Photo Credit: Jeff Roberson/Associated Pres

Today is the day we baseball nuts wait for all winter. The Major League Baseball Season opens up with three games on tap.

At 1:05, the St. Louis Cardinals play the Pittsburgh Pirates at PNC Park with Adam Wainwright taking the mound for the first time since Tommy John surgery. He will go up against Francisco Liriano, who was 12-7 and the ace of the team last season.

In the second game, at 4:05, the Tampa Bay Rays host the Toronto Blue Jays in Tropicana Field. Marcus Stroman, who missed most of last year with a knee injury will take on Chris Archer, who is expected to be the ace of the Rays staff.

The third game, at 8:37, is a replay of last year’s World Series. The New York Mets and their ace, Matt Harvey against the Kansas City Royals and Edinson Volquez. All three games are on National Television. Five of the six teams in the Opening Day Games made it to the Post Season last year, with the Rays the only exception.

There has been a proposal to make Opening Day a National Holiday as a large portion of the American public take the day off anyway to see the spectacle. Whether that happens or not, Opening Day will always mean full houses for all but few teams.

This is the first year in the last seven that I have not been physically present at an Opening Day. Last year, I was in Tampa’s Tropicana Field for Opening Day between the Rays and the Baltimore Orioles. The Orioles won that one 6-2, beating Archer in front of 31,042 fans. The next day, the Orioles won again 6-5 and there were only 13,906 fans present.

The previous year, 2014, we were in Chase Field in Phoenix for the Opener between the Arizona Diamondbacks and eventual World Series winning San Francisco Giants. With 48,541 fans on hand, the Diamondbacks lost the opener 9-8 on a Buster Posey two-run homer in the top of the ninth. The next day, the Giants got off to a 4-0 lead in the first inning against none other than Wade Miley. After giving up the four runs in the first, Miley then shut out the Giants for six more innings as the D’Backs came back to win 5-4.

The crowd that day was only 18,974. Obviously, the magic of Opening Day goes away quickly in some ball parks in different cities. Not everyone can sell out almost every day like the Boston Red Sox do.

If you have never seen an Opening Day, with its pageantry and drama, you are missing something that every baseball fan should experience at least once. There is usually a special event scheduled for that day in every ball park, but watching the introduction of the players and the teams lining up on the base lines to start the season is worth the trip.

Also worth noting: since this is an even numbered year and the San Francisco Giants have won the World Series in the last three even numbered years, fans will be watching them closely. 

By the end of the day on Monday, if the weather is good, every team will have at least one game under its belt. But with 161 more to go, we will be no closer to being able to predict the ultimate winner. At the end, there will be ten teams in the Post Season.

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Photo Credit: Jim McIsaac/Getty Images

While most observers are calling the American League Division races wide open with no clear favorite in any division, the National League East race appears to be easier to predict. Of course, with 162 games ahead of us, anything can and probably will happen to upset anyone’s choices.

From my perspective, the National League East winner will be last year’s National League World Series representative, the New York Mets. 

The Mets announced today that Matt Harvey would miss his last scheduled start of Spring Training on Tuesday and might not be available for opening night against the Kansas City Royals because of an undisclosed medical problem, unrelated to his arm.

The Mets refused comment other than to say that the problem was not related to his Tommy John surgery last year.

Assuming that that Harvey’s problem becomes a non-issue, they have the 26-year-old back. He went 13-8 with a 2.71 ERA last year. The team also boasts Jacob deGrom (27, 14-8, with a 2.54 ERA) and Noah Syndergaard (23, 9-7, with a 3.24 ERA) to top off the top of the rotation. 

New York also has Steven Matz, 24, their only lefty starter,who came up late in the season and won four of six starts with a 2.27 ERA and Zack Wheeler, 25, who is expected to return from Tommy John surgery mid-season. While Wheeler rehabs back, Bartolo Colon, 42, will round out the rotation. He is nearing the end of his career but has done a solid job in the Mets’ rotation the past few seasons.

The Mets were also able to retain free agent Yoenis Cespedes, one of the catalysts in the Mets’ World Series run for at least another year. He will join the ever-reliable Curtis Grandson and the future of the outfield in 23-year-old Michael Conforto. 

As for the infield, Lucas Duda and David Wright will return and start the season at their normal positions. The middle of the infield, which was a weak spot for the Mets last year received a huge upgrade. Over the offseason, the Mets traded for Neil Walker and signed the veteran Asdrubal Cabrera.

Overall, the Mets finished 12^th in baseball in fielding percentage last year and this infield hits with the best of them. There doesn’t seem to be any outliers as far as weaknesses go. 

Behind the plate will be 27-year-old Travis d’Arnaud. While he has struggled with injuries, he is a threat on offense and is among the best hitters on this New York team.

Manager Terry Collins has a young team with plenty of pitching talent and a potent offense that should win the relatively weak National League East.

I have to stick with the Mets to go all the way though, despite the fact that I will be rooting for the Chicago Cubs because I still think that a Red Sox and Cubs series would be a classic, played at Fenway Park and Wrigley Field. It couldn’t get any better than that.

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Photo Credit: Ross D. Franklin/Associated Press

Legendary catcher and broadcaster Joe Garagiola passed away today at the age of 90.

Garagiola, who came from the Hill section of St. Louis to become a Major League catcher like his boyhood and lifetime friend Yogi Berra.

He joins Berra as one of baseball’s most beloved players and characters. Garagiola passed away six months and one day after the passing of his close friend.

I wrote the following column on April 6, 2014, after watching Garagiola honored on Opening Day in Chase Field in Phoenix before the Diamnondbacks opened the season against the San Francisco Giants:

On Opening Day in Phoenix, we had the pleasure of watching Joe Garagiola recognized as the winner of the Buck O’Neil Lifetime Achievement Award. The award, given by the Board of Directors of the Baseball Hall of Fame and Museum, recognizes those who have demonstrated extraordinary efforts to enhance baseball’s positive impact on society. The formal award presentation will be made on Hall of Fame weekend, July 26.

Garagiola was one of the founders of the Baseball Assistance Team (BAT), which is an organization which helps members of the baseball family who have experienced hard times and are in need of assistance.

He is also a founder and driving force in the National Spit Tobacco Education Program, designed to discourage the use of tobacco by youngsters.

Garagiola spent the last fifteen years broadcasting Arizona Diamondbacks baseball. He retired from broadcasting baseball last year at the age of 87 after 58-years behind various mikes.

Other than being a broadcaster, Garagiola had an undistinguished nine-year major league baseball career.

In his nine seasons, he played in only 676 games and had a career batting average of just .257. He was a member of the 1946 World Series Championship St. Louis Cardinals in his rookie year, playing in just 74 games and hitting .239. In his career as a broadcaster, he often poked fun at his baseball career, saying once that he “went through baseball as a ‘player to be named later’.”

It was as a broadcaster that he made himself a household name, however. He started out with Harry Caray doing Cardinal games in 1955. He moved to doing New York Yankee games with Red Barber in 1965 and went to NBC Baseball in 1988, where he worked with both Curt Gowdy and Vin Scully. He received the Ford C. Frick Award in 1991 and is recognized in the Broadcaster’s Wing of the Baseball Hall of Fame.

His career took him to many different broadcasting venues in addition to baseball. He was a regular on the Today Show, an occasional host of the Tonight Show, covered the

Rose Bowl Parade and, in his most unlikely venture, hosted the broadcast of the Westminster Kennel Club Dog Show. There aren’t many baseball people from his era still around and it is nice to see that baseball still appreciates the contributions he and his generation made to the game.

I was fortunate to have been in Chase Field that day. Baseball will miss Joe Garagiola. The two left-handed hitting catchers from the Hill were a great rags-to-riches stories and contributed much to the game.

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Photo Credit: Getty Images

The Boston Red Sox held off a ninth inning rally by the St. Louis Cardinals this afternoon to take a 4-3 win. As we know, these final scores don’t mean a lot, but what happens during Spring Training with individual players is more important than game results.

For both the Sox and the Cardinals, today was a positive day. Clay Buchholz, who has been on the disabled list at least once every year for the last six years, pitched 4 2/3 innings of one run ball against the powerful Red Birds who had most of their regulars in at the start of the game.

Buchholz, despite his injuries, has shown the ability to win and, if healthy, could be a big help as the Sox try to go from Worst-to-First again.

The battle for third base – between Travis Shaw and Pablo Sandoval – which has now been acknowledged by the Sox management, heated up. Shaw went 3-for-4 and Sandoval, in at DH, went 2-for-3.

Shaw is now 18-for-38 or .474 on the Spring while Sandoval is 9-for-31 or .290. Shaw has shown more at third defensively while the Panda has not looked good. If it were not for Sandoval’s big salary, this wouldn’t even be a match.

From the Cardinals point of view, the best catcher in baseball, Yadier Molina, coming back from two surgeries on his left thumb, got his first hit of the year. Adam Wainwright looks to be fully recovered from his Tommy John surgery and ready to go.

The Cards won the Central Division last year with a 100-62 record without Wainwright, who has won 121 and in his career with a 2.98 ERA.

The Cards lost John Lackey and Jason Heyward, but the return of Wainwright and a healthy Molina make them a much stronger team. The question is, do they have enough to hold off Joe Maddon’s Chicago Cubs? It’s going to be an interesting year in the National League Central Division.

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Photo Credit: Mike Carlson

Spring Training games don’t usually mean very much, but Monday night, the New York Yankees beat the Boston Red Sox 6-3. The fact that the Yankees won and the Red Sox lost really meant nothing, but both teams came away with some really good news.

On the Red Sox side, David Price, though by his own admission, didn’t have his best stuff on the mound. But he boasted superb control and good velocity, looking like the ace that he is. He went four innings and gave up just one run and that came on a good pitch.

Aaron Hicks’ homer to right center was down and on the outside of the plate, not a mistake on Price’s part and usually a good pitch. Price is one of the best left-handers in baseball, but this was the first time he had gone four innings and Red Sox fans got a good look at him as their future No.1 starter.

On the Yankee side, Ivan Nova, who came back last year late in the season after Tommy John surgery, went four innings as well, giving up just one run in the first inning. He had good velocity and his control was better than last year. When he and Price left after four, the score was 1-1 and they had both looked ready for regular season.

In Nova’s case, he may very well end up in the regular rotation depending upon what happens with C. C. Sabathia coming back from his personal problems and a horrible 2015 campaign. If Nova can continue to improve on last night’s performance, it will make the Yankees much stronger. Michael Pineda’s tendency to succumb to injury mixed with the possible problems with Masahiro Tanaka’s elbow and Sabathia’s off-the-field problems, Nova could be a real key to the Yankee season.

Both teams, who could fight it out for the American League East title, got good news in Florida last night.

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Photo Credit: Rick Osentoski – USA Today

The Boston Red Sox have had two of the worst finishes in back-to-back seasons, finishing in last place in both 2014 and 2015. The last time the Red Sox finished in last place two years in a row was 1929 and 1930.

According to baseballreference.com, the Red Sox have finished in last place just four times since 1930, once under Bobby Valentine in 2012, once under Butch Hobson in 1992 and twice under John Farrell.

As everyone knows, the Sox were a vastly improved team over the last month and a half of 2015 under Torey Lovullo, who took over when Farrell was diagnosed with and underwent treatment for cancer.

After treatment for his cancer, Farrell was brought back as Manager despite his team’s terrible performance with him managing. Many people, myself included, felt that Farrell would not have been back this year if he had not become ill.

Now, a month before the season is scheduled to start, Farrell is reported to have been in a relationship with a reporter covering his team in what appears to be a clear conflict of interest.

If such a relationship exists or existed, Farrell should be given his walking papers. The Red Sox have bent over backwards for John Farrell and have been more than fair in their treatment of him.

There is a young talented team down there in Fort Myers just waiting to have a great season. They don’t need the distraction this ‘affair’ will generate. It isn’t as if they have to look far for a replacement. The best manager they have had since Terry Francona is sitting right there as the bench coach.

The Sox should take action quickly to get this matter out of the way so Torey Lovullo can get this team on an even keel before the real games begin.

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No matter what you think of Alex Rodriguez, and I am sure that many feel that he should have been banned from baseball, what he did last year is one of the greater comeback stories in the history of baseball. Coming back from a full year away from baseball and a major hip operation, he hit 33 home runs and drove in 86 runs while playing in 151 of his teams 162 games and, along the way, hit his 687th career homer.

The question facing the Yankees at this point is, can he do it again? Sure, 33 homers is a great total and 86 RBI is nothing to sneeze at, particularly in a 40-year-old who missed most of the season in 2013 and all of 2014.

In the first 82 games of the 2015 season, he hit .278 with 18 homers and 51 RBI. In the last 69 games, he hit just .216 with 15 homers and 35 RBI. He averaged just .191 for the months of August, September and October.

According to Baseball Reference, in 2015, he hit only .179 for the year against so called ‘power pitchers’, those with a higher strikeout to walk ratio than the average pitcher. Against so called finesse pitchers, those with a lower strike out ratio, he hit .280. Although, I do not generally put too much stock in these new statistical methods, it would appear that ARod was having trouble catching up with the fast ball last year. Anybody who had seen him in his prime and saw him play more than a few times during the 2015 season could see that he was obviously not the same hitter.

The numbers appear to show a player in decline. However, the numbers from his last few seasons prior to the drug suspension, combined with his loss of time and physical problems, would never have led anyone to believe that he would perform at the level he did last year.

My guess is that anyone who showed the dedication and desire that he emulated last year is capable of producing one more time. If he isn’t, the Yankees had better have a replacement ready. If he is able to produce as he did last year, everybody, Red Sox included, better watch out for those Yankees.

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Photo Credit: Tommy Gilligan-USA TODAY Sports

Pablo Sandoval arrived at the Red Sox Spring Training camp early, talking about what good shape he is in and how he is committed to having a good year. You don’t have to look far to find where his commitment is, it’s hanging over his belt. If anything he is much heavier than he was last year.

His supporters have always marveled at his agility, given his size. I was one of those supporters. However, after the debacle of the 2015 season, when he looked svelt compared to what he looks like now, it’s hard to believe anyone his size can be in shape to play a 162 game Major League baseball season.

The Red Sox have players with the ability to go all the way this year. If Sandoval and the other expensive, yet average, outfielder turned corner infielder, Hanley Ramirez, don’t perform better than they did last year, building this young, talented team was a waste of time.

I understand that the Red Sox have major money tied up in these two and, like most teams, can’t stand to see all that money being spent on players that are sitting on the bench. Whatever happened to the concept of ‘throwing good money after bad’ which is what they will be doing if these two flop again?

With Brock Holt available to play third and Travis Shaw first, why not give them the jobs and let Sandoval and Ramirez earn their old jobs back? In any other business, workers who produced as poorly and were paid as highly as these two did in 2015 would be looking for work.  Unfortunately, the Red Sox are stuck with them.

Maybe the two of them will surprise Red Sox fans and return to their previous form, but I wouldn’t hold your breath waiting for that to happen.  In the meantime, the Sox appear to have the ability to win without them in the lineup.

Why waste a potentially successful season waiting to see if these two can produce?

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I picked up the Boston Globe on Wednesday of this past week. The sports section had eight pages and, in all eight pages, the word baseball never appeared once. The New England Patriots were not even in the Super Bowl.

They even had an article about that 23-year-old juvenile and millionaire, Johnny Manziel. Yet, nothing about baseball.

Do people really care more about a spoiled football player more so than they do about a baseball season which starts with pitchers and catchers reporting to Spring Training in two weeks?

Baseball last year drew 73,760,815 fans to the ball parks and millions more to television and radio. The Los Angeles Dodgers, who have not been in a World Series in 28 years, drew an average of 46,479 fans per game.

For the REAL baseball fan, this is the worst time of the year. Kind of the lull before the storm. Not much news. Most of the free agents have been signed. Not much will happen until the teams get to Florida and Arizona.

The experts are saying the American League is particularly well-balanced this year and that almost any of the fifteen teams could be a winner. Of course, here in New England, we are more interested in the Eastern Division than the rest of the league. I still think that will come down to the New York Yankees against the Boston Red Sox in a really close race.

Some good news and some bad news from the Yankees this past week. The good news is they apparently realize that, although they have possibly the strongest back end of the bullpen in baseball, they still need to strengthen the middle of the pen and are actively pursuing relievers like Carlos Torres formerly of the Mets. If the Yankees have a weak point other than their advanced age and uncertain health, it is the rest of the bullpen.

The bad new is that they have lost Greg Bird, their 24-year-old backup first baseman and possible designated hitter for the season. Bird, who hit .261 with 11 homer runs and 31 RBI last year in just 46 games, has a torn labrum in his right shoulder which will keep him out for the season.

With Mark Teixeira, their regular first baseman turning 36, Bird was expected to get a lot of playing time this year. Teixeira, in addition to his age, has had significant injury problems in recent years, averaging just 93 games per year for the past four years.

Come April both teams will be ready to play and look to capture the American League East.

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Photo Credit: Jim Rogash – Getty Images

It’s that time of the year. It seems like more, but it’s only been 85 days since the Kansas City Royals got five runs in the top of the twelfth inning in Game 5 of the 2015 World Series to go ahead of the New York Mets, 7-2. When Wade Davis then came in to pitch the last of the twelfth and shut down the Mets’ bats, baseball was over until 2016.

That’s not to say that there hasn’t been anything going on in baseball to keep our interest. The Red Sox signed David Price, one of the best left-handed starting pitchers in baseball. The front office traded prospects for one of the best closers in baseball, Craig Kimbrel, and also got Carson Smith from the Seattle Mariners to give their bullpen even more depth. They also signed Free Agent outfielder Chris Young, who is notorious for his success against lefties.

Some Red Sox fans may think that these moves were sufficient enough to make the Sox a pennant winner in 2016. Other fans may wonder why the Sox have not gone after another high profile pitcher or infielder and why they haven’t dumped Hanley Ramirez instead of making him into a first baseman.

I, for one, think that Dave Dombrowski and his brain trust did just what they needed to do. They have a group of young, talented athletes that appeared to be ready to compete.

It’s only 71 days until the Red Sox open their regular season at Cleveland on April 4 and only 38 days until they play their first Spring Training game. Believe it or not, there are only 26 days until pitchers and catchers report to training camp at Jet Blue Park. Then we will begin to find out if this is the beginning of a new dynasty, or if they are not as good as they were at the end of the 2015 season.

I can wait but, just like every baseball fan of every team, it can’t come quick enough for me. Unlike the great Rogers Hornsby who said that in the winter he looks out the window and waits for spring, I look at the calendar and count the days until the games begin.

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