4-0! Someone should go check the temperature in Hell ;).
Doesn’t history say that the Orioles have to fire Showalter, though, before they win the World Series? 
Did he redesign the uniforms at all?
Nelson Cruz hit his fourth homerun for the Rangers last night. That puts him in the rarified company of Babe Ruth and Willie Mays as the only ones in MLB history to have done so in the first four games of the season. It would’ve been nice if Kinsler did too, but they weren’t letting him see any good pitches.
Here’s to Nellie doing it again tonight!
How is Hamilton doing so far? I wish the Reds had managed to hang onto him.
Ivan Nova looked pretty good last night. It was 3 earned over 6 innings but only 77 pitches and Joe Girardi passed it over to the bullpen as per the plan for this season.
CC goes tonight to keep him on a 5 day schedule. Garcia has game 6 of the season.
Mets head into Philadelphia tonight. I don’t know why I’m letting myself get excited about this season, but fatalism just can’t survive Opening Day, I guess.
Hamels, Blanton, and Halladay. The Mets probably can’t win against Halladay, but they can beat Hamels. And Chris Young, who I think might actually have a season for the Mets this year, is good enough to do it. Then it’s just a matter of Pelfrey outpitching Blanton and that’s two out of three to New York, 4-2 overall, and first place going into the weekend.
Am I convincing anyone? Just myself? All righty, then.
Strange stat, but the Rangers 3 (Hamilton), 4 (Beltre), and 5 (Young) hitters all have lower slugging percentages than the rest of the batting order spots. Obviously that shouldn’t continue, but basically the Rangers great offense has yet to come from the middle of the lineup, with the exception of a grand slam from Beltre.
Disregarding numbers, Hamilton has looked okay but not great yet. When he is hot he has a completely different look to him when he is at bat. You can even see the change before he starts getting hot. The way he holds the bat and moves pre-pitch are very different when he is locked in. I don’t get the impression that people think of him as a streaky hitter, but he very much is one to me.
Chris Young!
Yunel Escobar!
Didn’t want to start a new thread, but if you’ve got Netflix streaming, Ken Burns’ Baseball is available this month. The DVDs aren’t available, but you can stream the series.
Astros still on course for the 0-162 season. Might as well make history.
Michael Pineda!
Please stop that.
Well that was more like the Dodgers that I was expecting to see. Kershaw has 17k and 1BB through less than 14 innings of work. He has given up a total of three runs in two games. His pitching last night (excepting 2 pitches that were not great, and a third that was fine but not at that time) was remarkable.
All of this means nothing if the Dodgers cans score a run in FREAKING COORS FIELD!
Seriously. When Tony Gwynn JR and Jamey Carroll are the third and fourth best hitters on your team you are in *bad *trouble.
That said, I am liking Gwynn a lot. He is a better hitter than I expected and is a great fielder. Thiswas one of the better defensive plays I have seen so far this season.
So are the heavily favored Red Sox. No team has ever won the World Series after a 0-4 start, but I’m sure they won’t let that discourage them.
Sorry, sorry. What I meant was:
As a long-time observer of the professional baseball franchise based in Queens, New York, and properly called the New York Metropolitans but colloquially called the New York “Mets,” I was pleased to see that right-handed starting pitcher Chris Young pitched effectively in his season debut for the team; in this performance, he successfully limited the previously undefeated Philadelphia Phillies, a significant rival for the “Mets” emotionally, historically, and practically and also a team whose production on offense is among the better in the sport, to minimal offensive output. Mr. Young also contributed to his team as an offensive player, which is quite unusual for a pitcher in contemporary baseball. Through his contributions to both offense and defense, Mr. Young helped to secure a situation in which, at the end of nine innings of play, the “Mets” had significantly more runs scored than the “Phillies,” which results in the team being credited with one “win” and the Phillies being credited with one “loss.” Admittedly, it is early in the season, and this outcome will have only very modest impact on the ultimate outcome of the competition between these two franchises to accrue as many “wins” as possible. However, prior to the beginning of the season, it was generally expected by observers that the Mets would perform very poorly. Following a very bad showing in their first game, however, the team has exceeded those low expectations on three consecutive occassions. The performance by Mr. Young, who was once considered to have the potential to be a very good right handed starting pitcher before a series of injuries limited his growth as a player, is cause for careful optimism and, yes, even modest excitement among those who hope for the Mets to outperform their expectations in the many games to come.
In other words, “Chris Young!”
That’s much better.
Brutal loss for the Yanks last night. Soriano was terrible after CC Sabathia pitched a brilliant 7 innings of shutout ball.
Likewise, Seattle Mariners’ rookie starter, Michael Pineda, performed very well last night despite taking the loss. The 22-year-old made his Major League debut against the so-far-this-season-undefeated, reigning American League Champion Texas Rangers, and managed to keep the Rangers’ hitters inside the ballpark for his six innings, the first time that’s happened this season.