Just how impressive are those cubs. Frm the outset, as soon as DeJesus smoked the triple down the first-base line they never really looked as if they were going to win this game. However, what the Cubs always do well is they never give up and answered with one of their own. Then in the bottom of the ninth, a run down, i never gave them a chance – but in typical cubbie style they proved me wrong, if they keep proving me wrong, who knows how far they can go this year. I was impressed with the Royals also – it takes two teams to make a good game, especially DeJesus – who has been pretty good for a while now and Teahen. It looks like te outfield really can provide the firepower for them this year.

Royals + All royals pitching except Soria, especially Yabuta, OF players, team DF in general was good

Royals - Bale looked tired after 3, Soria didnt pitch well – need to be mentally stronger in the ninth

Cubs + A ninth inning win, i am not a fan of Cedeno but i cannot argue he played well, if Soriano and D.Lee have off days t seems Ramirez will always hurt. Pitching was ok

Cubs – Fukudome i want impressed with, im told from a cubbie fan Lahey is one of their best pitchers this year….didnt look like it today but its only spring.

Final – Kansas City Royals 5 Chicago Cubs 6.

Until next time…

I think i saw…

WILT – Duffy – Mercy

Hi to all and a fantastic St Patricks Day. Id first of all like to apologise for the lack of a match report that should have appeared here by now – my St. Patricks Day celebrations got a little carried away yesterday. I had many to drink and a great night…and unfortunately missed the baseball and the Red-Sox – Pirates game i should be bringing to you.

Instead i will tomorrow be watching the Royals-Cubs game tomorrow as a replacement. I will cover a Red-Sox game before opening day because (more than anything else) i want to see how the World Series champs are going to line up this year. I also must see the NL champion Rockies next weekend.

All is looking good with the Cards at the moment. Keeping scorelines tight means you always have a chance – just one Sir Albert swing changes it all.

Until tomorrow…

HAPPY ST. PATRICKS DAY FROM

I think i saw…

WILT – Kenny Chesney – Shiftwork

First off, id like to congrtulate the Tampa Bay organistion for removing the ‘devil’ segment from their franchise. Seriously, i did not know they had changed it for this year but obviously it can only be a good thing.

Right onto the game. The commentators were raving about Kennedy right through the first couple of innings. I really i hope for the Yankees that he gets better as the season wears on because at the moment, from what i saw today he wouldnt get through 4 innings – he threw over 60 pitches in the three innnings he did do today – i wasnt very impressed. Opposing him was another pitcher i hadnt seen before (isn’t spring training just great) Niemann. I thought he did ok. Worked himself out of trouble…a few times but went about his business well.

Offensively, both teams were strong as expected – especially considering the squads were split into two for other games that were going on. For Tampa i thought Hinske was excellent – not just for the deep HR but for his hustling on the bases with his second hit – a single and eventually coming in to score. Base-running in general was very good. For the Yankees, Jeter was very bad, especially with the first SO and his double play but is he really bothered until April comes around? – i doubt it. A-Rod was, well, A-Rod. You know everytime he plays you are gonna get a multi hit game and superb defense. There was one confrontation where A-Rod seemed to be making a point by not hustling for a home plate collision and instead letting himself be tagged.

Defensively, the Rays were pretty bad in comparison with the Yankees – probably the best vs the worst defense in the AL. Igawa was bad again for the Yankees – i understand he had a fantastic career in the japenese major league, and i dont think his face fits in the Yankees organisation. All pitching for Tampa was very, very good.

Yankees + A-Rod, the entire team defense, also i thought Riviera got a good innings work.

Yankees - Kennedy for me, Jeter’s indifferent at-bats and Igawa’s flat pitching performance, offense in general was not productive enough when on base

Rays + Offense was great, pitching was fantastic, relief was even better and Hinske really looks like he can be a great player this year

Rays – Defense was a bit shoddy but apart from that cant really give much negative feedback – a great overall performance

Final – Tampa Bay Rays 7 New York Yankees 2

For tomorrows game, i will feature the Red Sox @ Pirates – i am interested to see why they are below .500 this spring and how they will do with Josh Beckett on the DL.

Until then…

I think i saw…

WILT – Taylor Swift – Picture to Burn

Sorry for the no-post this week, have been busy, but now im back for a busy schedule of weekend baseball. A quick note on my cards, ive been keeping track of box-scores this week and its been an indifferent week from what i can make out. Yesterday would have to have been the highlight with Rick Ankiel going long twice in one game although quite a few games went to the 10th this week – at least they are fighting hard which was something i felt was lacking last year, when we went behind i just never felt we would win.

So onto today. It is quite an easy choice of the match i am going to watch. It has to be the Devil Rays-Yankees. I heard about Giradi’s suspension, which is quite an ugly decision in my opinion. How can you suspend someone when it is not proved that they do something wrong? I doubt he told Shelley to slide in feet up into second. This does, however ridiculous, set a benchmark for future decisions this year, they are going to be a lot stricter considering that a suspension is possible for a ST incident…. so TLR is hardly ever going to be present at a Cards game this year and dont get me started with Pinella. Everyone will have thier own opinion and some people will think the suspension is justified but i cannot agree with that.

Till later today…

I think i saw…

WILT – Rascal Flatts – Life is a Highway

What a game this was for the Mets pitching staff. Maine was awsome not even giving up a hit in 4 innings. The Mets combined had only given up 2 hits going into the last inning. Reyes leading off hits a HR againdt the wind! Someone tell me how the little guy powers it out that far? David Wright hit a stand up triple in the same inning. Still on Mets offense Ryan Church hit an unbelieveably long foul ball that some poor fan had to go into gator territory to retrieve. Valentin also deserves a good mention as i thought his effort was top draw today.

Having said all this, im thinking of something positive other than pitching to say about the Astros. This was not their strongest team nor was this the best performance from the people who would be their regulars. Pence looked ok to me even though he ended up hitless and the stolen base from Newhan off Maine was quite impressive but i think that was it ofensively. Defensively Pence was excellent in RF and made a great defensive play in the 7th. Church looked a bit nervous when going near the fence in the first. There was also a great play at the plate from Quintero to nab other Reyes at home – i think in the 6th but i could be wrong. Ty was unlucky to get an error on a ball that really was not a routine play and in my opinion did the job by holding the runner at third.

The pitching matchups were good all day long – not something which is usualy associated with Spring games – pitchers just looking to get their arm in. Maine had his arm in ice after his 4 inning workout which he said in commentary was routine. If there were any negatives all day from a pitching point of view it would be Muniz for the Mets, i was less impressed with his inning of work.

Mets + Got to be Maine. He was outstanding, other good performances from Rincon, Valentin, Reyes (the power of the man) and Church.

Mets – Maybe Muniz…but maybe im too harsh. Not much else except i would have liked to have seen runners at third actually get home rather than stranded or thrown out.

Houston + Pence played ok, Wiggington also played good. Not their strongest side still competed and were in the game all the time. Pitching was ok.

Houston - Diaz to me didnt look like a MLB star. Their rotation has to be a worry behin Oswalt. Not enough offensive production to trouble a Mets side which could have could have scored more in truth.

Cards got trashed again today, i really dont know where we go from here. Looking at the scoreboard the Indians and Red Sox both put up big 0′s against NL opponents – although technically we are Cactus’s and Grapefruits for this month. I will hopefully be watching a couple more matches next week and i hope to make the weekend report a regular thing as the Regular Season kicks in.

Until the midweek posts…

I think i saw…

WILT – Evanescence – Call me when your sober

Interesting was indeed a good word to use in my last post. MLB TV had barely booted up before runs came flying from all angles. The pitching matchup was Kuroda-Looper, my first look at Kuroda and i thought he did well, he got into a little trouble in the 1st but pitched excellently in the second. Looper was on one of his bad days as on a good day he can pitch a whole lot better than that! Ludwick made two throwing errors in the same inning but made up for it with some great defense at times – he should be the cards opening day RF.

From an offense point of view the cards were Pujols-less but still had some big hitters in there (Ankiel, Glaus and Rasmus) The only player who really stood out for me offensively was Adam Kennedy and he will surely have very little opposition for the 2B position this year if he keeps the same form up both offensively and defensively as he did today. For the Dodgers….everyone was good offensively but Kemp was particulary good as he hit two triples, 1 which was maybe 1 inch from being a homer and the other was a poor play from Glaus in my opinion. 26 runs in total and nearly as many changes by both the managers, it was exhibition and was clearly used as a showcase for both bosses to assess the talent they have – rightfully so.

Defensively, it wasnt a good game, 6 errors, blinding sun and a vicious wind that the commentators said was blowing out to right. Ive already touched on Ludwicks two, Izturis made the other – a player who i do not think will make too many errors for the cards this year. Loney made 2 of the Dodgers 3 errors but players who did make errors today have surely got to shrug it off and say that even the best could have made errors out there today.

Bullpen wise, i was impressed with Hawksworth and Springer for the Cards. Hawksworth could be a very useful relief pitcher this year and Russ, i really liked last year and i hope he can do a similar job this year. All the Dodgers relief pitching looked ok and if this continues i may have to edit my earlier post and say i was wrong

So to brief it up here are some + and -

Dodgers + Pitching (Kuroda and relief), Kemp, Martin behind the plate..oh and 20 runs without Nomar

Dodgers – Not very much at all, just the errors which were all condition based errors anyway

Cardinals + Rasmus, Ludwick and Hawksworth a little but most notably Kennedy. Barton with that very cool hairstyle also deserves a mention. Defense besides errors was very cardinal-like.

Cardinals – Conceding 20 runs. The combined performance of Looper and Villone was very unimpressive. No appearance form Sir Albert

Feel free to leave comments. Im going to cover the game tomorrow between Houston Astros @ New York Mets

Until then…

I think i saw…

WILT – Carrie Underwood – So Small

So, we are at the end of my predictions with the NL West. This is definately going to be a very competitive division this year with the expert pitching that makes up this division – certainly every year i have been following baseball. Jake Peavy, the newly acquired and i feel underrated Dan Haren and especially Brandon Webb are at times just awesome, i feel this may be the year of Jeff Francis to join the ranks of these pitchers. I dont think Randy will have the same effect for the D-Backs as when they won the world series. If Jeff and the rest of the Rockies pitching do keep up the same quality as towards the end of last year they surely have to be contenders. However, i feel it will be the D-Backs who will take the title this year with San Diego following them home. I wouldnt be surprised to see the Dodgers not far away also with the fantastic mind of Joe Torre and any of these four teams have the talent to surely do well in representing the NL West in the postseason. San Francisco will do a lot better than last year without the distractions that were evidently a factor last year and if some of their youngsters can step up, they might surprise but i feel that it is not that San Francisco are a bad team so much that the others are very good. I cant finish without recognising the talent on the Rockies offense. If only every team had Tulowitski, Holliday, Helton and Hawpe. I think this is going to be a very good division this year and i wouldnt be surprised whoever wins. Joe Torre would not be happy with fourth again and i think head 2 head games in this division will be crucial as to deciding who wins

1. Arizona Dimondbacks

2. San Diego Padres

3. Colorado Rockies

4. Los Angeles Dodgers

5. San Francisco Giants

On another note, i will be watching my first full game on MLB TV today and i will provide my take on the game later. The game i will be watching is:

LOS ANGELES DODGERS @ ST LOUIS CARDINALS

It should be an interesting game considering that they played last night and the Cards managed to have 2 HR back2back in the first inning and that proved to be the deciding factor. In fact there was no other 1/2 innning that over 1 run was scored in the game.

Until then…

I think i saw…

WILT – Cascada – Everytime we touch

Hiya All. Here, finally, are the western predictions starting with the AL. This could once again be the year of the Angels with some great pitching both in the bullpen and in the rotation + Vlad of course. I predict Oakland will do a lot better this year after last years disappointments. If they can get players healthy, and pitch well, they will surely go close. Texas will again finish bottom, the Mariners may not have the greatest year although you can never tell with the Mariners – i would like to see them win this year:).

1. Los Angeles Angels

2. Oakland Athletics

3. Seattle Mariners

4. Texas Rangers

Until tomorrow…

I think i saw…

WILT – Duffy – Mercy

Finally, the division in which i have spent the majority of my baseball watching time following. It is so often ridiculed for being very weak and an overrated division. The Cardinals, Cubs, Reds, Astros and Brewers are all looking to take the division this year which should make it the most competitive and it could go all the way down to the wire. However, being byast has prevailed as i think the Cardinals could be back to championship winning form this year and i think the Reds may finish as runners up. I think the Brewers and Cubs will fight out for third and i predict the Brewers to win this battle. The Astros wont be too far behind either with the woeful Pirates left to battle with the Orioles for the worst team in baseball – and i even think they wont win that.

1. St Louis Cardinals

2. Cincinatti Reds

3. Milwaukee Brewers

4. Chicago Cubs

5. Houston Astros

6. Pittsburgh Pirates

Until the next post

I think i saw…

WILT – Nickleback – Rockstar

Alright all, its time for the AL central picks. Im making a bold prediction…..Royals will not be bottom. Okay, so maybe not that bold a prediction but anyways. I am hugely impressed with the Tigers organisation and i think they can get it done this year by a long margin. I think they will be the first to wrap up their division. I think the White Sox may be runners up and may take the WC race and the Indians a close up third, the Royals to avoid the wooden spoon at the expense of the Twins.

1. Detroit Tigers

2. Chicago White Sox (WC)

3. Cleveland Indians

4. Kansas City Royals

5. Minnesota Twins

Until next time

I think i saw…

WILT – Kelly Clarkson – Since you been gone