Random Thoughts On Opening Day

by user ASwaff

-Kevin Millwood, the proclaimed savior of the Rangers pitching staff, lost to the Red Sox by giving up 5 earned runs in 5 innings. Only time will tell if this speaks more to the talent of Boston of the lack of talent of Millwood, but it’s an awfully bad start.

-Brad Wilkerson, the guy the Rangers got to replace David Dellucci at the top of the lineup, went 0-for-4 yesterday, continuing his Spring Training trend of being utterly ineffective at the plate. In fact, Wilkerson and Michael Young combined for an 0-for-8 outing yesterday. I think that’s more an aberration than a show of things to come, but it’s still pretty bad.

-Speaking of bad leadoff hitting, here’s a useless but fun stat for opening day - leadoff hitters batted just .278 on opening day. That includes five 0h-fers.

-On the other hand, there’s Jimmy Rollins. He needed 8 innings and all four of his at-bats to do it, but he extended his hitting streak to 37 games with a double off of Adam Wainwright. It’s exciting to have such a compelling story this early in the season. Congratulations, Jimmy.

-St. Louis is good. Albert Pujols hits the ball far.

-On the other side of the Show Me state, the Royals are still the Royals. Even after a very active off-season that saw them acquire Mark Grudzielanek, Reggie Sanders, Scott Elarton, Elmer Dessens and Doug Mientkiewicz, the Royals are still the most pathetic team in Major League Baseball, and maybe the world. Let’s see them go up against South Africa. That would be a game.

-Same goes for the D-Rays. To score 6 runs and still lose…that’s downright sad.

-The Atlanta Braves blew an early 7 run cushion, but held on to defeat the Los Angeles Dodgers…11 to 10!? Since when do the Braves rely on hitting to win games? This is going to be far and away the most offensively potent team they’ve had since Gary Sheffield left. By the way, in his first game against his old team, Rafael Furcal went 3-for-5 with a walk and 3 runs.

-The Mets and Nationals combined for just 5 runs on 22 hits yesterday. Was the pitching that good, or was the offense that bad? You’re right, it was both. The two teams stranded a combined 19 runners, 15 of which were in scoring position. This only helps to strengthen my opinion that the Braves will win the National League East by virtue of the fact that the division is absolutely horrible.

-Can anyone tell me why ESPN was broadcasting the Giants-Padres game instead of one that was played at the exact same time that featured the defending National League champion Astros playing against last year’s Cy Young runner up? Are people really that excited to sit through 3 hours of crappy baseball just for the possibility that Barry Bonds might hit a homerun that they could see on Sports Center anyway?

-Speaking of the Astros, they had a great pitching duel yesterday between Dontrelle Willis and Roy Oswalt, even though Willis ran up his pitch count and had to leave after the fifth inning. Too bad the Astros needed a bases-loaded pass ball in the 7th to score the lone run of the game. Isn’t their offense supposed to be better this year? It doesn’t help that newly-acquired RBI man Preston Wilson went 0-for-4 with two strikeouts and 4 left on base in his Houston debut.

-Think the Cincinnati fans are still excited about this season? I know it was only one game, but having your number one starter getting lit up for nine runs (six earned) in five innings is only indicative of every season they’ve had for the last five years. And getting lit up like that by a Cubs offense that’s only supposed to be mediocre this year can only further serve to depress. When on earth is that team going to look for a serious solution to its pitching woes?

-A 3-to-2 extra inning pitcher’s duel in Colorado on opening day? What’s this world coming to?

(Stats courtesy of http://thebaseballcube.com)

Date
Tue 04/04/06, 9:37 am EST