The First Game
(AP Photo/Tony Tribble)
Nothing like being able to watch Opening Day. I don’t work at KPFA on Mondays and the headlines editor at Free Speech Radio News did me a favor and turned down my pitch for today’s headlines. I am sure it won’t feel like a favor in a few days as I will have around $47 to see me through to next payday after the rent, credit card and MLB monthly subscription are paid and I definitely have to sell more work in April to make rent in May. (Working at the station doesn’t cut it). But I’ll think about that later.
Today is Opening Day of the 2008 Baseball Season! It should be a national holiday. Seriously. And if business interests argue that there are too many holidays already, tell ‘em we’ll trade Presidents Day for Opening Day. What makes for a better celebration, the seasonal start of our national pastime or guys like Millard Fillmore and Calvin Coolidge?
This part of this blog entry is being written just before the Diamondbacks tangle with the Reds. Webb vs. Harang. I’m changing procedures a bit this year: I am going to take notes during the game so I have the details down for a quick post after the game. I will do The Eric Byrnes Pitch Count Report after each game with the help of the archives and the MLB gameday pitch reports. The EBPCR will thus take another step forward in sophistication by taking a look at what Byrnesie did with what kind of pitch. This schedule will also encourage me to to the EBPCR for all the games. I got lazy after a while last year.
As far as I know now, the definition of True Elation will remain the same as last year: Multiple hit day with multiple RBI or the game winning RBI, however obtained.
I’m looking for 200 hits and 100 RBI from Byrnesie this year.
The Game:
There was a long rain delay. There’s a big low in the middle of the country and rain all the way from Oklahoma to New York. (The Yankees final home opener in The House That Ruth Built” was washed out.) Hail and possible tornadoes in some places. But they got it all in in Cincinnati. In fact, in the 8th inning, the crowd cheered as the sun finally came out.
For the introductions, the Reds all wore uniforms with No. 41 and the name NUXHALL in back, and their real numbers in front, to honor the late pitcher and broadcaster Joe Nuxhall. The Reds Hall of Fame at Great American Ballpark will have an exhibit about him all year and several permanent mementoes of him have been installed in the park. They’ve even renamed the part of MainStreet that runs in front of the park after him. The players changed into their regular uniforms for the game, but starting pitcher Aaron Harang wore the Nuxhall No. 41 shirt.
As usual, there was the military display to begin the game. Why is it the only way we can display patriotism is with representatives of the military marching around with flags. Is there nothing else in this country worth honoring? Why must we do this at all? Can’t we keep jingoism and politics out of events that they have nothing to do it. I mean, it’s a baseball game, for cryin’ out loud, not a Fourth of July parade. They even had the military plane flyover, though it could not be seen because of the cloud cover.
When they finally got around to playing baseball, the Diamondbacks got off to a quick start; with the help of a throwing error by 3B Edwin Encarnacion and a wild pitch by Harang, the Diamondbacks scored one run in the first inning. Conor Jackson, hitting clean-up, singled home Orlando Hudson from second base. Eric Byrnes, batting third, grounded out to short his first time up and Hudson, already on second, could not advance. Harang pitched him outside. Trying to pull that kind of pitching results in grounders to short. Jackson’s single was more up the middle, between the second base bag and the shortstop.
Chris Young hit a solo homer into the upper deck in left in the third inning. Two batters later, Eric Byrnes slammed an 88 mph cutter into the lower left deck. <Grin> It was thrown down the middle and sent bye-bye, unlike the pitch where he grounded out, which was more outside. The Cincinnati announcers said he is not the type of hitter to whom you should throw a “get me ahead” fastball because he’ll swing at it. Yes he will. <Grin>
Reds’ CF Corey Patterson robbed Hudson of a double in the 4th with a diiving catch after a long run. It was named the “Hot Dog Play of the Day.” Eric Byrnes sent a comebacker to Harang.
I lost my connection and lost over an inning due to the slowness of the MLB player reloading. Things have been poor in computerland in general lately. I had terrible buffering problems with weather.com today and for several days LiveVideo.com has been buffering and driving people crazy over that.
In the 7th inning, Jeff Salazar batted for Brandon Webb and sent a ball into the rightfield bullpen. (The D’Backs had 12 pinch-hit homers last season, including one Salazar hit in San Francisco in September to a place where Barry Bonds frequently hit them). Chad Qualls then came in to pitch a scoreless 7th for the D’Backs. Byrnesie grounded to short again in the 8th off David Weathers. It is going to be a very long, dreary season for him if he keeps having to reach for those outside strikes. MOVE IN CLOSER TO THE PLATE, BYRNESIE! (I’m now entering my fourth season of squawking at him over this issue).
Tony Pena pitched a scoreless 8th. Orlando Hudson robbed Ken Griffey, Jr. of a single by going into short right field to grab a grounder and throw him out.
Closer Brandon Lyon notched his first save with a 1-2-3 9th. The D’Backs staff struckout 10 Reds: winner Brandon Webb K’d 6, holders Qualls and Pena K’d 1 apiece, and Lyon K’d 2.
The biggest impression I got from this game was that the Reds did well to get Corey Patterson. He covered all sorts of ground in left-center, right-center and back to the warning track to rob the D’Backs of extra bases. Given the slowness of Adam Dunn in left and Ken Griffey, Jr. in right, they need a CF who can cover a lot of ground. Patterson does.
Off day tomorrow and then the season really gets rolling!
Go, Diamondbacks!
ByrnesBlogger1
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Posted by ByrnesBlogger1
Kellia Ramares is a freelance journalist, poet and baseball blogger from Oakland, CA. Kellia writes (and does some audio work) about baseball, especially the Arizona Diamondbacks, on her blog, Down The Left Field Line: Life, Baseball & Eric Byrnes. (http://byrnesblog.azsportshub.com), under the name ByrnesBlogger1. She expects to expand her sports journalism from baseball fandom to stories on social issues in a sports context in a website she is building in the fourth quarter of 2007 to be an annex to the "Byrnesblog".
Contact: ByrnesBlogger1[at]azsportshub.com
http://byrnesblog.azsportshub.com
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