Play Ball!

I fully understand the logic that there are 161 games left in the season and nothing that happened today has any bearing on what will happen in October (unless a race is decided by one game). However, I could not care less about this logic and say that there are some definitive truths we can take away from Opening Day: God hates the Yankees, the Cubs may go another 100 years, and the Mets will win it all, being three of the more prominent ones.

I watched four games on Opening day: Royals at Tigers, Giants at Dodgers, Angels at Twins, and Astros at Padres. Besides hating the Dodgers, I don't really care about any of these teams, but it's baseball, so who cares? I did notice quite a few things from around the league.

-It really is amazing that someone named Reggie Willits is white.
-The Johan Santana trade is going to be very good for both teams. Santana threw a 7-inning, 3-hitter for a 7-2 win for the Mets. Carlos Gomez was 2 for 3 with 2 steals and 2 runs scored in a 3-2 win for the Twins.
-There's always next year for the Cubs. This season marks the 100th anniversary of their last World Series win. They are a National League favorite. They opened at home against Divisional rival Milwaukee. Everything seemed great: Carlos Zambrano and Carlos Marmol combined for a 9-innings of shutout ball, and their franchise hero Kerry Wood came in in the 9th to hold the Brewers so the vaunted offense could win it in the 9th. Let's just say that after Wood's first game as a closer, his ERA is 27.00. Cubs came back to tie in in the bottom of the 9th, only to lose in the 10th. Could any single pre-All Star Game loss have been more painful?
-CBS news anchor Paul Magers said today that being a Cubs fan is like having a chronic illness.
-Miguel Cabrera is absolutely huge and is no longer a cute little chubby kid. Good trade Marlins, thank you.
-I feel bad for Reds fans. They hired Dusty Baker which means they are not going to win much (as though there was any question about that anyway). But at least that gets him off my TV all summer.
-Tom Glavine paid for his sabotage of the Mets by returning to the damned Braves and launching them towards an 0-2 start. Glavine only made it 5 innings and the Braves lost in the 13th inning. My favorite non-Met Xavier Nady went 4 for 7 with 2 home runs, 4 runs scored and 4 rbi. The Braves may not win a game this year.
-I am not sure which big-time pitcher I am more happy the Mets missed out on: Darren Driefort or Barry Zito. The Giants may not win a game this year either and I am not even kidding this time (sorry Josh).
-What stopped the Yankees from their magnificent final Opening Day in the House the Ruth Built? God. The game rained out. God hates the Yankees.
-Scott Schoeneweis and Jorge Sosa prevented two inherited runners from scoring. And they faced the other team's 3 and 4 hitters. But it was the Marlins' 3 and 4 hitters. But still! Mets win World Series.
-I hate the guy with the speed gun at Dodger games with the white hat. Screw that guy.
-The NY Giants were back at the Giants' facilities today after nearly two months off. The last two months have been a perfect storm of sports happiness for me: Giants win best Super Bowl of all time, USD upsets St. Mary's, Gonzaga and UConn, Mets win opener. Sure the Mets game is less important but after last September/October, I will never take a win for granted again.

I have lots of things to say about the Dodgers' Coliseum debacle, but no time. My last shift (during which I generally shirked my duties, as this posting attests to) at CBS is over and I am going home. But seriously, if you're hiring, email me. Seriously. No joke.

Baseball's Opening Night

Opening Day is not happening in Major League Baseball this year. Or it already did...kinda.

Opening Day in baseball has always been a great spectacle. For whatever reason, there is more excitement about it than there seems to be in other sports. I suppose that it is that 6 months from now, you may be pissed off about the whole thing, but for today, you are in first place. Even the Rays. "Next year" is always "this year" on opening day.

I understood why they moved the first game away from Cincinnati. Having it be a rematch of the World Series winner's LCS was a great idea. I never understood why teams would play a game and then sit a day and then finish the opening series, but I can deal with that...it's logistics - they have to finish the series on Thursday so the next one can start on Friday.

That had become a fun tradition. But this year, Major League Baseball took this American spectacle to Japan and played the opening game at 3 a.m. Pacific time. I could have forgiven them the move to Japan had the game been played at a watchable hour here (like the NFL did with the London game last year). But instead, the league basically gave their entire American fan base the finger, and told us to deal with it.

My frustration has nothing to do with being a "purist" or "traditionalist." I am fine with playing games in other countries. But the U.S. fans got screwed on this one.

If the game had been played at 10 a.m. in Japan (admittedly a bit early for a day game, but still a reasonable hour), it would have been at 6 p.m. in Oakland and 9 p.m. in Boston (the home cities of the teams involved).

What makes it even more maddening is that the league essentially admitted how stupid this all is with the rest of the scheduling this week. Both the Red Sox and A's will return to the States and play more Spring Training games before re-starting the remainder of their regular season schedule!

Had these Japanese games been exhibition games, the league wouldn't have lost anything. They'd get their international outreach. They'd get the Daisuke Matsuzaka-media frenzy in Japan. They would have sold out the games still. They would have sold the TV rights still. But they wouldn't have alienated their American fans.

Good thing Bud Selig got his contract extended again. What a great job he's done!