With 53 years of experience, Baltimore knows how to get Opening Day right. I have the privilege of a one-day vacation between jobs today, so I'm enjoying WJZ 13's coverage of Opening Day festivities (and I am enjoying it. Excellent team coverage from Baltimore's CBS affiliate).
All of the players are being introduced and jogging out alongside a youngster. Scott Williamson jokingly held the kid back and then raced ahead of him. Literally a minute after the idea struck me, Kevin Millar did his best grass-sniffing Ray Lewis impression before jogging out. I still haven't really taken a liking to Millar, but he is winning me over. Given my predilection towards scruffy Orioles (Joe Orsulak, Billy Ripken, Brian Roberts), I really can't explain why I'm not a Millar fan.
An excellent National Anthem from an unknown singer. The traditional A-10 Tank Killer flyover from Martin State Air Guard Station is close to my heart because of my grandfather's years of service as Martin's top non-commissioned officer.
Game time. Let's hope the game lives up to the pageantry. Christ, it's Jim Palmer. Save us Gary Thorne!
April 9, 2007
Orioles Opening Day
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MASN problems continue. They just switched back to the game with the count to Granderson at 2-1.
And reality sets in. Backup catcher Paul Bako and Aubrey Huff just collided while trying to catch a foul pop-up in front of the Orioles dugout.
Rather than turn this into a live blog, I think I'll just watch the game now.
Live blog! Live blog!
Odds Pudge picks a runner off at first today: 10-1. The Orioles are well-protected from Pudge's specialty with a number of lefty batters. In addition, the fact that the Orioles' dugout is on the first-base side provides an extra 15 or so first base coaches.
This is not as much of an anomaly as it seems as 17 teams (Atlanta, Baltimore, Boston, Cincy, Colorado, Florida, Houston, KC, Milwaukee, both New York teams, Philly, San Diego, Seattle, St. Louis, TB and Texas) all have first base home dugouts. And why not? There are more righty hitters than lefty, and thus more hard foul balls enter the third-base dugout than the first-base one. Didn't save Glenn Davis though. At least we didn't give up Steve Finley, Pete Harnisch and Curt Schilling for that broken jaw.
Interesting to note that KC is the only team that plays all of its division games in the first base side dugout while Toronto is the only team that plays all of its division games from the third-base dugout.
Ok, I resisted the live blog concept out of pride, but I will yield to my day-working brethern.
Corey Patterson just misjudged another tailing liner. He did the same in the bottom of the 9th yesterday, but recovered in time to make a visually impressive catch. They credit Casey with a double, but that's home cooking.
Tigers lead 1-0 despite quality controlled pitching by Cabrera.
Thank God Tejada is proving all the experts wrong with his blazing start to this season. 4-for-21, 3 errors already this season (2 on one play last series).
Is this the year Cabrera makes the leap?
And I think Simmons picked Tejada to have a down year this year.
Cal Ripken is the MASN booth guest. I can't overstate how far he has come in terms of his ability to speak off the cuff.
He's shilling a couple of books, but pitchman is not exactly a new role to Comcast Lays Cal.
Kevin Millar, who Palmer just referred to as a "young man" lined one over the left field fence to tie the game.
Corey Patterson followed it up with the most beautiful and smart drag bunt I've ever seen. It was cleanly fielded (feld?) but no one could beat Patterson to the bag. Redemption baby!
And Patterson stole second. That technically makes up for the two "bases" his misjudged liner allowed, but it doesn't make up for the run. If he's going to wear Jackie Robinson's 42 on April 15, he has to steal third and home.
Patterson scored on a bloop between short and left by Brian Roberts. Big balls by Patterson on the hit and run to assume Les Tigres wouldn't pull it down with only one out. Pudge nearly picked Roberts off overrunning first after the late throw home. I have a bad feeling I doomed the O's to a Pudge-induced first base pickoff.
Cal just admitted that basketball was the only way he wanted to stay in shape during the offseason. Why do I foresee a Cal Ripken, Terrell Owens, Tony Gonzalez "And 1" travelling team?
Mora just hit a base-of-the-wall double, and the O's lead 3-1 all of the sudden.
Wow, the Orioles playing (relatively) small ball. Where's your NL fan now?
Great home-field fan interference. Some Orioles fans down the left field line just did their best Bartman impressions in refusing to move for the Tigers LFer trying to catch a first-row foul pop.
My NL fan, aka our Left Coast Correspondent, is just now going to lunch.
Detroit's pitcher Durbin is falling apart. He just accidentally threw a ball 18 inches over Tejada's head.
Play at the plate! Tejada grounds one through the SS-3B gap but Mora beats the throw home.
4-1 O's and Tejada moved up on the throw home.
This big inning reminds me. If anyone wants the early-90's "Orioles Magic" MP3, contact me at jreddish@gmail.com.
I don't think it was ever sold commercially, so there shouldn't be copyright issues.
Gary Williams now the subject of a "sideline" interview from Amber Theoharris.
MASN reports the game is sold out. Eat it Nats' fan(s).
47 degrees and still a sellout. Let the Nats fans whine about weather now. (although I'm sure attendance tomorrow won't be so hot)
Palmer just pointed out that Durbin "struck out the side" last inning, despite giving up 4 runs. My understanding is that striking out the side involves three up-three down.
The Tigers bullpen is up. This could turn into a lot of fun.
Daniel Cabrera has no walks through four innings. He should also have no earned runs. I never understood why the home team offical scorer thought he was assisting the home team by being stingy in handing out errors when they play such a small part in position player statistics and earned runs play such a large role in pitcher statistics. Perhaps the answer is found if you replace the word "statistics" with "salaries" in the previous sentence.
Great Geico commercial with Mike Wallace's (Busch Series, Geico car) cousin saying he'd put Mike in the wall. Then it shows the kid putting him into the wall in go-karts, grocery cart jockeying, and remote control boat races.
Gary Thorne just said "Give that fan a contract." I'm quite sure Rex Barney just chuckled in his grave, and I'm quite baffled as to how Gary Thorne, a New Englander, knew to make the comment.
Brian Roberts just reached first on a swinging bunt. Again the Tigers had first base coverage issues. The proper play was to have 1B perform a snap field and tag, but the pitcher bobbled the ball while 1B stood by and watched.
Fundamentals baby.
Tejada is 2-3 with an RBI. I should have called him out last week. Since we all know that what I say and think affects the team.
The correct play is almost never to have the pitcher field the ball if he has to move to do it.
Aubrey Huff low-lines one into right, and Roberts scores quite easily. Another two-out run-scoring hit from the Orioles.
You are right about that being the correct play. Unfortunately for the Tigers, both balls were rollers that went more than three-fourths of the way to first. That's no-man's-land for the pitcher-1B combo. I think both plays were 1B field-and-tag plays, but it's been very apparent over the years that baseball is not a fan of the 1B-man tagging the runner. I am not sure why this is, but I blame the plethora of poor-fielding 1B-men that have come up with increasing frequency.
A 'tweener falls in front of LF and behind 3B for a double, and Tejada score. Luck is on the O's side, as the play was with 2 outs so the O's were running hard on contact.
WOW! Kevin Millar is being IBBed. That's gotta be a first!
The O's have 10 hits in 4 2/3 innings. Patterson bats next, and given his penchant for liner homers that could be a big mistake.
No dice. O's 6, Tigers 1 through 5.
Placido Palanco distractingly chokes up on the bat, and he hit a beautiful leadoff Baltimore Chop basehit. I haven't seen that kind of crap since Little League.
From Jim Palmer: "A lot of people think the wind has changed since the Ravens built their stadium across the parking lot."
WHO THINKS THAT?!?!?! The Ravens' stadium is literally a quarter-mile away, and situated behind home plate. I should be a color-commentator.
"Aubrey Huff pulls the ball a lot less since he started squaring off his toenails rather than cutting them round."
I dare you to tell me how that makes less sense than what Palmer was paid to say.
Gary Thorne called Palmer out for using the word "confluence" twice. Thorne said "I thought we were back in Pittsburgh, I was looking for the three rivers." Palmer admitted he had the "Cosellian" dictionary.
That's absurd. There's no way the Ravens stadium has any large effect on the wind at Camden Yards
The Thorne and Palmer relationship is not off to a good start. I think Thorne might be TOO good at citing stats and facts, and Palmer seems threatened. Thiesmann-Kornheiser had more flow.
Seventh Inning Stretch!
THANK GOD I'M A COUNTRY BOY!
In other words, Jeremy can go to Hell with the rest of his filthy MoCo brethern.
And no, that wasn't an Anti-Semetic comment. Judaism doesn't have Hell.
Dare you question the wisdom of Palmer?
And the Ravens Stadium affects Camden Yards argument might have made more sense in 1998, when the stadium first existed.
Then again, the O's have had nine losing seasons and the Ravens' Stadium has existed for nine years. Hmmm.....
And the Orioles win. I can really see why a fan would want to jump to the wholly punchless Nationals. Well, anyway, thanks for the revenue!
WJZ referred to Detroit as the "defending World Champions". That pretty much destroys all of the goodwill they earned previously.
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