pleasure to watch.

Update: Pierre just got his fourth hit and third single of the game.

How bad is the Giants offense? The had four hits against the Dodgers today, and one of them was by a relief pitcher! The have scored 71 runs in 19 games, or 3.7 runs per game. That's more like the 2003 Tigers than a team that won the division last year. Combine that with a pitching staff that allows HR to Alex Cora and Cesar Izturis and you have the recipie for a last place team.

And I'm sorry, what's with Bonds coming out early in every blowout? Last I noticed, big comebacks weren't all that uncommon, and they are much more likely to see one if Bonds is in the lineup than if he's on the bench. When the Giants are on the plus side of a slugfest, Bonds can sit. But it looks bad when the team is losing.

Steve Bonner has some ideas on how the Yankees should shake up the order. I left my thoughts in his comments.

Julio Franco is back in the lineup after leaving last night's game with dizziness. One of the commentors mentioned that it was dehydration. That's good news. Julio seems to have his head on straight as he singles in the first for the third hit of the first off Dontrelle Willis.

John Hill is writing about the Dodgers at Dodger Hill. Stop by and say hi.

Mark DeRosa ends Dontrelle Willis' string of not allowing an earned run with a home run to deep center field to give the Braves a 1-0 lead over the Marlins. It's only the 2nd extra-base hit Willis has allowed this year.

I'm scoring the Mariners-Rangers game, and I just watched the Rangers go back-to-back-to-back in the bottom of the 6th with the 7-8-9 hitters. The neat thing is that they distributed them nicely; the first to center, the 2nd to straight away left, the third to straight away right. Not a good relief job by Kevin Jarvis.

Two excellent pitching matchups catch my eye today. The first is in the Bronx, where Pedro Martinez returns to faces the Yankees for the first time since game 7 of the ALCS. He'll go against Javier Vazquez. Both are 2-1 with good ERAs. Martinez matches up very well against the Yankees left-handers. For their careers, Giambi is batting .179 (7/39) against Martinez, Williams .200 (12/60), Posada .191 (9/47) and Matsui is 0 for 10 with three strikeouts. And if Travis Lee is in the game, he's 1/13 vs. Pedro.

The other game is Sunday Night Baseball game. The Braves visit the Florida Marlins and send John Thomson against the nearly perfect Dontrelle Willis. This is the first time I'll have a chance to watch a game in high definition this year, and I'm really looking forward to this matchup. Thomson, who's given up a HR every 7 innings in his career has only allowed 1 in 20 innings so far in 2004. Willis has yet to allow an earned run this year, and has only given up 1 extra-base hit this year, a double. He's a big reason the Marlins are playing like champions this year. The Braves need a win to keep the race for the NL East close. They've been the only team in the East that has handled the Marlins right now, but it hasn't been enough to keep the Fish from opening a three game lead.

Enjoy!

Julio Franco just came out of the Braves game after getting a pinch-hit single and an RBI. He did not appear to be injured, but he did appear to be dizzy. Franco's been solid for the Braves so far this year, so they'd hate to lose them. But also given the history of players with vertigo, there's a possibility we just saw Julio's last hit, his 2365th.

There appear to be cheerleaders at the Marlins game. I really like the Marlins, but cheerleaders would be a big negative in my mind. There seems to be some discussion of it here.

Lisa Gray alerts me to the introduction of synaptic flatulence, a blog by a fan of the Expos and Blue Jays. From his first post on what we are likely to expect:

Bud Selig will be roundly criticized regardless of what he does. If he finds a cure for cancer (which I doubt, the man couldn‘t cure a ham) he’ll probably screw it up by insisting the MLBPA submit to a salary cap in gratitude.

I like this blog already.

When I'm scoring games, I'm using a Tivo to record while I score the earlier innings. That way, I can go back if I have to and get an accurate read on what's happening. One thing I do, of course, is fast forward through the commericals. And I noticed something interesting. Last night I was watching the KC broadcast of the Royals game, and the network always had about 20 seconds to kill when they came back from commericals between innings. I'm watching the Devil Rays broadcast today, and they are constantly missing the first pitch of the inning. Do the Devil Rays really get more advertising dollars that the Royals? Or is it that the DRays are on Fox Sports Net, and have to absorb all the Fox promos?

If scoring the Devil Rays at White Sox game, and while I'm a few innings behind, I'm impressed so far with Waechter and Wright's work. I love pitchers who get the ball and throw it. They don't walk around, they don't blow on their hands. They get the ball and go after the batters. A real pleasure to watch, and so far they have been effective.

A funny thing happened on the way to the Angels domination of LA. The Dodgers started winning. They have the largest lead of any first place team in baseball. Granted, they aren't any better than the Angels; so far they've just been luckier (Dodgers have outscored their opponents 75-73; the Angels have outscored their opponents 93-92). But the Dodgers winning at the start of the season will keep their fans in their ballpark; long term, the Angels may be better off with Moreno at the helm. But the Dodger have DePodesta, so even if the Dodger's debt makes them cut salary, DePodesta knows how to put a low price, quality product on the field. All in all, it looks like a great time to be a baseball fan in LA.

I don't ever remember a team as talented as the Yankees going into such a collective slump. Posada is the only player hitting, and Torre still has him batting 6th. They still have their batting eyes; most of the regulars have OBA's 100 points above their batting averages. But their batting averages are so low that even with the walks they are not getting on base enough, and they are not generating enough power to drive those runners around. I suppose if they all come out of the slump at the same time, they might win 20 in a row. But right now, they just keep getting bombed in the Bronx.

And to add to it today, Kevin Brown made errors on consecutive plays that led to an unearned run for the Red Sox, as Boston is up 2-0 in the 2nd.

I'm keeping track of the Dernell Stenson case using Google news alerts. Today, I got one, but it was about an interesting web site run by Frank Russo called TheDeadBallEra.com. Frank tracks the deaths of major leaguers. He has links to obituaries, photos of graves, deaths by category, everything you want to know about your favorite dead pull hitter. Check it out.

I'm very interested to see how Roger Clemens fares in Colorado today against Jeff Fassero. Last year, I asked Bill James if the Rockies should use fireballers on their staff to strike out a lot of opponents. Here's what Bill said:

This assumes that fastballs get strikeouts. This is untrue. Breaking pitches get strikeouts. Breaking pitches are difficult to throw at high altitudes (a fact, incidentally, which has been known by baseball pitchers at least since the 1920s. In the 1920s there are published comments about how hard it is to throw a breaking pitch in Salt Lake City.) But there is a valid point in there--which is, that if the value of offense increases per ball in play, then the value of fielding skill also increases.

So will Clemens split finger drop less in Colorado, and be easier to hit out of the park? We'll see.

It looks like the Red Sox have figured out Contreras in the fourth. Millar and Bellhorn go back to back to extend Boston's lead to 3-0.

Update: After putting two more on, Osborne relieves Contreras and promptly gives up a three run HR to Bill Mueller. From the frying pan into the fire.

Today's line was much more Maddux like. Seven innings, 1 BB, 8 strikeouts. Either he needed three starts to warm up, or he needed a game against the Mets.

They used to film HR Derby at the old Wrigley Field in LA. Today, Chicago's Wrigley Field is off to a fast start with Alou hitting a 2-run homer in the bottom of the 1st, and Cameron with a solo blast off Maddux in the 2nd.

Update: Maddux in trouble in the third, bases loaded no one out, gets a tapper back to the pitcher for the 1-2-3 DP. He's not quite out of the woods yet, with men on 2nd and 3rd and two out.

Update: Maddux strikes out Cameron looking to end the inning.

It looks like it might be slugfest Friday. We'll start off with the Mets at the Cubs, where Seo faces Maddux, both with 0-2 records and both with ERA's of 8.00 or more. Maddux has walked 9 and allowed 5 HR in 15 IP, amazingly high numbers for him. The Mets are only averaging 4.0 runs per game, so maybe this is a chance for them to break out.

The Red Sox make their first trip to Yankee Stadium tonight, and this game features two pitchers with 9+ ERAs. Derek Lowe faces Jose Contreras. Lowe was the victim of the Yankees offensive outburst last Sunday, while Contreras couldn't get out of the third in the same game. He's walked five in seven IP this season.

St. Louis at Milwaukee pits Chris Carpenter against Brewer Matt Kinney. Kinney's opponents are batting .322 against him, and he's issued 10 walks! Carpenter has allowed a .400 BA so far with men in scoring position.

Heading south, Kyle Lohse's 7.88 ERA is nearly half of Kevin Appier's 15.00. Appier is simply getting smacked around. Batters were 6 for 15 against him in his only start. Lohse is having long ball problems, having given up four HR in 16 innings.

Finally, Houston visits run haven Colorado as Brandon Duckworth faces Jason Jennings. These two offense are near the top of the NL, and I'd expect more than snow balls to be flying in Colorado tonight.

Enjoy!

Patrick at the house that dewey built links last night's Red Sox game to game 7 of the ALCS.

Curt Schilling gets a boo tonight. He blew a 3-0 lead and gave up a grand slam HR to Chris Gomez. Chris Gomez who hits a HR every 70 AB. Who would have thought that the Blue Jays would have found their bats against Schilling.

My guess is that right now, Barry Bonds is frustrated with the Giants. All you have to do to beat San Francisco is walk Bonds. There's nothing behind him, nothing around him. And the Giants are stuck with a huge salary, and while they have the attraction of Bonds chasing Aaron, unless they make a move, they don't have much else.

I'm pretty sure Bonds wants to stay in San Francisco. But it could also be that the Giants would be better off using Barry to rebuild. If they could free up part of his contract and get some good prospects in return, one could believe that San Francisco would be better off making a deal. So why not trade Barry across the bay?

Bonds is the ultimate on-base power guy. He's the kind of player Beane tries to draft or pick up cheap. If the Giants offered to pay 1/2 of Bonds contract in exchange for three or four top prospects, would Beane do it? They haven't gotten out of the first round of the playoffs, and Bonds could be their ticket out of the LDS. My guess is that the A's could find $10 million to pay Bonds, especially since he'll put fannies in the seats. I have no doubt that this will never happen, but it makes a lot of sense to me. Bonds in Oakland? What do you think?

Matt Mantei has blown another save. Given a three run lead at the start of the ninth, he issued a one out walk, then gave up an RBI double to Overbay. The Brewers then pinch hit with their two way player, Brooks Kieschnick. Kieschnick hit a pinch hit two run homer to tie the game. You have to love pitchers who can hit, and you really have to love the ones that hit so well they can regularly pinch hit or DH.

Lew Ford continues to impress when he plays. I saw him for both New Britian and Edmondton in 2002, and had a good time saying Lew, not boo. He hit his 3rd HR of the year today. In 113 ML AB, he's hitting .372. Now, anything can happen in 100 AB, but it's a lot more encouraging to be hitting that well. In his short career he's also drawn 11 walks and is 3 for 3 stealing. The Twins farm system keeps producing.

Jaret Wright's wildness caught up with him today. He walked five in 1 2/3 innings while allowing four hits. The Reds lead the Braves 5-0 in the fourth.

I think it is time to move Omar Vizquel out of the number 2 spot in the Indians order. He hasn't had a good OBA in the slot since 2000. With his 0 for 3 today, he's down to .319. The obvious replacement is Matt Lawton; he has a decent OBA and not too much power (despite the five HR this year). At this point in his career, I think Omar would be best used 9th, as a potential 2nd leadoff man.

Lots of afternoon action today, so hook your headphones to your computer and tune in to MLB.com.

Jaret Wright and the Braves face Cory Lidle and the Reds in Cincinnati this afternoon. Wright, of course, is the Braves latest reclamation project. It's hard to believe he's only 28. He's been successful this year, despite walking a ton of batters. He's not (or maybe his defense is not) allowing the hits to drive those runners around.

Jose Lima and Shawn Estes each go for their third win today as the Dodgers face the Rockies at Coors. The Dodgers have five regulars with OBA's over .360, and a team OBA of .351. It's a huge improvement over their .303 OBA of last year. This will be Estes' first start of the year at Coors.

The surprising Texas Rangers send Chan Ho Park to the mound against the Angels Bartolo Colon. Park pitched seven shutout innings in his last start at Seattle. Colon has been everything the Angels expected and more so far. His 1.64 ERA leads the AL.

Third in the AL in ERA is Mark Mulder, who faces fellow lefty Jamie Moyer as Oakland visits Seattle. The Mariners lineup still looks pretty weak; Ichiro's slugging percentage is less than his OBA, for example. I think Seattle got old fast.

And finally, a battle of the KW's in Pittsburgh. Kerry Wood takes the mound for the Cubs against Kip Wells and the Pirates. Wells has a Wood like 20 strikeouts in 19 innings. The batters will likely be generating lots of breezes along the rivers.

Enjoy!

Andres Galarraga's cancer has returned. He's still hoping to return to a team and hit the two HR he needs for 400. I just hope he continues to recover.

The Padres had a big win over the Giants tonight, 11-0. They struck out Bonds in the 2nd, then walked him until he came out of the game. The Padres got the leadoff man on in each of the first eight innings, and that runner scored in seven of those. Peavy and his relievers had no problems with the rest of the Giants lineup. There's no pop outside of Bonds.

Jason Schmidt allowed a leadoff triple to Terrance Long in the 2nd. He got a groundout and a strikeout to keep Long at third and face the opposing pitcher. But Peavy hit the ball to the hole side of shortstop, and Perez couldn't backhand it and wound up with an error. Since Neifi's main job is to play defense, it would be nice for him to come up with the tough plays.

Bonds strikes out to start the 2nd for the Giants.

The Baseball Crank is raising money for a worthy cause. See if you can help him out.

The Cubs staked Sergio Mitre to an 8-0 lead tonight, and he delivered six shut out innings in return, allowing four hits and striking out seven. Corey Patterson had the big night offensively, going five for six with two doubles. The Pirates have finally scored in the ninth off Borowski.

A nice win by the Expos tonight. They threw out two Mets at the plate to preserve a 2-1 victory. Glavine pitched well enough to win, but Livan Hernandez pitched better tonight.

Jon Garland and Javier Vazquez are locked in a good pitching duel on the south side of Chicago. Each has made one mistake; Vazquez gave up a HR to Carlos Lee, and A-Rod matched that in the six with a four-bagger off Garland. It's a 1-1 tie in the sixth.

Update: Garland makes a mistake to Posada, and the Yankees take a 3-1 lead. He's now tied with Dye for the AL lead in HR with 7.

Randy Johnson is in classic form tonight. He's allowed 1 earned run while striking out 10 over six innings. Doug Davis of the Brewers is matching him however, also only allowing 1 run so far. Both are throwing strikes, and both have walked only 2. It's 2-1 Brewers in the 7th.

The Tigers are up 9-2 on the Twins in the third inning. Three of their big acquisitions are paying off for them. Rodriguez, Guillen and White all have hits and RBI tonight. They all have batting averages over .300 and all have OBA's over .380. I started wondering last year if Dombrowski was as smart as I thought he was. Given the leeway to sign some players, Dave has done as good a job as any GM. It looks more and more like the Tigers will show a dramatic improvement in 2004.

Tom Glavine and Livan Hernandez are certainly putting on a show at Shea. Both have allowed just one earned run so far, the difference being an unearned run allowed by the Mets. Both are being efficient, throwing about 14 pitches per inning. Expos lead 2-1 in the bottom of the 7th.

A rough first inning for Josh Fogg. He's given up five runs so far without getting an out. He came into the game with an ERA of 12.00. There is an error in the inning, but looking at the play-by-play, I think most of the runs will be earned.

Update: Fogg does not get an out before he's relieved, and allows 6 runs, five earned. His ERA now stands at 17.00.

As someone pointed out in the comments today, lost in Barry Bond's HR barrage is one by Scott Rolen. He hit his 8th tonight to give the Cardinals an early 3-0 lead. That gives him an .831 slugging percentage.

Allen Barra gets it right on Steinbrenner.

Some good pitching matchups tonight. Tampa Bay at Baltimore features two starters with sub 2.00 ERAs so far this year, Paul Abbott and Matt Riley. Matt is both striking out and walking a lot of batters, but has been otherwise unhittable. Righty Paul Abbott has not allowed an extra-base hit to a lefty this year.

The Fish try to continue their domination of the Phillies this year as Carl Pavano faces Eric Milton. Milton's control has been excellent, walking 1 in 11 innings while striking out 9. Pavano has yet to allow a HR. A number of Phillies have very good OBA's against Pavano, so we'll see if he walks a lot of batters tonight.

A rejuvenated Tom Glavine takes on Livan Hernandez at Shea tonight. Glavine has allowed only 10 hits in 20 innings while only striking out five. Righties, however, are hitting .156 against the lefty, a sure sign that the dead fish ball Glavine throws is working.

Finally, the Padres at Giants, in addtion to the Bonds Show, will feature two good pitchers with losing records. Peavy and Schmidt each have sub 3.00 ERAs, but both are 0-1. Luck is likely to change for one of them tonight. Bonds has 2 HR in 9 AB vs. Peavy.

Enjoy!

Joe Kennedy is off to a suprisingly good start for the Rockies. He shut down the Dodgers at Coors Field last night, with the Rockies winning 7-1. He struck out 7 and walked only 1 in the game, and for the year he's K'd 13 and walked only 2. Both are improvements for Kennedy. His ERA at Coors is 2.08. He'll be 25 next month, and may just be coming into his own. Maybe the Rockies have found someone who can handle the thin air.

As you know, Bonds has homered in seven straight games. Sort of. On April 14, having hit HR in two straight games, Bonds pinch hit and walked. After DiMaggio's hit streak, a rule was adopted for counting hit streaks that being walked or hit by a pitch would not be grounds for ending a streak. They wanted to prevent a team from stopping a streak simply by walking a batter four times in a game. So even though Bonds has not homered in every game he's played during this streak, the HR streak is still alive.

What is being glossed over at the moment is that the Giants, despite Bonds, are losing. During this streak, the Giants are 3-5, and they've falled 3 1/2 games behind the Dodgers. They've only been outscored 37-32 during this streak, however. Bonds has 51 of the team's 192 total bases; if you take Bonds out of the lineup, the team slugging percentage falls from a good .410 to an anemic .327. The Giants have offensive problems that they need to address, and a pitching staff that has an ERA about 1/2 a run too high. If they don't find a way to improve this team outside Bonds, they'll end up like the McGwire Cardinals, a losing team with a great slugger to bring in the fans.

As a post script, when Griffey was on his HR streak, I figured the chance of HR in nine straight games was about the same as the odds DiMaggio faced when he hit in 56 straight games.

Update: Roy points out in the comments that Barry and Bobby Bonds have now combined for 999 HR.

The Royals 3-4-5 hitters had a great night, driving in 10 runs with seven hits, two doubles and a HR. The Royals are blowing away the Indians 15-4.

Mark Buehrle is being shelled in with tiny hits. They Yankees have four singles, a walk and a hit batter. Three of the singles have been of the infield variety. To make matters worse, Cairo, the Yankees weakest hitter, gets a double down the left field line (not hit hard, but well placed) to drive in three and give the Yankees a 7-0 lead. It's one of those performances where you know Buehrle is pitching better than the score; he's just been unlucky. Alex Graman will come into his first ML game with a huge cushion.

Update: With a 7-0 lead Graman strikes out his first batter, catching Willie Harris looking.

Carlos Zambrano continues to impress. He's dispatching the Pirates easily through four innings tonight, allowing two hits, no walks and no runs. He's lowered his ERA to 1.06, and has only thrown 44 pitches. With Prior possibly out for the season, Zambrano is stepping up and filling the ace hole.

The Red Sox have an interesting problem shaping up at 2nd base, albeit a good one to have. With both Bellhorn and Reese playing, Mark is showing that he's a supreior offensive player to Pokey. Bellhorn's OBA is almost twice as high as Reese's. When Garciaparra comes back from his injury, the Red Sox will need to decide if they want Reese's defense or Bellhorn's ability to get on base in the lineup everyday.

Mark Redmond just did a nice bit of base running. He was on second after a throwing error, and Alex Gonzalez grounds to third near the bag. As soon as Bell releases the ball to first, Redmond takes off to third and beats the return throw from Thome. He's now at third with one out, in a position to score on a sac fly.

Update: Dontrelle Willis strikes out to end his hit streak, but Juan Pierre gets his second hit of the night to give the Marlins an unearned run and a 1-0 lead in the bottom of the 2nd.

Dontrelle Willis leads the fish into Philadelphia tonight to face the Phillies and Vicente Padilla. Willis has outscored his opponents 3-0, has allowed one extra-base hit and delivered two, and is batting 1.000 while allowing a .196 BA. The Phillies have started to hit, however, and they are looking to end their three-game losing streak against the Marlins.

Halladay and Martinez meet in round two of their Cy Young pitching battle. Both turned things around in their last starts; Roy for the better, Pedro for the worse. It seems to me it's just a matter of time before the Blue Jays offense comes to life; Delgado is not a .119 hitter. Hitting Pedro hard be a boost to their confidence.

Although it's not a great pitching matchup, keep your eye on the Tigers at Minnesota tonight. Detroit is off to a good start and is just 1/2 game out of first place in the Central. The Tigers are outscoring their opponents by a few runs; if they can keep that up the whole year, they'll finish around .500 which would be an amazing improvement.

Finally, the Padres are in San Francisco tonight and send Brian Lawrence to the mound to try to stop Barry Bonds' home run streak. Bonds has hit two HR off Lawrence in 18 AB. Sounds like a typical performer vs. Barry. If Bonds was on steroids and off now, it certainly hasn't hurt his power.

Enjoy!

Ryan Wilson takes a statistical look to see if the move to the big city is responsible for Alex Rodriguez's struggles.

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It's Patroit's Day, and what better way to celebrate the start of the revolution than with a titanic tilt between the Yankees and Red Sox! Kevin Brown brings his 3-0 record to the 11 AM start against Bronson Arroyo. I'll be driving home today, so look for audio blog comments on the game.

Clemens perfect through three innings.

Update: Clemens pitched another great game. Seven innings, seven K, 1 BB and 1 run. He's 3-0 with an 0.87 ERA. There's little doubt he retired too early. At this rate, he'll win another Cy Young award.

Maddux's woes continue. A walk, two hits and a homer in the first give the Reds a 3-0 lead and takes Maddux's ERA to 9.28. Sammy Sosa gets one back in the bottom of the 1st with a HR.

The Marlins at Braves this afternoon offers a pitching matchup of contrasts. At age 25, Brad Penny appears to be finding his groove. So far this year, his strikeouts are way up and his walks are way down. Today will be a good test to see if he can do that to a team other than Montreal. And while righty Penny has pummeled the Expos, lefty Mike Hampton has been hammered by the Mets. His ERA stands at 16.20, and he's allowed 18 hits and four walks in 6 2/3 innings.

Roger Clemens takes the mound for the Astros as they host the Brewers this afternoon. He'll face lefty Chris Capuano. Clemens has struck out 12 in 13 2/3 innings so far. When Clemens left Boston, and a number of people thought his best years were behind him, Bill James pointed out that his strikeout numbers were still great, and as long as they stayed high, Clemens was going to be a good pitcher. He's been unhittable so far, although he's walked six batters, something very unlike Clemens. However, I can easily see Clemens being another Nolan Ryan and pitching another five years. His strikeouts are still there, and Houston appears willing to give him as much rest as he needs. Who knows how long he can last.

Greg Maddux looks to turn his season around this afternoon in Wrigley against the Cincinnati Reds. The Reds send the reborn Paul Wilson to the mound. I remember in 1996 when Wilson and Isringhausen were going to be the future of the Mets staff. They both blew out their arms and were out of baseball for a while. Jason was remade as a closer, and Paul Wilson is showing signs this year of fulfilling his potential. Maddux is off to a terrible start, but people have pointed out to me that he had three bad starts last year before he hit his stride. Like Clemens, he's walking a lot of batters. Unlike Clemens, he's not striking anyone out. I'm waiting to see on Greg.

Enjoy!

I'm a bit of an ice cream snob. When I was in college, we were lucky to have about 1 ice cream parlor for every 10 students (okay, that's a bit of an exaggeration, but it sure seemed like that). If you started at the southern end of Harvard Square, there was the traditional Baskin Robbins (whose flavor of the month happens to be Baseball Nut). As you walked up Massachusetts Avenue north, you came to Belgium Fudge, which later became Emac and Bollios (that may not be the right spelling). Both were specialty ice cream stores that served unusual flavors.

Continuing up the the street, as you came to the square proper (where the subway station stands), was Brigham's. Brigham's was a Boston version of Friendly's. The ice cream was the poorest in the square, but still pretty good. If you turned left at Harvard Coop instead, you'd head up Brattle Street to Bailey's. Bailey's was an old fashioned ice cream palor, with small marble tables, food and ice cream on one side of the store, and chocolates on the other. It was a perfect place to go after a movie for a frozen treat.

If you were in good shape, you could continue up Massachusetts avenue to Somerville (the subway didn't go there yet) to Steve's. Steve's was a blast. The line wound around inside the store, out the door and down the block. I don't think I ever went to Steve's when there wasn't a line. It was always a half hour wait. You were rewarded with ice cream that was made in the window (he seldom had more than three flavors on hand). And Steve would mix in up to three items; nuts, candies, dried fruit. The staff would grab giant scoops from the freezer with a pair of flat spatulas, form a depression in the middle, add your mixins, then fold until the ice cream and candy were blended. It was heaven.

Eventually, Steve expanded and opened a store in Harvard Square. He sold out to a large corporation, and later opened Herrell's. The corporate Steve's is gone, but the Herrell's still thrives in the square, and lucky for me, Northampton, MA. The Herrell's in Cambridge is located in an old bank. You can sit in the vault to eat your ice cream. Herrell's had the best ice cream I ever tasted. Until now.

I've been working out of the home office in Bethlehem, PA this week. Downtown Bethlehem is neat. There are a number of specialty shops, resturants and historic sites. I've been exploring when I've had the chance, and today I stopped by The Heavenly Hedgehog Ice Cream Company for a bit of frozen fun. I ordered a raspberry sundae with banana cream ice cream, whipped cream, almonds and a cherry. The second the spoon brought the first bite to my tongue I knew I had found something special. The ice cream was smooth, the flavors subtle and the raspberry sauce was to die for. It is simply the best ice cream dessert I've ever tried. Barbara Garrison, the owner was there, and I started asking her questions about the store and her confection. She supplies a number of resturants in the area, and is thinking of selling via the internet (although that is going to be very expensive). Next time I'm down, I'm going to bring a cooler and stock up.

If you are anywhere near Bethlehem, stop by. Drive up from Philly. If you are in western NJ, make the trip. If you are five or six hours away, and are looking for something to do, make the trip. If you love ice cream like I do, you won't be disappointed.

Correction I did misspell Emack and Bolio's. They still exist, just not in Harvard Square.

After hitting only eight HR in their first eight games, the Phillies have phound their stroke, blasting two yesterday and phour more today. They've now won three in a row.

Mussina has walked three and hit a batter in the bottom of the second for NY, giving the Red Sox a 2-0 lead. That give Mussina 9 walks in 17.1 IP this season. For his career, he averages 2.0 walks per 9.

There's a breeze at Jacobs Field today, and it's being generated by the batters. Through three and a half innings, both Maroth and Davis have each struck out four.

Once again, the Yankees at the Red Sox offers a compelling pitching matchup as 200 game winner Mike Mussina faces the unquotable Curt Schilling. Mussina is getting hammered by lefties so far this year. They are 12 for 27 against the righty, with 6 of those hits for extra bases. Schilling's had two good performances so far. If he's really in Boston to break the curse, today would be a good chance to show he can get it done.

Victor Zambrano tries to become the majors first four game winner today as the first place Tampa Bay Devil Rays host the Chicago White Sox. The White Sox are averaging six runs a game, but he's already beat two good offenses in the Orioles and the Yankees.

Finally, one of my favorite young pitchers makes his first start at PETCO Park, as Brandon Webb leads the DBacks against Ismael Valdez and the Padres.

Enjoy!

What a great night of baseball! The Davids in Boston and Oakland defeated their goliaths with great pitching. Roy Oswalt struck out 10 and walked none in a complete game shutout. Matt Riley spun a gem vs. Toronto. Jody Gerut was five for five with 11 total bases, and just missed the cycle by a triple. The DRays shut down the White Sox, and the Rangers shut down the Mariners. (Isn't being shut out by Chan Ho Park and the Texas Rangers the ultimate indignity? :-) ) Bonds got to Gagne, but Gagne still got the save. Randy Johnson was back in form striking out 8 for a complete game shutout. I'm sure there will be more fun today.

Tom Glavine pitched a brilliant seven innings tonight, allowing 1 hit and 1 walk to the Pittsburgh Pirates. He threw 78 pitches, 50 for strikes and left with a two nothing lead. Before the bullpen could get an out in the 8th, that lead had disappeared. The Pirates scored 7 that inning off three different relievers, two of whom did not get an out. The Pirate pen did its best to give the game back, but Jose Mesa stayed perfect in save opportunities and the Pirates held on for a 7-6 win.

Damon's Disciples now have their own web site, if you haven't seen it yet.

Jorge Posada gets one back as he hits his fifth HR of the year. Not a bad first two weeks for the Yankees receiver.

Bill Mueller takes Vazquez deep after a Giambi error to give the Red Sox a 2-0 lead in the first. It was a blast, going over the bullpen into the stands.

Update: Manny hits a Pesky Pole HR to make the score 3-0. Vazquez gave up 28 HR in each of the last two seasons, and the Red Sox appear to be exploiting this weakness.

Update: Jeter lets the ball go through the wickets. Maybe "let" is being too easy on Derek. Once again he shows why he shouldn't be playing shortstop. I caught two seconds of a game the other day, and what did I see? Ground ball by the diving Jeter. When was the last time you saw Jeter dive and come up with the ball?

A-Rod comes to Boston! Unfortunately, it's with the Yankees. Going into this game, there are a lot of negatives for Red Sox fans:

• The Yankees are in first place.


• Pedro has an ERA over 4.00.


• They have neither A-Rod, Nomar nor Magglio.


• Tim Wakefield, the last Sox pitcher to face the Yankees, is on the mound.

On the positive side, Wakefield won't have to face Aaron Boone. And except for that HR, Wakefield almost single handedly defeated NY in the LCS. He'll face Javier Vazquez who looked very good in his first start with the Yankees. It will be lively, it will be loud, and everyone can see it on Fox.

Of course, it's not the only major battle going on tonight. Three thousand miles away, two more teams that will battle each other for the division meet for the first time as the Athletics head south to Anaheim. With Moreno running the Angels with the free agent abandon of Steinbrenner, and Beane battling on a shoe string, this could have the makings of a West Coast Yankees Red Sox. Both teams have six wins, and you couldn't ask for a better pitching matchup in Hudson and Colon. Maybe this is the game Fox should have hyped; it promises to be every bit as good as the Yankees-Red Sox.

Finally, Jason Schmidt makes his 2004 debut as the other famous West Coast rivalry gets underway. The Dodgers send Odalis Perez to the mound in San Francisco with first place on the line. The Dodgers are playing well; there was pre-season talk of fans being disappointed with the Dodgers not picking up a bat. But the last minute addition of Bradley, and being 3-1 in close games should bring back a little enthusiasm. I was getting the impression that the Angels were going to steal Dodger fans away; with the Dodgers winning, too, it won't be as easy for the Angels to pull that off.

Enjoy!

As I was checking the Baltimore-Boston boxscore last night, I noticed that the Red Sox had used nine pitchers in the game. They carry 12, so the entire relief core and the fifth starter were put into action last night. They hadn't seen action in a few days, so I'm sure they needed the work. But if McCarty had not pinch hit, the Sox would have used as many pitchers as batters last night.

The Hardball Times crashed yesterday, but they are back up and running now.

Since the Red-Phillies were rained out yesterday, they'll repeat as a game of the day.

The best pitching matchup is in Boston, where if it's dry enough, Sidney Ponson of the Orioles will face Pedro Martinez of the Red Sox. Both have ERAs around 2.00, but have approached those ERAs differently. Pedro is power and control, striking out 12 while walking only three. Ponson has walked eight while striking out only six. So far, however, he's baffled lefties; they are only 4 for 24 against him.

If you like runs, however, you might want to check out Arizona at Colorado. Casey Daigle, who has given up eight runs in 2 2/3 innings so far this year get thrown into Coors vs. Scott Elarton, who has averaged a hit and a walk per inning this year. I suspect the bullpens will get a workout in this one.

Enjoy!

It always seems that when baseball needs a star to appear to save the game from some scandal one does. Josh Levin had written earlier that there was no Babe Ruth this year. I disagreed:

Just because there isn't an obvious Babe Ruth doesn't mean that one won't emerge. Albert Pujols is young enough that he should still be improving. Who knows what kind of numbers he'll wow us with this year. Mark Prior and Josh Beckett are still not mature pitchers. Maybe their stikeout artistry will entrance us this summer. Most likely, we don't know who or what the savior will be. That's what keeps us in love with the game; there's always something new and unexpected.

And now, Dontrelle Willis hit for 3/4 of the cycle yesterday in five innings while shutting out the Expos. I love this player:

1. He has a cool name. It's so easy to come up with titles for blog entries around this guy. "What you talkin' about Wills." "Don't Ask Dontrelle." And today's, truth be told.


2. He has a cool delivery. Tiant. Fernando. Nomo. Flair. All of these pitchers had that extra added entertainment value when they pitched, and Dontrelle has captured that.


3. He can pitch. Yes, he faded down the stretch last year, but it was still an excellent season. He strikes people out and doesn't walk too many. He keeps the ball in the park. And he's only 22.


4. He can hit. He hit .241 last year with a .328 slugging percentage. That's really good for a pitcher. With his six for six this season, he has a career .313 BA and a .453 slugging percentage. That's good for any player.


5. He has a great attitude.
   

   
   And to think Willis was feeling under the weather Wednesday with a sinus infection.

   ''I don't expect to go 3 for 3 every night,'' he said. ``I'd rather have seven consecutive wins.''
   

Maybe the Marlins can use him as a DH when they play AL teams. That would be very cool. Or play him in the outfield once in a while to get his bat in the lineup. I'm sure we'll see him pinch hit. Maybe Brooks Kieschnick was the start of a trend.

Dontrelle has me excited. Now I'm thinking about getting a cheap flight to Miami to see him pitch at home. I'm certainly going to try to catch him at Shea or Montreal. Can't wait to see his next game on Dontrellevision!

A very interesting game pitched by Wade Miller today. He walked seven in seven innings, but only allowed two hits. The Cardinals could not convert his wildness and their selectivity into pitches they could hit and drive those runners home. Miller, despite walking seven, did not allow a run! Sometimes a walk isn't as good as a hit.

Seth Stohs of Seth Speaks sends this link to an article on Slate about baseball bloggers. I'm on the road and very busy this week, so posting will continue to be light. Check out the blogs listed on the right, and some of the blogs in this article. Whenever I go through these, I'm always impressed with the high level of baseball writing on the internet.

Correction: Fixed link.

Two surprising teams phace off in Philadelphia today as the Cincinnati Reds visit the Phillies. When you look at Cincy's offensive core of Griffey, Dunn, Kearns and Casey, you have to believe they are going to score runs if those four are healthy. So far, they've supplied the power with 16 extra-base hits out of the 30 hits they've collected. And those four can supply more than enough offense when the pitching staff has a 2.29 ERA, with the bullpen contributing a 0.44 ERA.

Meanwhile, the Philadelphia pitching is fine (4.19 ERA is middel of the pack, and they've only walked 16 batters). But the offense has only outscored Montreal in the NL. If I told you Pat Burrell would have a .308 BA after a week, you'd probably think the Phillies were undefeated. But it appears that Burrell's 2003 rubbed off on everyone else, and the team has a .220 BA and more strikeouts than hits. Will they turn it around? Sure, this is a better team than that. But at five games out they have the biggest deficit in the majors.

Enjoy!

You can read all the opening day impressions here.

Adam Newman reports from the White Sox home opener:

I attended White Sox opening day at U.S. Cellular Field (aka "The Cell", still called by many "Comiskey Park") yesterday. It was a typically cold Chicago April day (although much nicer than last year's), but that didn't stop me from leaving work early and taking the train down to the ballpark - and when I got off the train, I was amazed at what I saw.

This off season was the 4th year of a planned 5 year renovation project that has altered almost every aspect of this unfairly criticized park. This year's renovations were the biggest yet, with the top 6 rows of the upper deck (consisting of 6,600 seats) were removed and replaced with an old-fashioned looking flat roof with iron work on the front. They also enclosed the upper deck concourse with new fiber optic panels that are supposed to light up at night (although I didn't see that). The overall effect makes the upper deck much smaller and friendlier. There were some other smaller changes, too, like adding additional levels to the popular "fan deck" in center field and adding a balcony to a party room. Along with this, the team continued their recent trend of making everything in the park green (as opposed to the original blue) by changing all the padding in the park. At this point, the only blue left is the seats themselves, which are strongly rumored to be changing in the next few years.

My seats were in the aforementioned upper deck, 6th row directly behind the plate. In other words, almost perfect. I got myself a kosher hot dog with grilled onions and a beer and watched the pregame festivities. First, the lineups announced by the best PA announcer in the game, Gene Honda. Kansas City was first, and aside from Tony Graffinino (who spent the last few years on the Sox and was generally liked by all), all the players got a round of boos. Then, the White Sox. Unlike last year, (which the Sox opened with a horrible road trip), people were generally cheering for everybody. The most mixed reaction was probably Billy Koch, who's pitched well this year but has to pitch well for a lot more than a week to make people forget last year. Some of the biggest cheers were the obvious stars, Magglio Ordonez, Frank Thomas, Carlos Lee, Mark Buehrle, Esteban Loaiza. The biggest one of all, though, might have been former Sox shortstop Ozzie Guillen, in his first home game as manager.

The Ozziefest continued with the first pitch, which was thrown out by the three White Sox Venezuelan all-star shortstops, Chico Carrasquel, Luis Aparicio, and (of course) Ozzie Guillen. The pitches were caught by Davey Concepcion (another Venezuelan all-star shortstop, and Ozzie's hero growing up), Magglio Ordonez (not a shortstop, but certianly a White Sox Venezuelan all-star), and (in a surprise to everybody, including Ozzie) Carlton Fisk (and you all know who he is). At this point, the crowd started an Ozzie chant that lasted until he tipped his cap to the crowd.

And then, the game. I won't go into huge details about the game, because this is already very long and you can easilly find game details elsewhere. I will say it was one of the more fun games I've seen in a while. White Sox starter Esteban Loaiza didn't have good stuff at all, giving up 5 ER (on 4 homers) in 6 innings. It was enough, though, because the high powered White Sox offense scored 12, including a dramatic 2 out 3 run homer by Paul Konerko. Every Sox starter got at least one hit, and every one scored a run except Magglio Ordonez. It was a 12-5 final, and the big opening day crowd went home cold, but very happy.

The White Sox's park was built a couple of years early. It was modeled after the Royals park, which at the time was considered a gem. Good to see the club is trying to adjust to more modern expectations in the stadium.

Last week it was Darrell May who was pounded by the long ball in his matchup with Esteban Loaiza. Today, Loaiza has given up two long balls to KC hitters through three innings. May has given up a couple of doubles, one to catcher Miguel Olivo. The light hitting catcher is off to a good start; through three innings today he has four hits in eleven AB with 2 doubles and a HR.

Nick Schulz links to an article suggesting that we allow but regulate performance enhancing drugs. I've taken a similar position in the past. But this article also suggests creating two leagues; one for the natural athletes and one for the juiced up players.

The two leagues would not work. The natural league would go out of business very quickly. It's like when Bob Cousy tried to start a basketball league for smaller players. I don't know if it's still around, but I haven't heard much about it lately. People want to see the best athletes perform at their best. They'd go see the stronger athletes. Of course, wouldn't it be funny if after forming the two leagues, you couldn't tell the difference?

Correction: Included link. Sorry, Nick.

I'm glad Doug Pappas is around. I've been too busy to keep track of Bud lately, but Doug is on the case.

Update: Tom Pollard writes:

Jerry Izenberg weighed in with a jaundiced view on this very topic in today's Star-Ledger. In case you find it worth commenting on,

http://www.nj.com/columns/ledger/izenberg/index.ssf?/base/columns-0/1081839370108210.xml

Great blog, by the way; it's done a lot to get me interested in baseball, which I never thought would be possible. Thanks!

Baseball Musings: Creating baseball fans one reader at a time! Thanks Tom!

Two more home openers today. The Chicago White Sox host the Kansas City Royals this afternoon in the baddest part of town. Darrell May takes the mound for the Royals; when they met on April 7, the White Sox smacked three home runs against Darrell and may take him deep again. Esteban Loaiza also started that day and got the win, despite a less than stellar four walks in six innings.

The Angels bring Seattle to town to open the former Edison Field, now Angel Stadium. Joel Pineiro faces Kelvim Escobar. The Seattle offense scored nearly a third of their 2004 runs on Sunday. They've shown no power, as the team has only two HR, both by Bret Boone. They are tied with Philadelphia for the fewest HR in the majors. Troy Glaus of the Angels beats them all by himself with three.

Another game of interest on the West Coast pits the Dodgers against the Padres in San Diego. Jeff Weaver makes his second start for LA after a stellar first outing. He's playing in a ball park tonight that seems to be trouble for power hitters, which should be to Weaver's advantage. He'll face Adam Eaton, who threw an eight inning four hitter against the Dodgers on 4/7, but did not get the decision. Smells like a two hour game to me.

Enjoy!

You can read all the opening day impressions here.

Andrew Olmsted, who has been a generous linker to this blog, attended his first opening day at Coors, and wrote about it on his blog, AndrewOlmsted.com.

You can read all the opening day impressions here.

Tom at Shallow Center attended the first game at Citizens Bank Ballpark and loved the new stadium. He doesn't like the way the Phillies are losing, however:

In the meantime, what has become exceedingly frustrating over the season's first week is not the losses, but how they're being incurred. The Phils' bland acceptance of defeat, their passive, uninspired play, is no better in person than it is on television. I don't expect water coolers to be hurled out of dugouts, but I'd like to see some signs of life. The Phillies are committing perhaps the worst sin of all -- not only are they losing, they are boring as well. Does anybody on this team's bench even know what a rally cap is?

Bad and boring, a deadly combination.

I never thought I would see a line from Greg Maddux where he had five walks and only one strikeout in a game. In eleven season with the Braves, he never walked more than 52 (and that was in his first season with Atlanta). Two less than stellar performances make me start to wonder if 300 is reachable. Sometimes players lose their ability very quickly. My guess is Maddux can find the 11 wins, but not with a 7.45 ERA.

You can read all the opening day impressions here.

Marty Cortinas attended the Giants opener. What a great day to be at a ball game in San Francisco! He published his thoughts at his blog, Across the Seams.

You can read all the opening day impressions here.

Jack Flynn attended the opener at Shea today.

Opening Day at Shea Stadium is a lot like taking the ugliest girl in your high school to the Senior Prom. For that one special day, when she's wearing a nice dress, has some makeup on and has her hair done nicely, you almost forget just how bad she looks like the rest of the time.

Unfortunately, you can only do so much with the big ballpark in Queens these days. Shea is 40 years old now and she's not aging well at all. It doesn't help that the organization isn't exactly bending over backwards to try make the stadium more aesthetically pleasing either; sure, the usual bunting was hanging from the rafters and the grass was sharply cut as always, but the seats are still dirty, the bathrooms are even worse and the scores of exposed rafters give the stadium the feel of an abandoned warehouse.

You're really not getting the Shea Experience unless you're sitting in a small, dirty seat that's not even facing home plate as the wind whips in from Flushing Bay hard enough to chill your bones. Sure, you could go wait on line for 25 minutes to enjoy watered down tap beer and some of the worst ballpark food in baseball (I've visited 14 stadiums in the last three years, so I know from what I speak), but you'd only be making things worse. At some point you'll have to visit the bathrooms, which are either impossibly crowded, stomach-churningly disgusting or simply flooded out and unusable.

In case I'm being too subtle here, let me be more blunt - I still love the Mets, but a visit to Shea Stadium is a terrible experience. Everything about a Mets game in Flushing is infuriating to any fan who expects some justification for the exorbitant ticket prices. But hey, the Mets smacked Mike Hampton and the Braves around on the way to a 10-6 victory today, so all is well in Wilpon-land!

It was a gray, chilly day in Queens and the demeanor of the parking lot attendants reflected the weather as they took $10 to pay for stadium parking. The parking lot was already a mess as the tailgaters were out in full force; I'm thinking the place will be all cleaned up by mid-July. By the time I got to my seat, it was just about time for the first pitch to be thrown. Unfortunately, when I got there I recoiled in horror - none of the seats in the section had been cleaned since (presumably) the end of last season and all featured a sickening layer of dust and grime on each one. This was a new low even for Shea - how do you not power wash every seat at least once in the offseason!?

Having attended roughly 200 Mets games in the last 15 years, I know better than to eat any of the food, but it was Opening Day and it would've been simply un-American of me not to have a few $6.25 beers. Big mistake. Of the 50,000 people in the stadium, 40,000 of them were men who also wanted to show how patriotic we were, and the lines to the men's room were (I'm not kidding) close to 100-deep by the third inning. Another curious quirk of Shea is that it features nearly twice as many ladies' rooms and mens' rooms, which certainly didn't help matters. By the end of the game, at least two mens' rooms had to be closed because the plumbing had failed and water was streaming from the bathrooms. Lovely, I know.

Lest you think there weren't any positives, I should mention that there were some minor improvements worth noting, especially the new scoreboards in right field and along the foul lines. They look more like silent radio now and are now longer reliant on the individual flash bulbs that are still used to display the out of town scores. Two other features are also nice additions - the scoreboards in left and right field now picture a head shot of each player next to their names and the main scoreboard keeps a pitch count with balls and strikes included.

In the end, these minor cosmetic improvements don't obscure the fact that Shea Stadium may well be the ugliest and dirtiest open-air park in major league baseball. It doesn't help that the surrounding neighborhood is a jungle of auto-body shops and expressways and has about as much charm and ambiance as a demilitarized zone. There is no franchise in baseball, with the possible exception of the Expos, in more dire need of a new stadium than the Mets. Don't hold your breath - unless you're entering one of the bathrooms, that is!

I first visited Shea Stadium in 1970. I remember my dad really liking it. Unlike Yankee Stadium at the time, there were no obstructed seats. In fact, they used to boast that there wasn't a bad seat at Shea. Of course, we were there with the Cub scouts, so my Dad and George Shawah spent the game taking the boys back and forth to the bathroom, because the den mothers couldn't. The Braves were in town that day, so I got to see Henry Aaron play. Unfortunately, he didn't get the ball out of the infield. It's sad to see a park that was once considered a jewel fall into such disrepair.

Congratulations to Barry Bonds who tied Willie Mays today for 3rd on the all-time HR list. I sure he was glad to accomplish the feat in front of his home town fans.

On to Ruth!

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More home openers today, although some of the east coast games are threatened by rain. The big one is in Philadelphia, where the Phillies open up their new stadium, Citizens Bank Ballpark. The Phillies are stuck in last place in the NL East at 1-5. They'll send Randy Wolf against Paul Wilson of the Cincinnati Reds. Wilson pitched a fine game in his first start, allowing no runs while striking out 6 over 7 innings.

The favorite son returns as Greg Maddux opens Wrigley field against Kris Benson and the Pittsburgh Pirates today. Maddux has not pitched in a Cubs uniform in Wrigley since 1992, and I expect he'll get a warm reception. Neither pitcher was stellar in his first outing. I wonder if Steve Bartman will get a free ticket after being removed from game 6 of the NLCS?

After helping the Twins open the season in Minnesota, Cleveland gets the favor returned as the Twins open Jacobs field. Kyle Lohse will twirl for the Twins against Cliff Lee. Lee was not impressive in his first start, walking four in 4 1/3 innings. Cleveland is in danger of falling four games behind Detroit after a week of the season.

The Mets return to Shea to introduce Kaz Matsui to the NY faithful. Mike Hampton faces Steve Trachsel in what could be a very wet slugfest.

It's snowing in Colorado this morning, but the Rockies plan to open Coors against the Diamondbacks. The excellent Brandon Webb will get his 2nd start of the season against the no-so-excellent Jason Jennings.

Finally, the Giants return to the Bay with Barry Bonds and Willie Mays in tow. My guess is that Bonds ties Willie in his first AB. There was talk on Baseball Tonight of how Clemens got the umpires to expand Bonds' strike zone. Maybe that's hurting him, but he's still drawn 7 walks in 6 games, so it's not hurting Barry that much. Matt Kinney of the Brewers may be the answer to the trivia question. Bonds is 0 for 1 vs Kinney with 2 walks.

Enjoy!

Congrats to Mike Mussina on his 200th victory. Looks like he's righting himself after two tough starts. He's one of the greats, and at 34 has a decent shot at 300 victories.

Happy Easter! I wonder if MLB will ever use pastel colored balls on Easter Sunday? That would be kind of cool.

Baltimore and Tampa Bay battle for first place in the AL East (sorry, I couldn't resist) as Yankee killer Victor Zambrano faces Eric DuBose. Okay, both these pitchers have an ERA over 5.00, but Zambrano has two start against the Yankees and two wins. That sure beats losing.

In the purple game, the Blue Jays and Red Sox send their #2 starters to the mound, as Miguel Batista faces Curt Schilling. Despite his 9 ERA, Batista has not allowed a HR this year.

The Easter Candy game has M&Ms pitching. Jamie Moyer tries to bring Seattle into the win column against the A's Mark Mulder. The Mariners are scoring 4 runs per game, and have an OBA under .300! That's hard to believe for a team with Olerud, Martinez and Suzuki in the lineup. But Bavasi doesn't care for the new math.

Finally, PETCO Park gets national exposure tonight on ESPN in high definition. We'll see if Bonds can tie Willie Mays on National TV.

Enjoy!

I scored the Giants-Padres game last night. The announcers were making a big deal about how difficult it is to hit HR at PETCO Park. I don't know that I agree with them. Players were hitting balls deep that were caught, and they were hitting balls deep that were falling on the warning track for doubles. The reactions of the hitters were being interpreted as, "That would have a HR at Qualcomm." Maybe. But most of those batted balls didn't strike me as home run swings.

You know the kind of swing I mean. The one where the batter gets all of the ball. His swing is perfect, his follow through is perfect, the bat has the right upper cut angle to drive the ball deep. Ken Griffey Jr. has that swing. Bonds has that swing. You just know the ball is gone before the camera turns to show it catching a lucky fan.

There were no swings like that in San Diego last night. A lot of those deep balls were hit the opposite way. There were close to 400 foot blasts the opposite way, but they weren't balls that were sure thing HR. And even if it turns out to be a doubles ballpark instead of a HR ballpark, that's fine. It's nice to have a park that's a little different.

Matt Morris rebounded from his poor first start to throw the second sub-100 pitch complete game of the day, as St. Louis defeated the Diamondbacks 10-2. Morris only struck out 1, however and has 4 K in 15 innings, way below his career average.

Hideo Nomo also improved on his first start as the Dodgers won 7-3 against the Colorado Rockies. He allowed 2 runs, but struck out 7 over six innings. Gagne picked up his first save of the year to keep his streak alive. And at 4-1, the Dodgers are in first place.

I agree with most studies that batting orders, over a 162 game season, don't really matter. But tonight I saw an example of bad lineup construction potentially losing a game for the Giants.

Alou likes to bat Bonds fourth. That means Bonds is going to lose a few plate appearances every year because of games where the player batting third makes the final out. Tonight, with two out in the ninth and trailing by two, the Giants loaded the bases against Trevor Hoffman. Instead of having the best hitter on the team come up in that spot, Michael Tucker got the honor keeping the game alive. Hoffman got Tucker on three pitches. I suppose the Padres might have walked Bonds in the that situation, but there's a good chance they would have pitched to him as well. We'll never know due to Alou's lineup selection.

I notice that David Aardsma is pitching for the Giants tonight. With his earlier debut in the majors, he moves past Henry Aaron for first alphabetically in the history of major league players.

Julio Franco had a great AB vs. Kyle Farnsworth. Fransworth throws him 100 MPH fastballs, and Julio fouls them off. He throws him sliders and Franco fouls them off. And he keeps fouling them off the other way, where Farnsworth was pitching him. He finally gets the count to 3-2 with the bases loaded and the score tied, and Franco hits the ball over Sammy Sosa's head to clear the bases.

Martinez and Foulke prove to be a deadly combination for the Blue Jays. They beat the Jays with 117 pitches, 78 for strikes. Foulke use only 11 pitches to get a four-out save as the Red Sox win 4-1. Once again, the Blue Jays are outslugged, 3 HR to 1, as all the runs in the game score on long balls.

A good pitching duel in Puerto Rico tonight. Al Leiter makes his 2004 debut for the Mets, facing John Patterson, making his Expos debut. Neither has allowed a run yet, and Patterson has struck out six through five innings. The Mets batters are averaging 8.25 K per game this year. If you had a pitching staff with that rate, you'd be very happy.

Great pitching duel between Pedro Martinez and Roy Halladay. No score through 5 1/2 innings, when David Ortiz hits a two run HR to give the Sox the lead. Both pitchers are throwing strikes, and both are being efficient in getting batters out.

Update: Orlando Hudson touches Pedro for a HR in the top of the 7th to make the score 2-1.

I live in Massachusetts, but it's unlikely that I can get Red Sox tickets at this point. I'd probably have to pay a ticket agent or scalper through the nose. It may actually be cheaper for me to go to Tampa Bay to see a game. I can fly there from Hartford for $100 round trip, and get a pretty good seat for $25.00. Someone in the Devil Rays organization should work a deal with Southwest to bring in visiting fans on discount fares whenever the Rays are in town, especially from New York and Boston. It's one way of boosting attendance.

Tim Hudson posted the first complete game of the 2004 season this afternoon. It was a great duel between Tim and Gil Meche, with the Mariners getting off to a 1-0 lead in the first and Meche holding it until he tired in the 7th, when the A's scored two. Hudson needed only 86 pitches (and 2 hours, 2 minutes) to retire the Mariners. There were a lot of balls put into play, as Hudson struck out and walked none (two DP's helped as well). A very efficient outing.

Travis Hafner is off to a great start. In five games he has six hits, five for extra bases, including his third HR today. That gives him a .333 BA, but a .944 slugging percentage. He's yet to draw a walk, however, and because he has a sac fly, his OBA is lower than his batting average (.316 vs. .333).

What a nice game by Ben Sheets today. Six innings, 103 pitches, 71 strikes. And he struck out 10 batters without walking any! The Brewers could use more performances like that.

Johnny Damon will miss three games due to injury. However, the NESN broadcast showed a group of fans sitting in centerfield, wearing fake beards and wigs, with Damon's Disciples T-shirts on. I wonder if they read Baseball Musings?

Update: They just interviewed Damon's Disciples on NESN. The T-Shirts cost $20 and the wigs cost $17. They did not mention Baseball Musings.

You can see all the opening day impressions here.

Scott Jefferies brings us opening day from Arlington, Texas:

Good Friday: The Rangers will not play a losing team from 2003 until May 3, so April will be torturous with games against Boston, Oakland, Anaheim, and Kansas City. But for one day, the Rangers schedule worked out to perfection for all involved. Having the home opener for the 2004 Rangers on Good Friday, a day where many people, particularly kids were home on holiday was a god send. The attendance at the Ballpark in Arlington for Fridays game was 50,000 plus and the mark was a record for the club in a regular season game.

The weather could not have been better. Clear skies, sunny, 76 degrees. I was glad to see so many people take advantage of the nice weather because the weather will be downright hazardous come July.

Lone Star: Now that Major League Baseball has corporatized Opening Day and we all are made to Live For This, I was particularly on the look out for Opening Day festivities that were indigenous to Texas. Besides the barbeque menu on the tailgate grills, the most obvious sign that you were in Texas was the Texas Flag. Covering Greens Hill in straight away center as I walked into the ballpark was a giant Lone Star Flag. I doubt the Colorado Rockies drape the field with the State Flag of Colorado during their games. Another sign of Texas sized influence was the rendition of the National Anthem by Texas music (think Jimmy Buffett on Tequila instead of Margaritas) artists Cross Canadian Ragweed. Decked out in replica Ranger uniforms, the Weed tried their hand at an Eagles style four-part harmony and it was really weak.

Saddam Hussein: One of the best things to happen Friday, besides the Rangers 12-4 win, was the honor and ovation given to the 4th Infantry Division from Fort Hood before the first pitch. It was these guys who were responsible for the capture of Saddam Hussein and to watch them march on to the field in front of the Angels and Rangers introduced lineups was inspiring. Everyone in the stands was on their feet and cheering. It always seems easier to be patriotic while sitting in a ballpark.

In honor of the men and women still in Iraq, the Rangers released 7,500 yellow balloons from the center field area. I was watching with keen attention to the direction of and strength that the balloons blew away so to pick up on any evidence of the much talked about Ballpark jetstream. It did appear that the balloons released directly from center field were helped out of the ballpark by a significant gust.

Gabe Kapler, Tim Crabtree, Einar Diaz, and now Mike Young: As the Rangers have moved on from their playoff runs in the late 1990s, they have gradually dropped star players and key pieces to their success. None of the immediate successors have had any staying power but Mike Young hopes to change that as he seeks to place his own mark on the Rangers shortstop position. Moving over from second base, Young received an early opportunity to show the home fans that the position was in capable hands. From the outset he failed. Two consecutive errors, one on a routine double play opened the door for the opportunistic Angels to score three runs on an Adam Kennedy homer. I wouldnt have been surprised if my binoculars showed tears running down Youngs face as Kennedy rushed by him in his home run trot. But what may prove Young to be more successful than the above mentioned successors is what he did in the bottom of the inning.

After a Lance Nix homerun and a Gerald Laird single, Young came up with one out and the Rangers down 3-2. He laced a double to bring home Laird and tie the game. Young later scored and also had an RBI single in the third and finished the game with three RBIs and two long forgotten errors.

It's a Cy Young battle in Boston tonight. Roy Halladay faces Pedro Martinez as Red Sox host the Blue Jays. Halladay had a poor outing against the Tigers in the Jays season opener. Pedro also had a rough inning and got the loss against Tampa Bay. It strikes me that the Red Sox have been a bit luckier this year than then Jays. The Sox have been out hit in BA, OBA and Slugging, but are very close to their opponents in runs scored. The Jays have been out slugged, but have been outscored 25-16. It's the best pitching matchup of the day. Enjoy!

Ken Griffey Jr. hit his 2nd HR of the season tonight. He's also drawn a walk and scored. With 483 HR, Griffey isn't out of the Aaron record derby. He needs a monster year this year (50+ HR), and then he needs to stay healthy until he's forty. He laid down a great foundation for reaching 755 in his teens and twenties. But he's spent that capital now, and will have to have an Aaron like finish to his career to catch Hammerin' Hank.

In addition to the Rangers and Blue Jays victories, the White Sox and Astros have also gone out to big leads. The White Sox are up 9-1 in the 7th behind a fine performance by John Garland, who just retired the side on six pitches. The Astros are spoiling the Brewers home opener, leading 11-2 in the 7th. Wade Miller has 7 K and 0 BB through six innings.

So much for the improved Boston bullpen. Timlin, Embree and McCarty combined to give up 6 earned runs in 2 innings. Timlin's ERA is now 16.20 as he picks up the loss.

Toronto gets in the win column with the 10-5 victory. Their bullpen did well in relieve of Lilly, giving up just 1 run in 3 2/3 innings, allowing just a HR and a walk.

The Rangers beat the Angels 12-4. The two positives were the offense (7 players with multi-hit games) and the starter. R.A. Dickey went 7 innings, striking out 5 and walking none. His only mistake was the HR to Adam Kennedy, made worse by two errors in the inning (his three runs were unearned). He was efficient, he threw strikes, and the bullpen didn't blow up. The Rangers have now given up 10 ER in 34 innings for a team 2.65 ERA. Hart and Showalter have to like that.

Michael Young just made consecutive throwing errors. The threw wide to first, then on a double play ball, threw past Soriano. You might say he "Chucked" them.

Update: Adam Kennedy makes the errors very costly as he hits a three-run HR to give the Angels a 3-1 lead. Young gets his arm back to throw out Eckstein for the 2nd out.

Alfonso Soriano singles in his first AB at The Ballpark in Arlington. It's 0-0 in the bottom of the first vs. the Angels.

Update: Mark Teixeira doubles in Soriano to give Texas a 1-0 lead. It's good to see Soriano in an RBI spot in the order (3rd). With Young and Blalock in front of him, Soriano could put up very impressive RBI totals this year.

I noticed in looking at the boxscores on ESPN that they are listing game scores for the starting pitchers, and they are keeping track of the best game scores this year. In looking at the leaders, it's interesting that there hasn't been a truely outstanding performance yet (game score > 90). Roger Clemens, the old, former retiree has posted the best so far, with an 81 vs. the Giants.

More home openers today. The Texas Rangers start us off with an unusual day game in Arlington. The Angels send Ramon Ortiz against the A-Rod-less Rangers and R.A. Dickey. Dickey's not too bad for a Rangers pitcher. If he can get his HR allowed down, he'd actually be a good starter. I'm also interested in seeing how Soriano is welcomed in Texas.

Ted Lilly of Toronto will try to get the Blue Jays on the winning way as he helps the Red Sox open Fenway Park. He'll be facing Bronson Arroyo. I'm hoping to see a "Damon's Disciples" sign in the bleachers. :-) I really like Lilly, although he hasn't lived up to my expectations. I hope he does in Toronto.

The first place Brewers return to Miller Park against the Houston Astros. Appropriately for the ballpark, the matchup is between Wade Miller and Wes Obermueller.

And finally, the Mets and Expos make their way into the tropics as the wandering Expos have their first home opener of the year in San Juan. Tyler Yates will make his major league debut for the Mets, while the Expos send Zach "Opening" Day to the mound. I'd love to hear from anyone attending this game. Enjoy!

You can see all the opening day impressions here.

Derek from Pinstrip News reports on opening day. He doesn't like the new scoreboards, either. Seems like the Yankees made a mistake with these.

Along with the Tigers, the Brewers are also on top of their division after finishing in last place in 2003. One encouraging sign I'm seeing is that Milwaukee is wauking more. :-) Last year, they drew one walk for every 10.1 AB. So far, they are drawing a walk every 8.0 AB. They are hitting better (.290 Team BA) and getting on base more (.373 OBA). The sample is too small to be significant, but it's a trend worth watching.

Dontrelle Willis had a great game yesterday against the Montreal Expos. He went 7 2/3 innings with eight strikeouts and one walk. Seventy seven of his 113 pitches were strikes. That seems like a high pitch count for his first start of the season, so let's keep our eye on that, but it's nice to see him open well after fading in the 2nd half last year.

You can see all the opening day impressions here.

Bill of the Detroit Tigers Weblog sends his comments on watching the first place Tigers in their home opener:

People always care about Opening Day in Detroit. It is an unofficial holiday in an around the city of Detroit. People play hooky from work and school, and start drinking very early in the morning-much like St. Patty's day. Fueled by a 3-0 start this year, the opener wasn't just about the peripheral festivities (drinking). The baseball game on the field actually took on more importance than any of the 7 previous openers I'd attended.

For my friends and I, the day started at a diner at 8:30 in the morning. We fueled up on omelettes, waffles, and coffee before heading down to Detroit.

Our favorite pre-game hang-out is a bar named Casey's. Casey's is located a couple blocks from the old Tiger Stadium. The bar is small and has been there for years. Legend has it that Lou Gherig came to the bar after the first game he missed in 1939. I don't know if the legend is true, of if the bar was even called Casey's back then, but one look around and it certainly seems plausible.

We spent several hours at Casey's taking in several pitchers. We excitedly discussed the possibilities for the Tigers this season, and how we actually expected the Tigers to beat an injured Twins team. We toasted, "Here's to the Tigers being undefeated, and this not being the first game of the year."

Shortly after noon we trekked down to another bar, Nemo's that operates a shuttle to and from Comerica. We reached Comerica about 12:45 and the place was already buzzing. With an hour until game time, we headed over to the Tigers beer hall to grab pulled pork sandwiches and more beer before heading up to our seats. This year, my friends and I sprung for a 21 game season ticket package, and we were anxious to see what our seats would be like for the year. Our seats are in the second row of the upper deck along the third base line. One of my main gripes with Comerica is that the upper deck is so far away from the field. However, these seats don't seem too bad. One of the main reasons for getting the season tickets was so that we could have access to 2005 All Star Game tickets. Now we're whispering about how if the Tigers make the playoffs, we'd have priority for those tickets as well. We're all aware this is only the first week of the season, but it's so nice to be working on a winning streak instead of a losing streak.

The National Anthem and a flyover by a pair of F-16's meant that it is game time. With the temperature in the mid 50's, no precipitation, and the no biting wind it is a pleasantly warm day. The late arriving crowd is still pretty sparse, but enthusiastic.

That enthusiasm was supressed when the Twins put up runs in the first two innings and took a 3-0 lead while the Tigers could only manage a single by Carlos Guillen. Skeptical fans were starting to voice concerns about the "same old Tigers." Fortunately Nate Cornejo settled down and only allowed two baserunners through the next 4 innings.

Then in the 6th inning, the "new and improved Tigers" came to life. Alex Sanchez improbably hit a homer, and then the Tigers strung together several more hits to take a 4-3 lead. The scoring was capped by double to the right-center gap by the much maligned Bobby Higginson. Last year an early 3-run deficit would have spelled doom for the Tigers. This year, anything doesn't seem insurmountable.

Unfortunately the lead was short lived as Cornejo gave up a solo homer to Jacque Jones that tied the game.

In the 7th inning, the stands were still surprsingly full. Normally half the fans have headed back to the bars at this point. I don't know if it was the fact that the Tigers are better, or if the weather was warmer, but people were staying-and they'd be glad they did. After two quick outs the Tigers drew 3 straight walks. A wild pitch scored the go-ahead run and Comerica was rocking. The Tigers then piled on 3 more hits which scored an additional 4 runs putting the game out of reach. The scoring was capped once again by a Bobby Higginson shot into the right centerfield gap. The inning ended when Craig Monroe to Jacque Jones to the warning track in straightaway centerfield which is no small feat.

Higginson, who has been the target of a lot of negative feelings due to his large contract and lack of performance the last few years received a standing ovation and chants of "Bobby" as he resumed his position in rightfield.

Eric Munson hit his second homer of the year, and the Twins managed to pick up a couple of runs on a 2-run homer. With two outs in the ninth the remaining crowd came to their feet to urge on Steve Colyer and the Tigers. As strike three was called, the crowd roared and for second consecutive home game (the last being the last game of 2003) the Tigers came off the field to a standing ovation.

It was a great day for the Tigers, and a great day for the fans. While the season is only 4 games old, at least they are 4 wins. I don't know if this Tiger team will be good or not this year, or if this is just a 4 game win streak. However, for a franchise that has started so poorly the last few years, this streak is awakening a baseball city that has been dormant for too long.

It's good to see the fans in Detroit have something to cheer about this year.

You can see all the opening day impressions here.

Clifford of Clifford's Big Red Blog also attended the Yankees home opener. He doesn't like the new scoreboards, and he has pictures.

Idiots Write About Sports writes about the political contributions by the owners and executives of MLB teams.

This list does not surprise me. During the 50th anniversary celebration of Jackie Robinson's debut, I asked Bill James why black baseball players had not been as radical in the 1960's as their counter parts in football, track, boxing and basketball. Bill's explanation is that baseball is a very conservative game. The people who run and play the game tend to be to the right politically.

You can see all the opening day impressions here.
Brian attended the Yankees home opener and left his thought on his blog, Commerce Comet.

I love the way Brian notices how the park changed from last year. He has a great eye for detail.

Just noticed I turned the counter over today. Thanks again to all the loyal readers of this site, it's been a blast.

I turned on the Angels-Mariners just in time to see Hasegawa blowing a one-run lead. He came in with a man on first and none out, and after three hits and a balk, it's 3-1 Angels. He's not throwing strikes, 9 of his 17 pitches have been called balls so far.

Update: Erstad caps it off with a 2-RBI double. 5-1 Angels going to the bottom of the ninth.

Update: Kevin Gregg shows the Mariners how it's done, getting Seattle 1-2-3 in the ninth. Angels win.

Apart from having the highest scoring scrabble name in the history of baseball (Javier Vazquez, two Z's a Q, a J and two V's), I love the fact that this pitcher throws strikes. He tossed 106 pitches today, 73 for strikes. The new additions to the Yankees rotation have so far out-performed the guy they kept (Mussina).

Today's the 30th anniversary of Hank Aaron breaking Babe Ruth's career HR record. In an unusual move at the time, NBC was interrupting their regular programming. The buildup for this had started in September of 1973, since Aaron was close to the record and had a shot at breaking it then. They would run projections showing how many HR they thought he would have at the end of the year. It was very big news.

I remember watching the game. I remember the swing, the ball going into the bullpen, the fans running on the field and patting Hank on the back. It was a fantastic evening for a very deserving player.

I don't agree with this from Tim Kirkjian, however:

Someday, perhaps, Barry Bonds will break Aaron's record, but with all due respect to the brilliant Bonds, it won't be the same. Aaron broke Ruth's record, one that had never been seriously approached. Aaron broke it in an era when the home run was significant, as opposed to today, when it is overexposed and devalued. In 1974, no one had hit 50 in a season since Willie Mays in 1965. Last year was the first time since 1994 that there wasn't a 50-home run man. When Aaron hit 714, he was one of only 11 players with 500 career home runs, only 15 players had 400. Now, we have 19 players with 500, and 36 with 400 -- over twice as many as in 1974. In 10 years, there's probably going to be 30 guys with 500 home runs and perhaps four players -- Bonds, Aaron, Ruth and Sosa -- with 700.

There were about 40 years between Ruth and Aaron reaching 700. If Bonds reaches that plateau, over 30 years will have passed. That seems about right to me. There may be three or four 700-HR hitters from the current crop of active players, but there just as likely may be none. As for the 500 HR club, there were 11 players who reached it over the first 50 years of clubs playing long ball (starting in 1920). There have been many more players in the 30 years since, so the growth seems about right to me. I get the feeling that some people just want one 50 HR season per decade. I'll take the occasional 70, and the occasional 700.

Mariners Wheelhouse has a devestating post on Bavasi's use of statistics when it comes to minor leaguers:

The quotes by Bavasi from both Thiel and Ryan Wilkin's (via Jay Jaffe) dovetail nicely. Bavasi simply does not believe that minor league statistics mean anything.

Thus, we see the Mariners pattern of acquiring toolsy toolsy minor leaguers and young players who haven't done squat. I like the last part of the Bavasi excerpt: "I have a hard time answering the question of how statistical analysis helps you below the majors. I'm going to return to squat -- veteran scouts, not younger scouts." Bavasi gets squat from squat.

Bavasi, the anti-Beane.

The first place Detroit Tigers open at home today against the AL Central Champion Minnesota Twins. Carlos Silva, picked up in the Milton trade, makes his first start for the Twins today. Nate Cornejo gets the nod for the Tigers. I don't have a lot of confidence in Cornejo I must admit. Last year, and for his career, he's walked more batters than he's struck out, so his 5.14 career ERA should not come as a surprise.

The Yankees finally reach home today, and Javier Vazquez will face Scott Schoeneweis of the Chicago White Sox. There was a great New Yorker cover last week, entitled "Stars and Stripes Forever." It had the Yankees lined up on the baseline for opening day in pinstripe Yankee suits (with ties), and A-Rod coming out to join them with money bugling out of his doffed cap and pockets. It will be fun to see how the NY fans greet him.

San Diego opens their new stadium today. Barry Bonds could christen PETCO Park with his 660th HR. David Wells will be home coming king on the mound, facing the Giants Dustin Hermanson.

Enjoy!

I was scoring the Mets-Braves game last night for work. One of the things I love about scoring is that it really makes you pay attention to what is going on. I told my wife the score (18-10), and she asked if that was a slugfest. I said yes, but after sleeping on it, I'm not sure that was correct. It seems to me it was an example of the deadly combination of having a pitching staff that doesn't strike out batters combined with a porous defense. The Braves had 19 hits, but 13 were singles, and only one was a HR. There were any number of balls hit that better fielders would have at least kept on the infield. Wigginton looked particularly bad to me; I kept seeing balls go by him that good third basemen would have dove. Ty seemed frozen on his feet.

I was also more impressed with Kaz Matsui's offense than his defense. He was selective at the plate and looks like a very good hitter. But I expected him to be a wizard with the glove, and last night he looked more like Derek Jeter than Ozzie Smith.

Scoring ten runs was great, but they are going to need to do that quite often if they are going to win regularly with that defense.

Dan Lewis has a new sports blog, ArmChairGm.com. He covers all sports, including this strory about how the average baseball salary has gone down this year.

Julio Franco pinch hit for Mike Hampton in the Braves big fourth inning. The Braves sent so many men to the plate that Franco batted again. Officially, he doesn't have a position on this AB!

Update: And by the way, he had two hits.

Piazza and Cameron go back-to-back with two out off Mike Hampton to give the Mets an early 3-0 lead.

The DRays have loaded the bases against Rivera in the 9th with 1 out. The Yankees are playing the infield back, except for Clark at first. Sort of the opposite of the end of the 2001 World Series, where the Yankees brought the infield in and Luis Gonzalez popped one over Jeter. Torre makes the right decision this time as Fordyce grounds into a 5-3 double play to end the game.

With their 2-1 victory over the Oakland A's today, the Texas Rangers ERA now stands at 3.24. Now, while I don't think that's going to last, it should be noted that the Rangers ERA doesn't have to get that low for them to be a winning team. If there offense is still very good, all they reall need is to get their ERA down to around 4.50. This is a good start.

This isn't good.

Mauer tore medial meniscus cartilage that will require surgery. The team set no timetable for his return, but the Star Tribune reported on its Web site that Mauer could miss at least three weeks.

I hope it's not too long. He looked like a very mature hitter watching him opening night. The hazards of being a catcher and playing on turf.

Kenny Lofton spoils Abbott's no-hitter with 1 out in the 6th. Jeter follows up with a double to give the Yankees their first threat of the day.

Update: A-Rod delivers an RBI single to center. He didn't hit it great, but it dropped in to tie the game.

Update: Looks like Abbott has lost whatever he had. He falls behind Giambi 2-0, and Jason rips the next pitch for an RBI single. It's 2-1 with Sheffield up. No breaks until Wilson in this lineup.

Bill Ferris pointed out that Tiger Blog is remembering the 1984 Tiger Season by keeping a running diary of the year on his blog. For those of you too young to remember, the '84 Tigers were one of the greatest teams of the last 40 years. Off the top of my head, I'd only put the 1998 Yankees ahead of them. They got off to a big lead early, and never looked backed.

Today's the anniversay of Jack Morris' no-hitter.

There's two out in the fifth, and all Paul Abbott has allowed the Yankees is a walk to Matsui (Huff has also made an error).

Update: Posada hits a long fly ball to end the inning. No-hitter for Abbott through five. He's thrown 77 pitches, about 15 per inning.

Brown is pitching very well, also. He's given up 4 hits and 1 run.

Soriano just got a hold of one, and Mark Kotsay made an amazing grab. Kelty had lost the ball, and Mark came out of nowhere to make a one-handed grab at the 362 mark in left-center.

Scott Brodeur sends along this link comparing Johnny to a semi-famous cartoon character.

I still think he looks like Jesus, which has an interesting downside. If he doesn't start hitting, how long until fans start yelling, "Crucify him, crucify him!" :-)

The Tigers try to make it three in a row today against cross border rival Toronto. The send the youthful Jeremy Bonderman against the wiley Pat Hentgen. I keep hoping that Bonderman is going to turn out like Greg Maddux; a poor rookie season followed by brilliance. We may get a glimpse of that tonight.

The previously retired Roger Clemens makes his Houston debut tonight on ESPN2. He'll face Barry Bonds, who (if you didn't know) is one HR behind Willie Mays. I'm sure he'd like to get the traveling road show over. Keep an eye out to see how far inside Roger pitches Barry. Roger has walked Bonds three times in their three previous plate appearances.

Another veteran returns home in a fashion as Greg Maddux make his first start for the Cubs in over a decade as the Reds host Chicago. Maddux's W-L record with the Cubs 95-75, so he's just five wins away from 100 with two teams.

The Indians and Twins will try to play a nine inning game tonight. The Indians bullpen has been awful, posting a 7.50 ERA in 12 IP, including 7 walks.

Finally, Jeff Weaver moves from harsh lights of NY to the lush life of LA. He'll make his debut as the Dodgers #3 starter tonight against the Padres. Here's hoping that Dodger Stadium is kinder to him than the House that Ruth Built.

You can see all the opening day impressions here.

Mike Hunssinger attended the Marlins opening game, and almost caught Choi's HR!

Correction: Fixed link.

You can see all the opening day impressions here.

Jeff Lancaster attended the Royals opening game. Here's his take:

- I arrived a bit early so I made my way to the live broadcast of the Royals flagship (810am). They were broadcasting outside the stadium, very close to the George Brett statue. I watched a quick segment and during their break, the actual George Brett arrived, and participated in an interview and a roundtable. I believe it was my first experience of seeing a statue and the actual live model at the same time.

- Also heard from my buddies that they had spotted the true baseball spokesperson from Kansas City driving a champagne colored Cadillac. Buck O'Neill had his arms out the window and his patented smile on his face. His famous quote of "born at the right time" still rings true.

- It was about this time that I received a call from a member of my foursome that his car broke down and he wouldn't be able to make the game. Not a good game to miss.

- Noticed many, many people with fingers held aloft looking for tickets. A very welcome sight outside of the K.

- My other buddies called to tell me that they had found a spot for the Winnebago so I began the trek. They were located near the Chiefs practice facility which is easily a half-mile from the stadium. While walking through the crowds, I noticed dozens of tailgating games of washers. If unfamiliar, it's very similar to horseshoes but played with palm-sized metal washers. The "pit" is a wooden box with a white cylinder in the middle of it. One point for a toss into the box, three points for a toss into the cylinder.

- Arrived at the Winnebago (which was a gift to our group just to drive it away from the previous owner) and a 16-team washer tournament had already started. Brats, hamburgers, peppers, chips, and Boulevard beer was the menu.

- Made it inside the stadium for the National Anthem, Challenger the Eagle, and the flyover. Our seats were about four rows from the top (row AA) on the first base side. Clearly a great angle to yell at the umpire for those missed calls.

- The Royals handed out, for the first time ever I believe, ThunderStix. For the first eight innings, they were very, very annoying as various drunk fans used them simply to give me a headache. In fact, one such person sat one row below us and about ten seats to our left. And he only seemed to reach truly epic levels of annoyance when his wife would leave for bathroom breaks. However, when used in unison, they were extremely loud and proved very effective. In fact, it's our belief that Mendy's home run was ThunderStix aided.

- One noted conversation: Friend A: "I had no idea that Sandy Alomar was still playing baseball. I mean he's really old and he really sucks." (Five seconds later) Sandy: "HOME RUN". Unbelievable.

- More quotes: "Well Pena's obviously giving up by bringing in Shawn Camp and Nate Field". (I still believe this, by the way) "There's no way that Pena will lift Stairs just because Marte is now pitching". "Mendy Lopez pinch-hitting for Matt Stairs, no freaking way".

- And wouldn't you know it, after Mendy's homer I even high-fived that annoying ThunderStix guy in the row in front of us. The moral of the story: Everyone is happy when the Royals win!!!!!!!!

- The very first call-in question on sports radio while driving away from the stadium......"How will we ever keep Mendy Lopez next year?".

I've had the experience of talking about how bad a player is just before he homers. They always want to prove you wrong. :-)

You can see all the opening day impressions here.

Michael Korte, Designated Driver for the Devil Ray Bandwagon, attended the home opener in Tampa Bay.

41,755. SOLD OUT. Devil Rays.

Many of us were under the impression that the Devil Rays couldn't fill the stands if the tickets were free and each seat had its own beer fountain. But tonight they filled the stands with people, and doubled the ticket prices too!

I was planning on going to the game 1 hour before, but 2 hours before I was flipping on the local news and people were already streaming in. It was a laid back batting practice, with everyone filling the first rows of the seats as the Yankees hit shot after shot out of the park.

Before the game started, I was concerned that fans wouldn't attend...like last year....and the year before.....As they were introducing the players I would estimate that 1/4th of the seats were filled, which would be an improvement over last year, but a disappointment for an opening game.

It became clear real fast that a big chunk of New York City had made the trip down to St. Pete, because the biggest cheers in the intro went to Don Zimmer, Tino Martinez, Jeter, and Torre. By the opening pitch, to my amazement, the stands were 90-95% full. STUNNING.

The game opened up as expected....Two Homers in the first inning from the Yankees (Arod and Sheffield), 4 runs on 2 hits, with everyone screaming for Zambrano's head. Little did we know the Yankees wouldn't score another run, and would only get 2 more hits.

It was ALL Rays from then on. Lugo, Crawford, Cruz Jr, Zambrano....they were all HUGE. Mussina was yanked in the 5th, another shelling to add to his season. I don't feel like doing a win share analysis on him, but I will say this: Mussina looked like crap, and so go the Yankees.

I came to see how Danny Baez would hold up as the closer. He did not disappoint. 1-2-3 final inning. With the entire crowd standing and clapping with 2 outs and Arod up, Baez strikes him out swinging, and the game was over.

I really hope this is a sign of things to come for the Rays, not only the winning but also the exciting atmosphere of a full dome. My gut feeling is that 30% of those people were there solely for the Yankees, but the buzz this game is likely to create, people will come. People will most definitely come.

It was a good day for Florida baseball. The two franchises drew almost 100,000 people. I don't know how long it will last, but beating the Yankees in that fashion should indeed generate some buzz.

And of course, people are wondering what's wrong with Mussina.

More early dividends from off-season acquistions. Kaz Matsui, has a perfect night at the plate, picking up three hits and two walks in a 7-2 Mets victory. All three hits were for extra bases; two doubles and his first HR. I'm sure there will be plenty of arguments between Yankees and Mets fans over who has the better Matsui. :-)

This is what the Red Sox want from their bullpen. Three innings, no hits, walks or runs. Apart from Timlin, the Sox bullpen is off to a much better start than they were last year.

Schilling is looking as dominating as ever. He's struck out 7 through six innings, while only walking 1. He's thrown 109 pitches, 76 for strikes. He looked like he was running out of gas in the 6th, but his splitter was working well enough to get a couple of strikeouts. Normally, 109 pitches would not bring Schilling out of a game, but this early in the season we may see a reliever.

Armando Benitez always makes it interesting. He enters the game in the ninth with a two run lead, gets the first two outs easily, then gives up a HR to Vidro and a double to Everett. He finally gets O. Cabrera to foul out to Choi. The Marlins win their opener 4-3.

The Marlins drew 55,000 today, their largest regular season crowd ever. Makes you wonder what would have happened if they hadn't sold off the team after 1997. It's great to see. Winning brings out the fans.

Josh Beckett is trying to out hit the Expos. He just singled for his first hit; the Expos have two. He averaging less than 10 pitches per inning, and over 75% have been for strikes.

Livan Hernandez has been pitching very well also. Through five, he's struck out 8 and only allowed two runs.

The acquistions continue to do well. Hee Seop Choi goes deep for the Marlins in his first AB to score Mike Lowell and give the Fish a 2-0 lead.

Beckett has only thrown 15 pitches in two innings, 13 for strikes.

Update: The broadcast was just interviewing a Korean reporter, who said Choi's HR would be front page news tomorrow (which, I guess, it already is over there). The reporter described Choi as their Barry Bonds.

Josh Beckett couldn't pitch any better than he did to Peter Bergeron in his first AB. He got ahead 0-2, wasted a pitch, then struck out Peter with a nasty curve ball. Just the way the Marlins want to start the season. Beckett strikes out two in an easy first.

No warnings have been issued, but the umps are keeping their eyes on things.

Update: Perfect from the other side as well as Pierre singles to start the Marlins half of the first.

Update: Oops, Pierre is picked off.

The raindrops liked Marco Scutaro's debut with the A's.

For those of you keeping track at home, that's 20 pitches seen by our main man Marco Scutaro in his four plate appearances, in which he made two outs. Twenty pitches for two outs. Billy Beane will take that every time.

More home openers today. The Florida Marlins kick off the afternoon and their defense of their championship against the wandering Montreal Expos. Livan Hernandez will face Josh Beckett, but they may be warned before the game about hitting batters.

It's good to see that both the Yankees and Tampa Bay are using the early start of their seasons to get extra starts for their aces. The first game of the North American season for them will feature the same starters as opening day in Japan, Mussina and Victor Zambrano. Tampa hopes they get the same result.

One of the more interesting matchups happens in Arizona, where Randy Johnson faces Colorado's Shawn "The Wilting Man" Estes. If the Diamondbacks are smart, they'll leave the roof open to expose Estes to the full heat of the Phoenix afternoon. :-) Actually, it's either a great story (cast off Cub starts opening day for Rockies) or a scary story (cast off Cub is the best Rockies can find for an ace). Beating Randy Johnson will tend to favor story 1.

Meanwhile, Johnson's former co-ace makes his Red Sox debut in Baltimore. Curt "Don't quote my publicly viewable statements!" Schilling will face Eric DuBose at Camden Yards. I'll let you know if Schilling deserves to be booed later in the day.

Finally, the Barry Bonds watch continues. ESPN2 will have the game again tonight, and I assume ESPN will cut in whenever Bonds comes to bat until he reaches the Mays milestone. Oh, and Andy Pettitte is making his Astros debut, too.

Enjoy!

You can read all the opening day impressions here.

Nathan Canby also attended the Dodger game.

The beginning and end of the story of any game at Dodger Stadium is traffic. Remarkably I sailed through town and arrived at the gates of the parking lot with an hour and fifteen minutes to spare. It took about 40 minutes before I could park. Once I made it to a parking spot I went ahead and parked further on, to be closer to the gate for easy exit. This proved to be a mistake, as I learned first of all when I got to the turnstile and realized I’d left my tickets in the glove compartment, and learned secondly after the game when my car was surrounded by others trying to leave, and was immobile for another 40 minutes.

But while I was surveying each inch of the parking lot, twice, the gray cloud cover lifted, to reveal blue skies and sunshine. The Navy fighters roared overhead and the doves were released _ a potentially unfortunate combination but one that worked out this time—just as I entered the stadium. I was sitting in the upper deck, which I love at Dodger Stadium. We all know the idea that baseball exists outside the clock and in a green place set apart from the world around it. From up high in Dodger Stadium, with the flowered hills and palms trees as a backdrop to the green field, the idea has the most force for me.

The Opening Day crowd was un-Dodger-fan-like. They were ready to boo the Dodgers from the first inning, they booed Shawn Green for striking out in the first inning, and Glenn Hoffman for not sending the runner in the third. The 30 year-old guy next to me was decked out in Twins gear, and was cheering for the Padres. He had never seen anyone score a game before, and asked me about it. His girlfriend, however, had been taught to score by her father, and told him all about it. On the other side of me was a guy originally from Pittsburgh with a shirt that read F--- All Dodger Haters, which struck me as an interestingly nuanced sort of double negative.

The new Dodgers acquitted themselves well at the bat, and those with new positions fielded them well, though Dave Roberts looked tentative on one ball in the corner. The lineup scoreboard was incapable of putting up Milton Bradley’s name - there was simply a blank in the third spot all game. I thought it was that he was too new, but they managed to put up Jason Werth's name as a pinch-hitter, who has barely been with the team longer, and who was, after all, a pinch hitter. So I figure: must be a trademark issue. Bradley earned well-deserved cheers for running down towards first each time he came up.
It’s hard to tell from the karmic signs where the Dodger season is headed: does one focus on the 2 meager runs, or the 15 hits? On Shawn Green’s long homerun, or the fact that it came in his only time at bat no one was on base? The Padres, on the other hand, look good - at least until Nevin hurts himself again and can’t be counted on for any more grand slams.

I love the Bradley scoreboard story. Maybe the Dodgers are embarassed they traded for him? :-)

You can read all the opening day impressions here.

Brandon writes about his first opening day game.

Welcome to the Jungle......

This was my first ever opening day, I have been a Dodger fan since 1988, but haven’t really taken true interest in the team until maybe 5-6 years ago. I had found out I had received tickets for the game on April 1st, so I was a bit concerned it was to be a big joke. I would have drawn blood if this were the case.

The day started out with a morning mist, but was expected to burn off by game time. Entering the stadium parking lot, my mother and I made our way to the stadium. It is by far the most beautiful stadium I have seen in my brief 22 years of life, every off season, Dodger Stadium is repainted and made to look brand new every season, she's forty years old and still grand. Set in Chavez Ravine, facing northeast, palm trees lining the outfield pavilions, Sierra Madre mountains in the background.

As we got to the gate, we spotted a sale for merchandise, and it was while standing in line that dookie (Lo Duca), shoe (Shuey), and mart (Martin) drove by in a golf cart to the applause of the crowd. I bought a great looking warm up jacket and we made our way into the stadium. Our seats were excellent, right above the press box perfectly lined up with home plate and the mound, almost directly a straight line from home to the mound to 2nd.

I was of course very excited. The Navy Seals were dropped from a USCG C-130 and dropped into center field, game ball, US flag and all. They were going through introducing past dodger greats. Maury Wills, Tommy Davis, the entire infield of the 70's was present, Ron Cey, Bill Russell, Davey Lopes (padres 1st base coach), and Steve Garvey, the great Tommie Lasorda. Then the ceremony turned to a celebration of the great Dodger Cy Young pitchers. The great Don Newcombe was introduced, first recipient of the CY award, Don Drysdale's son was present due to his passing, Mike Marshall, and Fernando Valenzuela were all introduced. Sandy Koufax was unable to attend since he goes to the Final Four games, but a taped message was shown on the video board, also, Orel Hershiser gave a taped message being the pitching coach for the Rangers. By far the largest applauds were for Fernando and Lasorda as both were given a standing ovation for a full minute. Then the Dodgers bullpen received the Rolaids Relief award and Gagne received his Cy Young award, presented to him by Don Newcombe.

The national anthem was sung with an over flight of F-18 fighters, balloons creating a flag were released in centerfield, and white doves were released.

First pitch was made by Newcombe, Drysdale's son, Marshall, and Valenzuela, it was great to see them

It was interesting to see the Padres in their sand colored uniforms, it was different, but not recommended for other teams.

Izturis got things going with a hit to left, and was followed by a single by Bradley to center

Nomo was bit shaky through the 1st 4 innings, he never got his fastball above 88mph, and seemed to nibble his way through the innings. He had a bad pitch that Lawrence, his opposite, stroked down the 3rd baseline for a double and I was a bit worried about this, the pitcher got a very good hit off that very badly hanging curve or something like a curve.

It all fell apart in the 5th :(
Nomo finally fell apart, he gave up another hit to Lawrence and finally got himself in a jam by walking Giles to bring up nevin, who promptly deposited a bad fastball into the left field corner for a grand slam

My glorious day stopped, along with my heart.

Nomo walked klesko who was pinch run for, and promptly gave up another HR to almost exactly the same spot to the CF.

Nomo did not come out for the 6th. I was very impressed by Duaner Sanchez, he had great velocity (93-95mph) and he swept through the side. Greenie did seem to be trying to over swing almost every time he had men on base. His one good swing reached about 390-400 to the right field pavilion.

Another impressive thing I noticed, was that the Dodgers were not swinging at every first pitch they saw, Lawrence had 50 pitches through 2 innings and only lasted 5, they were going deep into counts and battling. It was a welcome change from last year.

The crowd booed at the end of the 5th, and every inning the bases were left loaded, it was very disappointing, but they were getting on base, that was impressive. Most of the crowd left at the end of the 8th inning when they left the bases loaded and Beltre grounded out. Being down 8-2, all hope had seemed to be lost with the crowd.

It was great to see Dreifort pitch with all that he has been through, and he pitched a solid 9th.

I was impressed with Bradley adjusting quickly to NL pitching and Encarnacion also had a solid debut. Greenie looked decent at 1st, he'll get better as the season moves along. I pray for Nomo to come back and adjust, or it will be a long season

Those are my thoughts, I thoroughly enjoyed my first opening day, even if the day was a loss, there were silver linings, and maybe the season won't be as long as I had feared. It will certainly have its moments.

I agree. The Dodgers had a good, but not timely offense tomorrow. If they play most games like that, they'll score a lot of runs.

You can read all the opening day impressions here.

Lisa Gray attended the Astros game with her mom:

Well, mom and I get to the juice box just in time for batting practice. The crowd is already big and the mood isn't the usual hopeful. It is this mixture of excitement and confidence that I haven't seen since I was a little kid and my mom took me to see Mike Scott opening day 1986. This is the year we're gonna win the series!!!!! yessssssssss!!!!!!! Everyone here feels it, too!!!!!!!
Batting practice. Mom and I head down to the 3rd base line in hopes of seeing Barry close up and maybe getting an autograph. It is perfectly ok to be in love with Barry even though we're die-hard stros fans. (It’s like you guys drooling over the swimsuit issue) we meet 2 other girls there, both named Lisa. Barry comes out for throwing practice. He is smiling and happy and friendly with a few of the stros players- Vizcaino (is he showing him his swing??) and someone else who is not Jeff Kent. Barry is simply the hottest man ever. Hot hot hot hot hot. The other Lisas agree. And he's a good ballplayer, too. So we watch him take BP. First time thru, he doesn't hit anything out or even far. Seems to be getting his timing down, or else checking out the juice box- there is a good wind blowing from right to left. The next go round, he hits 3 homers, a double off the wall, one down the right line and one down the left. That perfect stance. That perfect swing. Us girls hope he'll wander down the sidelines, maybe turn and smile that fabulous smile, sign a few programs, but no luck. Chris Berman, no mike, corners him.
So we go to our seats. On our left is a mom and her 3 kids. On the right, 2 more die hard female stros fans, one in a retro jersey. Chicks rule. We all agree that Barry is the best looking man. But we'll brake for Brad Ausmus. He can't hit but he sure is cute.
The game. Finally. Yessssssssss. Roy Oswalt gets 3 fast outs - 8 pitches. Rueter doesn't look sharp. Lots of balls, few strikes. We leave the bases loaded. I remember that Rueter doesn't throw lots of strikes, doesn't throw over about 87/88 and doesn't strike out many. How can you look lousy, get so many outs and win games? For some reason. My stat geek friends who hate low strikeout pitchers, he gets hitters to swing at the balls. Don’t ask me how.
Barry plays catch with the Astros batboy between innings. Lucky kid. I’ve never seen another outfielder do that.
2nd inning. Barry hits a double down the left field line. So much for Barry shift. Alfonzo flies out to Hidalgo. Barry tags and slides into third. Lousy throw by Hidalgo. Don’t think he expected Barry to go. Hello. The guy stole 500 bases. Heads up, dog. But Roy looks every inch the ace. Dynamite fastball and curve. This little guy (really, about 5'10") throws 95,96 and spots it beautifully. Short guys rule. He is GOOD.
We’re up. Rueter looks absolutely terrible. Throws 32 pitches, half of which are balls and we only get 1 run. Kent gets himself out on a hit ball that bounces up and hits him as he's leaving the batters box. Funny how he doesn't look nearly as good without Barry in the lineup. 3 guys left on base. Not good.
3rd inning. 10 pitches for Roy. 3 up 3 down. He’s good. Rueter looks better this inning. 3 ground balls in 3 pitches. Doesn’t throw a first pitch strike.
4th inning. Roy gets 2 outs with 8 pitches. Then Barry is up. First pitch he drives off the left center wall for a stand up double. This looks just like batting practice. Remember that interview he did a few years ago where the interviewer asked him his secret to hitting and he said- "there's no secret. I’m just good." well, that is God's truth. Roy is one of the 5 best pitchers in the NL and Barry makes him look like the BP pitcher. Sorry, this is talent, not drugs. Maybe it really is safer to walk him. The next 2 guys single and Barry scores. Then Roy gets the last out. Rueter needs 7 pitches for 3 ground balls. Still not throwing lots of strikes.
5th- 3 up 3 down. Oswalt is dominant. Rueter gets 3 ground balls in 7 pitches, 4 balls. Why why why are they swinging at the next pitch?
6th- Roy is dominant, except for Barry. Walks him with 5 pitches. He sure missed by a lot. Getting nervous? Rueter serves up a homer to Hidalgo. The place goes WILD! I’ve never heard it this loud. Screaming chicks rock this place.
7th- Roy needs 6 pitches to get Neifi Perez out- and he darn near walked him. Neifi??????? Then 6 more to get Pedro feliz out. First time tonight he needed that many for a batter. Only 82 pitches. Guess he's tired. Well, we're ahead 2 to 1 so I guess it's Lidge then Dotel. Rueter is out, having thrown 93 in 6 innings. I guess Roy isn't being taken out- he's leading off. Guess Jimy isn't going to do the Lidge pitches the 8th and Dotel the 9th this year. Anyway, we get 2 runs off the new pitcher so they bring in another one to try to get Berkman out, which he does. 2 guys left on base. Well, we're up 4 to 1. But when Barry’s playing, I’d feel better if it was 10 to 1. I know that pitchers get him out half the time and he's due to get out, but still.
So Roy goes to pitch. Durham gets on- 5 pitches. Snow out on 3 strikes. Tucker gets on- 5 pitches/3 balls. Barry is up. I feel sick. Better walk him. Wait- Jimy's going to the mound. Lidge? Has he ever faced Barry? Jimy’s walking back and Roy’s thrown 96 pitches and 11 balls to the last 4 batters. Can u say Grady? Sure enough, Barry takes Oswalt's 96mph outside fastball just over the right field wall. 340 ft? Hidalgo started to break forward before going back- might could he have caught it? Probably not - looked like a screaming line drive. The chick squad discuses this. I’ll bet everyone is going to go on and on about how there wasn't a lefty in the bullpen, like Mike Gallo would have gotten him out. Yeah, surrre. He hit lefties better than righties last year. And the year before. And probly the year before that, too. NOW we bring in Lidge. And he finally gets the other 2 outs. Bad timing. Of course, he may not have gotten Barry out, either. Tie game. I remember Barry saying something about hating extra innings last year. And I remember what he did about it. I sure do wish he were on my team. Suddenly, I feel tired. And worried. Lidge did not look sharp. Will he do better in the 9th if he is still on?
9th- tie game. A lot of energy has gone from the park. Barry does that to you. Dotel pitching. Can he go more than 1 inning? The chick squad discusses "proven closer" - we think that some guys think it is tougher to get 3 outs in the 9th with no one on base than coming in some other time and not letting runners score. Well, if the guy believes he can't get someone out, he won't. Whatever. So dotel hits the first guy (that didn't look like a slider or fastball- what did he throw?????). Then a sac bunt. Then the guy steals 3rd without a throw. Then a sac fly and he scores. Up next, tucker, and then Barry. Dotel HAS to get tucker. Because Barry is, shall we say, hot? Whew. Tucker is out. Barry left on deck. So we're up, down 1 run. Herges is the closer. Another un-proven closer. Then Biggio gets himself out the exact same way Kent did in the second. Very weird. Then Everett does almost exactly the same thing. Bags is left. This isn't good. Because he tends to overswing in these situations. Which he does. Game over. Barry beats us. Herges is proven, Dotel, unproven.
We have 2 future hall of fame position players on our team- Bagwell and Biggio. But you simply can't compare them to Barry. He really is unbelievable. Anyone who thinks this is drugs just hasn't watched him play. I can't wait till tomorrow night. I’ll bet Pettitte and Clemens won't walk him either.
So I get home after the game and my husband has washed the kidz and put them to bed and sent his homies out and put the pizza boxes and beer cans in the garbage and cleaned the kitchen. So Barry is downgraded to lukewarm because a new hotness standard has just been set. So I need to go thank him. And if I do a really good job thanking him, think he'll watch the kidz tomorrow night, too?
Goodnight from Houston.

"Short guys rule." Being below average height, I like that sentiment (although, I'm known in the family as the tall Pinto). Of course, the lesson of all this is that considerate husband beats hot baseball player any day. :-)

Last night I was scoring the Twins game for work and didn't get to see the Giants game (or the UConn win, either). However, I bought a Tivo over the weekend, and it automatically recorded the rebroadcast of the Giants game. So I just got to watch the replay of the Bonds HR.

Man Bonds is strong. That had to be one of the worst HR swings I have seen from Bonds. The ball was a bit out of his strikezone, he was leaning into the plate and he had a lousy follow through. But he still managed to hit the ball square, and with his strength, that was enough to get it over the fence. Only one more to go to catch Wille Mays.

It was bad enough when I was in college and I noticed that people younger than me were playing major league baseball. But they showed Joe Mauer's mom, and she looks younger than me. I'm old enough to be the parent of a major leaguer. :(

You can see all the opening day impressions in this category.

Craig Brown attended the Royals home opener.

I've been a Royals fan for all my life. I've lived with the team through the highs (there have been a few) and the lows (there have been many more.) Today, the ballpark was as electric as I've seen it. To all long-suffering Royals fans, today's game was as exciting as Game 6 or 7 of the '85 World Series.

The day was perfect...sunshine, temperatures in the 70s. The parking lots were full about four hours before the first pitch as everyone knows Kansas Citians tailgate with the best. My group got into the stadium just in time to see the hardware handed out from last season. Angel Berroa got his ROY Award and Tony Pena picked up his Manager of the Year. Anyone who doesn't see what Tony Pena means to this franchise is blind. His attitude is infectious, and has given our once-moribund franchise some life.

The Royals pulled out all the stops for the opener. The players ran out of the dugout for pregame intros and down a red carpet. Challenger the bald eagle flew in from left field, and an Air Force flyover completed the celebration.

The fans were ready for some ball. Anticipation is higher than any April since 1990. Brian Anderson started with a called strike and retired the side in order in the first. We all agreed it was a good omen (that would hopefully carry us through to October.)

Buehrle started for the White Sox and struggled all afternoon. The Royals helped him out by being overanxious. It sounds funny to write that because he was behind Royals batters from the very first inning. He started almost all hitters off with a ball, and went to 2-0 on a majority. It just seemed the Royals were swinging on that count no matter what, and not getting good swings at all. A number of weak popups and harmless flyballs.

Anderson was not very effective after the first and gave up four runs in the second. He threw what seemed like a ton of pitches (94) and was gone after five. Not a great start from the guy the Royals are counting on to be their number one starter.

Today both Benito Santiago (39 years old) and Sandy Alomar (38) homered. This has to be some kind of bizarre record...Oldest catchers to homer in the same game.

Really that was the only thing interesting about this game. I thought we could get runs back from Buehrle, but he was pretty successful all day. Cliff Pollite came in to squelch a potential rally and the Royals were down 7 to 3 in the ninth.

Then the magic began...

Pollite started the ninth. Is this because it was a non-save situation? Pollite was bringing the gas, hitting 96 on the stadium gun, but it seemed strange to bring him back out. After Randa and Harvey worked him for back to back walks to lead off the inning, it's easy to second guess. In comes Koch and he gives up a double to Santiago, scoring a run before he strikes out Guiel. I was surprised when Pena let Benito hit. I thought it was the perfect time to showcase another free agent signing in Matt Stairs who does all his hitting against right handers. But now was when Pena decided to use him, pinch hitting for Graffinino. Out comes Koch and in comes the lefty Marte, so Pena counters with Mendy Lopez. I wasn't too sure about the matchup, which turns out to be exactly what Pena wanted. We just were looking for the three run big fly. And Mendy delivered! Pandemonium! Those of us of the 41,000 who stayed were delirious. Down four going into the ninth and now its tied. A single by Berroa got us donuts, but no one even noticed. We just knew we were going to win. Up comes Carlos Beltran who is going to have an All Star season. BAM! Homerun into the water spectacular and the Royals win!

I hadn't seen a baseball crowd go nuts like that since the '85 Series. This was a special afternoon that won't be forgotten by anyone who saw it. Just another reason why baseball is the greatest game. For over two hours we sat in a beautiful stadium on a beautiful day and watched what was turning out to be an average baseball game. That average baseball game became an extraordinary one in less than two outs in the ninth. What a day!

Hopefully this will be the launching pad for bigger and better things this season. This one is going to be difficult to top!

"That average baseball game became an extraordinary one in less than two outs in the ninth." That sure is one of the things I love about this game. Sounds like the Royals fans are very happy tonight.

I guess he's done everything else, so Barry might as well try to have a perfect season. He was 3 for 3 with a walk against Oswalt, and the three hits included his 659th HR. So, after one game, he has a 1.000 BA, a 1.000 OBA, and a 2.667 slugging percentage. I suppose he has to make an out sometime.

(The title refers to an inside joke of the 13th floor strat-o-matic league.)

Nice to see Joe Mauer draw a four pitch walk in his first plate apperance.

Bonds is 2 for 2 with two doubles tonight. He's now faced Oswalt 3 times, and has a walk in addition to the two-baggers.

The announcers are saying that the Metrodome just installed a new, spongier surface. Maybe we won't see those huge outfield bounces anymore.

The Dodgers left 15 runners on today, despite hitting into three double plays. Believe it or not, Dodger fans should be happy about this. The Dodgers hit .385 with a .455 OBA. That's a good offense. The timely hitting will come if they keep getting men on base like that.

Another winter acquistion comes through on opening day. Ben Grieve homered, singled and drove in three for the Brewers. Scott Podsednik added four RBI from the leadoff spot to lead Milwaukee to an opening day victory over the St. Louis Cardinals. Matt Morris was simply lousy, walking five and giving up five hits in six innings. The Cardinals don't have much pitching depth, so they really need Morris to be on top of his game.

The Pirates are bringing in Jose Mesa to finish the Phillies in the 9th. This is going to be a lot of fun for one of the teams. :-)

Update: It's Mesa who has the fun. He retires the Phillies 1-2-3 in the ninth to cement a 2-1 Pittsburgh win.

The Pirates have to be very happy with the outing they received from Kip Wells today. Six innings, seven strikeouts, no runs. We'll see if the Pirates bullpen can hold the lead.

On the plus side for the Phillies, Pat Burrell is off to a good start, going 3 for 4. Millwood had great control, throwing 56 of his 83 pitches for strikes. He pitched well enough to win, but at the moment is on the losing side of the ledger.

Update:After having a fairly easy 7th, Torres gives up a hit and a walk to start the 8th. A sacrifice puts runners on 2nd and 3rd for Rollins, who gets a sacrifice fly. It's 2-1 Pirates.

Update: Torres gets a groundout to end the inning.

Billy Koch came into the ninth with a 7-3 lead to nail down Guillen's first win as a manager. Politte had walked the first two batters, then Koch gave up a double to Benito Santiago (new acquistions seem to be doing well today). It's 7-4 now with men on 2nd and third.

Koch comes back and strikes out Guiel. One down, two on.

Update: And Koch is out of the game. Marte is in for the save. Guillen made the move because Pena pinch hit with Matt Stairs. Now Stairs is out of the game. But I guess the closer role isn't that clear cut on the White Sox. I think that's a good thing.

Update: Of course, it helps if the pitcher you bring in keeps the ball in the park. Mendy Lopez takes Marte deep to right center to tie the game at 7. The Royals fans are going wild.

Update: They're going even more wild now. Beltran smacks a two-run shot off Marte to seal the victory for the Royals. Not the way Guillen wanted Koch and Marte to work together. Tony Pena looks like he just won the World Series. A great way for the Royals to start the season.

Correction: Koch did not walk the first two batters of the inning. Politte did. Sorry about that.

Nomo loads the bases in the fifth with a HBP and a walk, then Phil Nevin comes up and delivers a grand slam to put the Padres up 5-0. A healthy Nevin will make a big difference in the offense of the Padres this year.

A walk later, Jay Payton takes Nomo deep to the same spot. It's 7-0. Nomo hadn't thrown that many pitches, but Tracy waited to get the bullpen going. Nomo is clearly out of gas, but he's still pitching.

Milton Bradley hits a solid line drive single in his first AB for the Dodgers. Runners on first and second for the Dodgers.

Update: Shawn Green strikes out swinging. It looked to me like he was overswinging, trying to make up for last year's power loss in one AB.

What a great day for the Tigers. Shutout a major league leading 17 times last year, they post a 7-0 win against the Toronto Blue Jays. They only scored 7 runs or more 24 times last year, fewest in the AL. Their big offseason pickups, Johnson, Rodriguez and White all contributed. The Tigers have given their fans a nice reward for buying those advance tickets.

The heart of the White Sox order had a good 2nd inning. Thomas, Lee and Konerko all had hits, and Alomar followed up with a 2-run HR. The White Sox are off to an early 4-0 lead against the Royals.

Jason Johnson did an excellent job of getting out of trouble in the 5th. After a leadoff triple, he got a grounder to third, a grounder to short with the infield in, then a popup to preserve a 1-0 lead. Then to cap it off, I-Rod leads off the 6th with a HR to left to extend the lead to 2-0. Lots of things going right for the Tigers today.

I don't see Kerry Wood that often, but he looks a lot sleeker to me today. Has anyone else noticed that he's gotten thinner? He looks really good.

Corey Patterson takes Cory Lidle deep to give the Cubs an early 1-0 lead. Lidle gave up 24 HR in less than 200 innings last year.

Carlos Pena smacks one into the rightfield bullpen to give the Tigers their first run and first lead of the year. It's 1-0 in the top of the fourth.

Through three innings, both Halladay and Johnson are having little trouble with the hitters. Halladay has faced 12 batters and struck out five. Johnson has retired the side in order over the last two innings, and has thrown only 38 pitches.

Roy Halladay starts off the Canadian baseball season with a strikeout of Alex Sanchez.

Update: Pudge singles to right with two out for the Tigers first hit of the season. And there was much rejoicing.

Update: Halladay strikes out Young to end the inning. He struck out the side, all looking. At least the Tigers are trying to be selective.

The Sports Retort is a new Red Sox blog. Right now, he has a handy set of links to each team's active roster. Stop by and say hi.

Update: I'm not sure how up-to-date these rosters are at the moment. The Cubs have 28 players listed.

It's opening day, part III, so all the games are pretty special. Here's the best of the day.

AL Cy Young award winner Roy Halladay leads off the day as the Tigers visit Toronto. Roy was 3-0 with a 0.69 ERA vs. the Tigers last year, but this is a different team. They lost their first 9 in 2003, so a win today would put them way ahead.

In the battle for the NL West, the Padres travel to LA to take on the Dodgers.
Keep you eye on Milton Bradley to see if he runs out everything.

The biggest game of the day appears to be the Giants at the Astros. Houston made a big push in the off season to improve their pitching staff, but we'll see a familiar face on the mound in Roy Oswalt. Jason Schmidt is on the DL, so Kirk Rueter gets the opening day call. Bonds, of course, is just two HR away from tying Willie Mays for 3rd on the all-time list. He has little history against Oswalt, facing him once and walking.

Action starts at 1 PM EDT. Enjoy!

Here's an excellent idea, a blog in the form of a comic strip. Soxaholix follows the Red Sox through office gossip. Check out Hart Brachen's idea. Even Baseball Musings gets a mention. :-)

A number of Baseball Musings readers have volunteered to write in with their impressions from attending an opening day game. All of these stories will be available under this category. Over the next week, you'll see them as they come in. The first is from Tom Bridge, who attended the Red Sox-Orioles opener Sunday night.

I've just returned from Camden Yards in Baltimore after a very enjoyable opener against the Red Sox. Just a couple things:

A) The ticket gates broke at all of the entrances, meaning each staffer had a hand-held scanner. This resulted in monumental waits to get into the stadium itself. We arrived at 7:20 and didn't take our seats until just after 8. Frustrating at best.

B) Pedro appears to have lost velocity on his fastball. I saw a 91mph fastball just once, though it appeared that the stadium's radar gun wasn't always reading properly. There certainly was some movement on his changeup, but his fastball was at best batting practice quality. Javy Lopez took him yard on one such pitch.

C) Orioles fans are incredibly excited at the new lineup changes. Everyone is buzzing about Javy Lopez and Miguel Tejada and the return of Rafael Palmeiro. There were numerous chants of MVP after the double plays, which were, I might add, smooth as any I have seen in 16 years of specatating! Tejada to Roberts to Palmeiro may not sound like much, but it's better than I expected!

D) Red Sox fans need to curb their drinking on other peoples' home turf. Most of the folks wearing Red Sox jerseys and hats and sweatshirts were three sheets to the wind by the middle of the third. Few things are more disgusting than drunken Sox fans. Very few things.

E) The weather was COLD. Not nearly as bad as last season, when it snowed heavily during Opening Day, but still, quite inhospitable.

F) The Strikeout/Throwout double play early on was the first one I've seen in person in quite possibly 10 years.

G) Ponson pitched decently, but he's still got a lot of problems to work out. He threw 111 pitches by my count, which is just an insane number for 5 2/3 innings of work. Mazilli has to keep this better under control.

O's fans have a lot to be excited about this season. If their bullpen doesn't blow too many games, and I fear that may be the case, it could be a great season up at the Yards.

Pedro also appeared not to have a good curveball last night. One of his strengths, however, is that he has four good pitches, so even if he loses two, he still has enough tools to get out batters.

I've experienced drunken Red Sox fans up close. It's one of the reasons we moved out of the Fenway bleachers to the grandstand in the late 1980's.

It's great Orioles fans are excited. Their off-season moves, combined with a great opening day win should have the town buzzing. Thanks, Tom!

Alex Belth has a very good interview with Bill James over at Bronx Banter.

Here's my look at the NL Central. As with the previous division looks, the chart below is based on last year's win shares for the core players (starting 8, 5-man rotation and closer) based on information in the CBSSportsline depth charts. See the predictions category for all the previews.

2003 Win Shares	Chicago	Cincinnati	Houston	Milwaukee	Pittsburgh	St. Louis
Starting 9	140	83	145	83	77	147
Starters and Closer	93	17	71	32	23	45
Total	233	100	216	115	100	192
Wins	78	33	72	38	33	64

It's the best and worst of divisions. Three very good teams, three very bad teams. Cincinnati, at least, in Griffey, Kearns and Dunn has a chance to but put up a lot more core wins than indicated here. But I don't see Milwukee, Pittsburgh or Cincinnati really competing for the title this year.

Houston and Chicago are the class of the division, with superior pitching to St. Louis. But don't count out the Cardinals starting 8. They have the best combined win shares in the division, and that's giving a 0 to Ray Lankford. And fans of the Red Birds would hope that Matt Morris can give the team more than 10 win shares this year.

The gap between the Cubs and Astros may also be not as large as it appears. Oswalt and Miller combined for 19 win shares last year; both are capable of more. Great seasons by these two pull the Astros even with the Cubs. The race may be moot, of course, as the 2nd place finisher will likely grab the wild card.

We go to the top of the ninth with the Red Sox trailing 7-2. Can this great offense come back against the Orioles pen?

Update: Ryan strikes out Ramirez looking to start the ninth.

Update: Burks, in his 21st century debut for the Red Sox, grounds out to first for the 2nd out.

Update: Millar keeps the Sox alive with a single to left center.

Update: Varitek strikes out swinging to end the game. A nice win for the Orioles. They received contributions from their free agents. Especially Lopez, who had a HR and three RBI. A long game, but a good start to the season.

Update: Kaplar reaches with, quite appropriately, a Baltimore Chopper. First and second, 2 out.

Mike DeJean loads the bases in the 8th with one out on a hit and two walks. Ryan comes in and gets a ground ball that eats up Tejada, but he stays with it and gets the force at 2nd. Mueller also grounds to Tejada, and Ryan gets out of it only allowing one inherited runner to score. It's 6-2 Orioles in the bottom of the 8th.

The Red Sox put the shift on Palmeiro, with Reese to the right of 2nd base. Palmeiro just grounded an easy one through the empty shortstop position for an RBI. Palmeiro doesn't strike me as an extreme pull hitter.

Update: Timlin's not having a good night, but Javy Lopez is. Lopez drives one into deep right center for a double, long enough to score the slow Palmeiro from first. It's 6-1 Orioles, still in the 7th.

Pedro pitched well enough to win tonight. Six innings, five K, one walk. He had a real tough 2nd inning, and his throwing error led to a run. In many ways he outpitched Ponson, but the Red Sox helped kill their offense so far with three double plays. It's 3-1 Orioles in the bottom of the 7th.

Miguel Tejada has really impressed me with his defense tonight. He's smooth, he fields cleanly, has a rifle of an arm, and isn't afraid to stay in on the double play. The Orioles fans are in for a real treat this year.

I wonder if there will be fans in centerfield calling themselves Damon's Disciples?

Ponson gave up a single to start the sixth, then got a DP. But he walked the 8th and 9th hitters (Bellhorn and Reese), and as he's well over 100 pitches, he's now out of the game.

I'm impressed with Reese's selectivity tonight. He's drawn two walks. I wonder if someone on the Red Sox has been drilling him on this.

Pedro has settled down, getting the Orioles 1-2-3 in the fourth. Both starters have thrown a lot of pitches, however. Seventy seven for Ponson, sixty six for Martinez. We'll be seeing the bullpens early in this game.

I wonder if Pokey Reese lost track of the out situation. With 2 outs, men on 2nd and 3rd, he drops a bunt. It would have been good enough to score a runner with less than 2 out, but otherwise it was just an easy out. Bad execution or a mental mistake by Pokey?

Here's my look at the AL Central. As with the previous division looks, the chart below is based on last year's win shares for the core players (starting 9, 5-man rotation and closer) based on information in the CBSSportsline depth charts. See the predictions category for all the previews.

2003 Win Shares	Chicago	Cleveland	Detroit	Kansas City	Minnesota
Starting 9	117	77	105	132	121
Starters and Closer	51	40	40	56	55
Total	168	117	145	188	176
Wins	56	39	48	63	59

The most encouraging sign in this chart is that the Detroit core is already above the Tigers 2003 win level. The most discouraging sign is the Indians low total, which is the lowest I've seen for a core so far. The Indians think they are developing and are going to contend. And with a young team, these numbers can improve tremendously. But they sure don't look very good right now.

KC is beating out the Twins here, but the big unknown is Joe Mauer. He's penciled in with a 0 right now. But if he's as good as people believe, a 20 win share season from him propels the Twins over the top. Looks like it will be a good dog fight between these two teams in the AL Central.

Manny Ramirez gets his 2nd hit and his first RBI. The ball hit off Ponson's heel and ricocheted past Reese at shortstop. It's 3-1 Orioles in the top of the third.

Johnny Damon hits a slow roller down the first base line. Ponson alertly hits Damon in the back with the ball, because he was running inside the baseline. Nice heads up play by Ponson.

Maybe Pedro just needed a long time to warm up tonight. He strikesout Roberts and Mora, and gets Tejada on a deep fly ball to end the inning. It's 3-0 Orioles after two, and Pedro is well over 40 pitches.

Mazilli send Bigbie up to bunt with no out and runners on 1st and 2nd. Bigbie quickly gets two strikes, but nubs one back to the mound. Pedro's only play is at first, but he looks at second, then throws wildly, allowing a run to score and men on 2nd and 3rd.

Pedro has not been sharp. He hit Segui, he's leaving pitches over the plate, and his control is not there. Matos just got a hit and an RBI. This is not what Red Sox fans want to see.

Lopez joins Tejada and Palmeiro in contributions to the game. Varitek strikes out, and Lopez nails Kapler at 2nd for the double play to end the inning. Varitek did make Ponson work, and he's now throw 34 pitches through two innings, 24 for strikes.

Update: An even bigger contribution. Lopez takes Pedro's first pitch deep to give the Orioles a 1-0 lead. Pedro's fastball is around 89-90 MPH according to the announcers. Of course, with Pedro, it's as much about the changing speeds as absolute speed. But Gibbons just got the fourth hit off Pedro, and the last two have been hit hard.

Mora gets thrown out at third to end the 1st, then with one out makes the Orioles first error of the year, allowing Gabe Kapler to reach first. Not a great way to start the season.

Palmeiro delivers his first hit of the year, a soft single to left, but Mora is gunned down easily trying for third by Ramirez. Although Pedro gave up two hits in that inning, neither ball was hit very well. More importantly, Pedro didn't throw many pitches, (13, nine for strikes).

Melvin Mora gets the first hit of the year for the Orioles, a slow roller down the third base line.

Ponson had Oritz 0-2, and threw an inside pitch. I thought it caught the corner of the plate. We'll see what Ortiz does with his second chance.

Update: Ortiz works the count to 3-2, then strikes out swinging. A very good inning for Ponson. He got two groundouts to Tejada, and threw 20 pitches, 14 for strikes.

With two outs, Manny Ramirez lines one into right for the Red Sox first hit of the year.

Damon takes Ponson's first pitch for a strike. People should keep an eye out to see if Johnny walks across the Charles this season. :-)

Update: Tejada is tested right away, with a soft grounder from Damon. He makes the play easily.

The Red Sox and Orioles are about to get underway. I'll be blogging the game (and working on the last two previews).

Here's my look at the NL East. As with the previous division looks, the chart below is based on last year's win shares for the core players (starting 8, 5-man rotation and closer) based on information in the CBSSportsline depth charts.

2003 Win Shares	Atlanta	Florida	Montreal	New York	Philadelphia
Starting 8	120	121	116	92	141
Starters and Closer	65	64	60	41	66
Total	185	185	176	133	207
Wins	62	62	59	44	69

It's interesting how close the pitching staffs of the Braves, Marlins, Expos and Phillies are. The real difference in the division is the Phillies offense and fielders. In looking at the numbers for the various players, I don't see anything that I'd change. This is a good number for their core.

On the other hand, the Braves have a couple of 0's in their lineup in LaRoche and Estrada. They'll get a lot more than 0 from first base this year at least. And their 1-4 hitters are the best in the division. It won't take much to bring their offense in-line with the Phillies.

Likewise with the Marlins. Cabrera put up 12 win shares as a rookie; I suspect that will go up. Choi only had 6 with his injury. Those two can add a total of 20 win shares, which again puts the Marlins right with the Phillies.

It's the Phillies division to win, but don't think it's going to be a cakewalk.

Kinja is a new service that provides members with a way to read all your favorite blogs in one place. They've said some very nice things about my site, so I signed up. Unlike my Feed Demon aggregator, this one seems to update whenever you refresh. And I just found that Milton Bradley has been traded to the Dodgers!

The other thing this site lets me do is share with all of you my favorites. So, if you'd like to read what I'm reading, check out this page.

You can see all the division summaries under the predictions category. As with the previous two division looks, the chart below is based on last year's win shares for the core players (starting 9, 5-man rotation and closer) based on information in the CBSSportsline depth charts.

2003 Win Shares	Anaheim	Oakland	Seattle	Texas
Starting 9	133	85	149	102
Starters and Closer	60	77	75	30
Total	193	162	224	132
Wins	64	54	75	44

The Mariners surprised me. I have not heard a lot of good press about the Mariners' moves this winter, so to see their core so far ahead of the rest of the division came as a bit of a shock. Yes, the team is old, and this is probably an overestimation. But still, this is a very good Mariner team; very few holes.

The Angels have some upside, and may be closer to Seattle than this chart indicates. I can see Erstad, Guerrero and Glaus each adding 10 win shares to last year's totals, which would bring them right in line with Seattle. And a good year by Percival would probably put them over. It's all in the injuries.

Oakland's low total comes mainly from two 0's in its lineup at 2nd base and shortstop. How much will Crosby and German contribute? I would guess the A's core is probably closer to the mid 60's. There's always a lot of unknowns with this team, and it usually changes a great deal during the season. One big unknown is Rhodes, who put up only four win shares in a setup role last year. The Orioles didn't think he should close; if he adapts, four will be a low estimate of his contribution. If the Orioles are right, his contribution will be minnimal. Right now, the A's look a lot more like a third place than a first place team.

With the new job, I been very busy and some blogging has been put on the back burner. I did want to try to get in some more division previews, however, especially of the more interesting divisions. As I did for the AL East, here's a chart based on last year's win shares for the core players (starting 8, 5 man rotation and closer):

2003 Win Shares	Arizona	Colorado	Los Angeles	San Diego	San Francisco
Starting 8	120	116	111	122	142
Starters and Closer	52	20	66	40	54
Total	172	136	177	162	196
Wins	57	45	59	54	65

This is what I expected. There are no great teams in this division, and any one of the top four can win. I see Arizona as having a lot of upside. Randy Johnson and Roberto Alomar combined for 23 win shares last year. Any return close to their former greatness could easily double that. The Giants have the biggest down side, with a lineup pretty dependent on aging veterans. I would be very surprised if Grissom could post 22 win shares again.

The Dodgers, for their supposed lack of talent, are right in the hunt on this chart. It would not be difficult, with one in-season trade, for the Dodgers to win this division.

My sentimental favorite is San Diego. They have a new park, the homecoming king in David Wells, and the underrated start Brian Giles. And there win share number is based on Hoffman having only 1 in 2003. So in the closer role alone, there is lots of upside.

It should be a good four team race. I don't expect a lot of wins out of any team in particular. A total in the high 80's will probably win the division.

Update: Since Bradley has now joined the Dodgers, replacing Roberts, that takes the the Dodgers offense to 121, total to 187, and wins to 62. Just a little trade like that, and they are a lot closer to the Giants.

The Padres have made Jason Szuminski the first MIT graduate to play in the majors. This reminds me of a cheer we did at Harvard, based on the famous MIT cheer:

E to the X, dy, dx.
E to the Y, dy.
Cosine, secant, tangent, sine,
3.14159.
Come on, Harvard, give 'em the digit!

Congratulations to Jason!

Today marks the 2nd opening day of the season, as the Red Sox visit the Orioles tonight at Camden Yards. For me, the real opening day is tomorrow, but I'm happy to have any major league action happening.

If you are one of the people who wrote me about helping with my opening day project, remember to write up your report and e-mail it to me. The sooner you write, the better your memories will be. I look forward to reading your comments!

The Ninth is a new baseball blog, with a Boston flavor.

John Perricone now has some help with his blog, Only Baseball Matters. I look forward to seeing this site return to its daily excellence.

There's a new web log on the Pirates, Honest Wagner. Stop by and say hello.

I was very disappointed to read about Milton Bradley's problems with the Cleveland Indians leading to his ouster from the clubhouse and likely trade from the club.

On Wednesday, Bradley was removed from a game against Houston in the third inning for not running hard on a second-inning popup that dropped for a single. Bradley was told quietly by Wedge that he needed to be on second base. Bradley responded, and while it was not a shouting match, the disrespect he showed for his manager in front of his teammates forced management's hand.

...

Shapiro would not characterize the most recent exchange between Bradley and Wedge. However, the GM said the club expects its players to display "passion, professionalism and respect."

"There is a line that they can't cross," Shapiro said. "You have to make sure that line is meaningful."

The Indians are clearly doing the right thing here. No one on the Indians can say they don't know what is expected of them.

What I don't understand is Bradley. Here he is, a major league baseball player. He's not the greatest outfielder ever, but he's good enough to start for an ML team. If he hustles and keeps his mouth shut, he'll be set for life in a couple of years. Plus, he has an obvious promotional opportunity. Instead, he's not playing hard, then complaining when he's called on it. Carl Everett without the talent.

Randy Johnson decided today to pitch the 2004 season right-handed.

"It's just too easy," Johnson expounded. "Even Barry Bonds quavers in fear at my elongated frame and side arm delivery. I'm 40 years old and can still strike out 12 a game. I need to do something more challenging."

Johnson is also changing his nick name to "Light Year," which is a very big unit.

Paul DePodesta admitted this morning that new studies show that batting average, not on-base average, is the most important batting stat.

"I was using a shift operation instead of multiplying by two, and didn't account for the high order bit," DePodesta explained. "Batting average blows OBA away. I just hope Billy Beane didn't make too many poor decisions based on my research. And I'm really sorry about all those old school scouts who lost their jobs."

Beane could not be reached for comment, but he was last seen heading to the A's computer room with a baseball bat.

Federal investigators have dropped all charges against the defendents in the BALCO case, saying it was just a bit of fun.

"Everyone thinks IRS agents are just boring accountants," lead investigator Jeff Novitzky explained. "We wanted to have some fun and get to meet some major leaguers. We know they don't take steroids. They don't have to. Just look how big Iran White got working out with Greg Anderson, and he never took the juice!"

Bonds' income generates about six million dollars worth of taxes a year. "Thank goodness the money is being put to good use!" he exclaimed when he heard he was in the clear. "That was a great joke. They almost had me believing I used steroids."

Silas Barnaby foreclosed on the Olympic Stadium mortgage today, leaving the Expos without a Stadium to call their own. The players can be seen during the day huddling on street corners with tin cups, begging for money to build a new ballpark, or at least bus fare to get out of Canada. Forced to play their home games in empty lots and dead end streets, Le Expos face the additional indignity of using cardboard boxes for their lockers.

"The situation is desperate," Hall of Famer Frank Robinson opined. "Last week a ball got by Carl Everett and rolled into the sewer. We couldn't afford to lose the ball, so Carl had to climb down there to get it. We'd call him Stinky, but we all smell pretty bad right now."

When reached for comment, commissioner Rose said, "I used to play in Montreal. They talk funny up there. What was the question?"

Derek Jeter and Alex Rodriguez asked Tampa Bay's management to trade them to the Red Sox so they could be legally wed.

ALAN SCHWARZ: When did you guys first meet?

JETER: Back in ’76, huh?

RODRIGUEZ: It was earlier. When were we born?

JETER: No, really, we met over the phone. What were you, a senior?

RODRIGUEZ: I was a senior, yeah. 1993. Your first year of pro ball.

JETER: We had a mutual friend. No one you’d know. Alex had called and was asking about his last year of high school, because I’m a year older than him. Things about the draft. That’s how we initially met.

And then, at a University of Miami baseball game. They were playing Michigan. I went to the game in Miami with Jim Abbott and Scott Kamieniecki in my first spring training. We saw each other there. That was the first time we met face to face.

No doubt it was love at first sight. Tampa hopes to get Pokey Reese and Byung-Hyun Kim in the deal. When asked about being the first openly gay players in the game, Rodriguez responed, "At least no one is accusing me of taking steroids. I could never live with that stigma."

Mark Prior's injuries were unbelieveably cured today by famed faith healer Peter Popov. Using the tried and true technique, Popov smacked the young fireballer in the head to drive out the demons inhabiting in his sore leg and elbow. While his arm and tendon are now fine, Prior is listed in serious condition at Chicago Hope hospital with a severe concussion. Neurosurgeon Adam Arkin had this to say:

"I'm not a doctor, but I used to play one on TV. I don't know why they brought him here. After all, ER is supposed to be in Chicago, and they're still on the air. Still, I'm looking forward to drilling a hole in Mark's head while Mandy Patinkin sings some Sondheim."

Bud Selig, in a move that stunned the baseball world, reinstated Pete Rose today and named him commissioner of baseball:

"Baseball is at a very important crossroads," Selig explained. "With the steroids scandal looming large, I thought Pete would be the best man for the job. Who better to catch cheaters than the greatest cheater since Hal Chase?"

Rose took the podium and seemed a bit confused.

"I thought they wanted me to catch cheetahs," said Rose. "Give me enough Greenies and I'll be happy to chase those pussies. They'll find out why I'm called Charlie Hustle!"

Rose was then overheard calling his bookie to place a bet on the Cheetah.

Update: Doug Pappas seems to think Bud is staying on forever.

In what some people call the most unlikely turn of events since Bobby Ewing's return to Dallas, George Steinbrenner apologized today for running the Yankees as an evil empire. As a way of doing penance, Steinbrenner has traded rosters with the Tampa Bay Devil Rays.

"I didn't know what else I could do," Steinbrenner explained. "We've been on a ten year roll, and Tampa's never won more than 63 games. Besides, I thought I owed Lou one after firing him two or three times. And with all the time I spend in Tampa, I'll still get to see a championship team. Besides, maybe now the fans will get off my back for letting Tino go."

Although he's traded the players, George is still going to pay the contracts. And as a special gesture, he's picking up the tab for the new Yankees as well.

"It's only fair," the Boss remarked. "The value of the franchise has grown about a billion dollars since I purchased it. I want to share the wealth. And I'm sick of the three and a half hour games the old Yankees played. With everyone swinging at the first pitch, I'll be home in time to watch Joan of Arcadia!"

Larry Lucchino was not impressed.

"Why did he have to trade them to Tampa?" Larry whined. "We couldn't beat this team in NY, and we're not going to be able to beat them in Tampa. Why couldn't he send them to Pittsburgh or Milwaukee? Now we'll never win the World Series. He's still evil. I want my mommy!"

Derek Jeter looks forward to playing in the relative obscurity of Tampa Bay.

"It's cool. I'm tired of staying out late and partying at night clubs anyway. I can use the extra time to work on my defense."

In a related story, the Dodgers are trying to work a deal to swap teams with the Angels.