Game 1: A’s at Mariners
King Felix vs Dan Haren, 3:35 pm
A bunch of interesting subplots in tonight’s game – Travis Buck makes his major league debut, Shannon Stewart tries to prove he’s alive, Jose Guillen may or may not play due to an ankle injury (which will probably lead to an Ignitor sighting), and of course, Felix becomes the 8th youngest pitcher in major league history to take the hill on opening day.
We’re generally ones who wave away gut feelings and fate, but to me, today’s game just feels like one of those that we’re going to remember where we we when it happened. Felix’s last start as a 20-year-old, on opening day, against the team that handed us our lunch last year. This is one of those games that the organization could really use, because no one wants to start talking about 2-17 against Oakland against.
So, my guess? Felix throws a complete game, allows one run on four hits, walks one, and strikes out 11. He walks off the field to a standing ovation, and we all remember April 2nd, 2007 as the day that King Felix told the world that he was here to stay.
Go Mariners.
Late game threadation
Aaaaaaaand sometimes they slip between authors, and we don’t notice until mid-game. Sorry.
Jeff Weaver goodness.
M’s in Vegas
Against the Cubbies! 7:15! On broadcast TV! I’m excited!
I’d also like to saw that so far, I find Dave Sims to be so far superior to the former alternate television broadcaster that it’s ridiculous. You can try and talk me out of it, tell me that he’ll wear on me eventually, but I’m loving it so far.
Spring training madness!
Setting aside for a second that Hargrove and the front office are doing things like putting old, never-hit infielders on the active roster for no reason, there’s going to be baseball on! Woooo! The M’s again flout the rule that they’re supposed to take at least two recognizable regular players and one guy on top of that they can point to and claim is a recognizable regular player, putting only Vidro in the early game.
Mariners at San Francisco! 7:15! FSN! In San Francisco!!! Fun note: the Giants are charging $90/seat for premium field club seats to this game. Really. And they’re available.
I was so excited I accidentally queued this up to run yesterday at this time, to briefly hilarious results.
For your game thread discussion: if the M’s spend $110 million and only (as seems to be the consensus prediction) win 73 games, what other teams since the start of free agency will have spent so much so poorly? And I’m not looking for cheap teams who sucked – I’m trying to think of massive spending done to so little effect. Right off the bat, a couple candidates: the 1999-2000 Cubs and Orioles teams.
Red hot televised spring training action!
Seattle @ Texas! Whee! 6:05!
First televised game of 2007 thread of awesomeness
Wooooo! M’s on television! Yayyy! I’m so excited I’m posting hours early!
Rumored M’s lineup, from the Times blog:
CF-L Ichiro
3B-R Adrian Beltre
DH-B Jose Vidro
LF-L Raul Ibanez
1B-R Richie Sexson
RF-R Mike Morse
C-R Jeff Clement
2B-R Jose Lopez
SS-R Yuniesky Betancourt
For the Giants: some guys. Who cares.
Edit: Also, Dave’s at the game, so if you see someone throwing rocks at Jose Vidro in the background, that’s probably me. Will have notes up late tonight. Brandon Morrow looked awesome in Mesa today, by the way.
From the Times blog:
Good thing the Cubs can fold their laundry and have a packed stadium come to watch, otherwise, the M’s would have some explaining to do
Hee hee hee.
Wednesday’s news, tightly edited
From sensory deprivation tank, Mussina agrees to 2y, $22.5m contract with Yankees
NL Manager of the year is Marlins’ fired Girardi
Leyland wins AL Manager of the Year
Acta named new Nationals manager
100-year old Hernandez gets two year, $12m contract
Mark DeRosa gets 3y, $13m
World Series Game Four, try two
First, how’s the weather in St. Louis? From the National Weather Service, it’s 54 degrees, 90% humidity, and their forecast should make you wince:
Tonight: Areas of drizzle, then occasional rain after 1am. Low around 50. South wind 5 to 7 mph becoming east. Chance of precipitation is 90%.
Friday: Periods of rain. High near 52. Breezy, with a north wind 6 to 9 mph increasing to between 17 and 20 mph. Winds could gust as high as 28 mph. Chance of precipitation is 100%.
Niiiiiiiiice. Anyway, if this games goes off, it’s Bonderman v Suppan, which brings me back to my frustration with the Tigers rotation.
How would you order these pitchers in a playoff rotation that goes 2-off-3-off-2?
A. RHP 4.08 ERA, 2.69 BB/9, 8.50 K/9, .76 HR/9
B. RHP 3.63 ERA, 2.9 BB/9, 6 K/9, 1.02 HR/9
C. LHP 3.84 ERA, 2.74 BB/9, 4.37 K/9, 1.01 HR/9
D. LHP 3.84 ERA, 2.89 BB/9, 5.91 K/9, 1.25 HR/9
An average pitcher walks 3 guys in 9, strikes out 6, gives up a home run, more or less.
But wait- say the other team’s vulnerable to lefties, and scores a third of a run/game less against them. That might bump a couple guys around, but assuming that this year’s lines are a good measure of the talent level right now, I’d arrange this ADBC, with the thought that with this scheduling, you’re looking at AD(off)BCA(off)DB, with the added benefit that in Game 7, you could conceivably start A on three days rest, and certainly pitch him out of the bullpen, along with C.
That ADBC rotation is Bonderman-Robertson-Verlander-Rogers. Now, I don’t care how you weight the relative intangibles of these guys, Bonderman is clearly the pick of the litter, and if you start him #1 you may well wring three starts out of him if it comes to that. The other guys don’t really matter so much
What if there’s a rainout, say, for game four, and you lose the second travel day and you’re down in the series? If you were super-aggressive, you could go AD(off)B(off)ADBC and immediately get another start out of the best pitcher in the rotation to give you your best shot at evening the series.
This has been driving me nuts all Series. Bonderman is, by far, the best pitcher in the rotation, and he’s #4, so you get one start out of him and then maybe you can bring him out again in game seven.
Anyway. Hoping for a good game.
World Series Game 4
Another World Series played in poor conditions, it looks like. So what do we get?
CF Granderson
LF Monroe
SS Guillen
RF Ordonez
1B Casey
C Rodriguez
2B Polanco
3B Inge
vs
SS Eckstein
RF Duncan
1B Pujols
CF Edmonds
3B Rolen
LF Wilson
C Molina (Y)
2B Miles
Pasco native Jeremy Bonderman v Suppan… well, one of those two is good. I can’t believe the Tigers are down a game going into this one and Bonderman hasn’t pitched yet. It’s crazy.
World Series! Game Three!
Detroit @ St. Louis, Nate Robertson versus Chris Carpenter. 5:33 supposedly.