Opening Day

I am so fucking excited for baseball season. Mariners open today, Felix is on the mound against the A's, it doesn't get any better than that. There's also a ton of games on TV through the day; I just caught the 2nd inning of Yankees-Devil Rays. I must admit to having a silly infatuation with the D-Rays; they're everything you want in a bad baseball team. What I like best about them is that they're interesting to watch: young with a bunch of interesting prospects, amazingly athletic. Their lineup is like a roll call of Baseball America top prospect lists through the years: B.J. Upton, Dioner Navarro, Delmon Young, they're packed with young talent. They also have the craziest man in baseball you may not know about: Elijah Dukes. This dude is intense. Big rap sheet, his father is in prison for murder, came from the same high school as Gary Sheffield, Carl Everett, and Dwight Gooden (there must be something in the water there. Something crazy). He's also 6-2, 250 lbs, and athletic enough to play centerfield, which is insane.

In a related note, my baseball viewing season got off to an auspicious beginning. I turned on ESPN, and proceeded to watch Dukes coax a full-count walk against Carl Pavano, one of those little things a baseball fan loves to see, and then B.J. Upton comes up, runners on first and second, two outs. What proceeds to happen was a double whammy of ethic proportions for a Yankee hater: Upton with a ground ball up the middle, past a diving Jeter! (this was not a very hard hit ball, and Jeter couldn't make two full steps to his left. But who am I to argue with his Gold Glove Defense?) Then, Dukes made what should of been a baserunning mistake, trying to go first-to-third on that ball, then hesitating when he rounded second, but he's bailed out by the girly throwing arm of Johnny Damon! Seriously, Damon had a through of about 120 feet, and he three-hopped the ball, and pulled the third baseman twenty feet off the bag; there hasn't been a worse arm in baseball since Otis Nixon. And you know what, this is what baseball is all about: getting enjoyment out of Derek Jeter's lack of range and Johnny Damon's girly throws. Okay, maybe that's not what baseball is all about, but it's a source of entertainment for me. (Cut me some slack, it's opening day and I'm delirious).