Opening Day
This one’s been a long time coming.
I can’t pinpoint the exact moment when Spring Training 2009 became tedious, but it wasn’t yesterday. I’m ready for bona fide, counts-in-the-standings baseball. I’m ready for the Janquis and the cascade of boos that will rightly rain upon Mark Teixeira‘s sick, venal skull. I’m ready for the first Nick Markakis Eutaw Street moon shot and the first time Koji catches a guy looking for strike three. I’m ready for Dave Trembley‘s Diet Soda and I’m ready for the guys on Sportscenter to marvel at what a fine young player Adam Jones is becoming.
I’m ready for about 15 nights at the Yard, and for meeting some of you there. I’m ready for the day in, day out breakdowns of how the team is doing.
And damn if I’m not ready for Matt Wieters.
It all starts today (unless you’re reading this in the next 90 minutes, in which case it starts tomorrow).
If you missed it over at Roch‘s blog, the 25-man roster is out. Plenty of surprises there if you’re going off of what we thought back in February, but no real surprises for right now. It’ll be interesting to see what they do when it comes time to bring Adam Eaton up to fill the fifth starter role. It’ll also be interesting to actually see how long Eaton lasts.
My over/under for him is five starts. If Brad Bergesen does what I think he’ll do in Norfolk and Eaton does what I think he’ll do here, the change will almost have to come.
But I’m getting ahead of myself. Jeremy Guthrie takes the hill today (assuming the rain holds back), and we’re off on the quixotic journey that is Baltimore baseball. Love it.
I’ve got one more prediction to add before we get going: at some point, the O’s will trade from their position of outfield strength.
I’m looking at Pie, Scott, Reimold, and Montanez and thinking that something has to give. I can easily see a team in need of help calling on us for one of those guys in June or July. Depending on the deal and who’s involved, and given AndyMac’s track record, the return should be solid.
@neal s – No doubt about it. There’s too many outfielders and not enough starting pitchers. It’s a no-brainer. I think it’s going to be one of those seasons where we see many changes throughout the course of 162 games in terms of both major and minor league rosters. It’ll be fun. The Former Big 4 of Bedard, Loewen, Cabrera, and Penn have been purged. It’s Andy’s team now. And he’s set himself up to make more trades by acquiring depth at positions.
OPENING DAY. It really makes me want to call out of lessons. I’m going to be squirming knowing that while this middle schooler plays along to “Back in Black”, the Orange & Black are duking it out on national TV against the hated Yankees, and worrying how Guthrie is faring against them. It’ll be agony. I love baseball.
it’s awn sOn
Does it make me a bad person to hope the game gets delayed 2 hours so I can watch the whole thing live?
@Andrew – Yeah man I’m with you… start this thing at like 8:30! haha
Random thought: During the whole unveiling of the new unis, I somehow totally missed the fact that the batting helmet brims were to be orange now. I noticed it in Spring Training and I love it.
GO RELISH
/characters
Judging by the forecast I’m not sure this thing gets played today at all. That would suck for many reasons, not the least of them being that it would accelerate the Adam Eaton clock.
weather.com has the rain oughta here by 3-4PM. . .just in time.
Praying that Guthrie can get back on track and that we boo Tex mercilessly!
Yeah I’m seeing the same forecast.. good news so far. There’s nothing I dislike more than a postponed baseball game.
The ball will be in the left crab, I predict.
At Yankee stadium, they do the Crab Shuffle with little Yankee batting helmets. They also have a really stupid race with the three trains you can take to the stadium.
I’m going with center crab. and Relish. Relish Forever.
I’m sitting in sec 98, row L.
If you’re going, let’s hook up for a beer.
SOOOOOOOOOO happy to see this game today. (assuming it happens)
And I’m thinking I’m gonna’ hit up the Wed. game too for my birthday. What could be a better present than an O’s win on your birthday?
Dan and I are obviously bored at work (or at home, or whereever Dan is)…we’re dueling for Peter Schmuck’s attention.
That live chat is pretty cool. I just submitted a question.
It’s fun, if a bit vapid.
I wish I could focus on work, but its opening day!!!!!!!
Even though it looks like I will miss the first 2 hours of the game. Someone who is going try to stall for time for me. Run onto the field 6 or 7 times.
My question never showed up, and then the chat shut down. Boo.
@Andrew – haha yeah that was pretty funny. By pure chance we post questions back to back.
I’m not doing any work. BASEBALL.
I keep tossing Guthrie around in my brain endlessly. He is either going to suck real bad or surprise all the naysayers. WHATSITGONNABEIGOTTAKNOWNOW
@neal s – I had two questions show up, two which didn’t, and schmuck only answered one of my questions. Whataschmuck.
I’m pumped for this game. Just gotta have the weather hold off for a bit. I’m going as a “first date” with this girl from my office… so I’m anxious as hell.
man the first date is all about pretending to be interested in HER…I think this can’t possibly end well…
but I’m rooting for you. Good luck ignoring the game…
I’m desperately seeking excuses to get out of this god damned office. I might just come down with some food poisoning from lunch….
“It’s my GUTS boss, I gotta get home and take care of my GUTS”
She’s the one who should be nervous. She has to pretend to like baseball for four hours while I talk her ear off about Luke Scott (who’s head I’ll be staring at the back of for most of the evening). At least I’m in my element. LOL
Steve Melewski at MASN has the scoop on the Norfolk rotation, along with some speculation about the lower levels.
@Joe the Guy – I LOL’d at the Guts bit, that’s hilarious.
Today is one of the few days I wish I was back home in MD, but if it’s any consolation the Orioles:Yankees gear ratio here in Mo’town has been 9:1.
Yeah first pitch strike to start the season…
Oh yeah, those boos are right on. Glorious.
man I’m at work in Gloucester, Massachusetts, watching the Gamecast of a game taking place in New York City, and chatting about it with cats in Baltimore…that’s just friggin cool….
First two “lowly Orioles” BOTH reach base against FatAss-ia and the city of New York gets collective heartburn – YES!
another wild pitch!
hell yeah
come on MELMO
ok I need to relax a bit maybe…
but I’ll give the O’s +2 points for making the Fat Man work.
I’m not sure what points are worth or why, (just yet), but I can always tell when to give them or take them away.
-2 points to Aubrey for swinging at the first pitch
I hate swinging at the first pitch. Unless it’s your third AB against the starter and you had two long grinding appearances before, and he starts you off with a meatball. You know? Something like that it’s cool, but I’m going to say 75% of the time it’s not cool to swing at the first pitch. Right?
Yeah, I do need to relax a bit. But…
BASEBALL! I’ve missed you so!
And you’ve returned, like a prodigal son. Let us slaughter the fattest lamb and celebrate your return with zeal.
I actually lol’ed a bit at “let us slaughter the fattest lamb and celebrate your return with zeal.” Nice.
I like what I see so far, although not scoring with one out and runners on 2nd and 3rd was tough.
This team has decent speed.
AJ blowing bubbles up the first base line but easily manages the triple. Damn. BRob just straight heads up, solid base-running.
They’ve got Biden in the booth. Fire up the Quote Machine. On the first pitch:
“I looked out there and thought, Maaaan that’s a long way……..”
This fifth inning is a thing of beauty. O’s doing all the little things right, and getting lucky on top of it. I wonder if this sort of thing is sustainable…
YES! Go fuck yourself everyone in New York
Good to know Melvin Mora can still run the Orioles out of an inning. He really Tejada’d that one.
Good to know that Xavier Nady is roughly as smart as Melvin Mora.
Jim Palmer just referred to the WBC as “that international Bud Selig tournament.”
Michael Kay and traitor Ken Singleton just pondered why on earth Teixeira is getting booed. They were mostly dumbfounded.
I, too, am dumbfounded.
I knew knew knew Teixeira would come up in the big spot…after that double I kept thinking “Shit…we need a bigger boat”…I just about hit my head on the ceiling on that bounceout…I missed you, baseball.
Also, for all the talk about Oriole fans not being into it – you saw right there that if the team were strong and that crowd was there every day, Camden Yards would be an awesome place to play. I won’t listen to any of Neal’s “the fans need to try harder” rhetoric ever again.
Hell yes, orange-shirted guy in left!
Whoa, wait a second: doesn’t this game prove my “fans need to try harder” rhetoric? I mean, think about it.
But today’s not the time for that. It’s an awesome crowd, and they’re doing us proud in front of the ESPN national audience.
Greg Zaun.
Awesome snatch. Classy guy. Working his butt off. I almost already feel bad for him losing his job to Wieters, although he’s the perfect role model.
Ray/Johnson both looking shaky in the Ray/Johnson/Sherril Triumvirate of Closure.
Let’s go Flatbrim!
Com’on Joe. Let’s Camden Chat that.
His name is ZAUN
Good game. Very exciting.
@Joe the Guy – that’s the first time anybody — anywhere — has referred to Greg Zaun’s “awesome snatch” (sorry).
@Andrew – I’m confused…
Over on CC they just yell ZAUN all the time. I’m not sure why, but it’s funny.
You know, today was, in a few ways, very cathartic for me. I was really tired of hearing about how horrific the year is going to be for Baltimore, and how we would somehow lose 100 games and so on. Opening Day always has that feeling for me…I can only think of one other game that ever felt like any given Opening Day, and that was that 15 strikeout Mussina game against the Indians in the ’97 ALCS. I was more than happy to just get going.
That it was against the Yankees, and that the Orioles won, and that the crowd was so overwhelmingly pro-Oriole, and that Teixeira came up and failed against Greatest Oriole Ever Jim Johnson, and that he got booed that badly…it felt more draining than ever before (in a good way).
And I will put this out there: my hatred for the guy is certainly in need of re-energizing. It’ll be back up there in an hour or so, but for now I feel like – even though I wasn’t part of that crowd – I let him have it and got it out of me. Now the only real way to shove it back in his face is for the Orioles to get good.
I’m looking forward to the Norfolk opener, too – David Price against Matt Wieters and maybe Chris Tillman or Brad Bergesen? Sign me up!