Bet on it

So another Major League Baseball season is a few weeks away. If you're a betting person, you can check MLB odds at BetUS. But I can already tell you who will win this year. The Reds, of course!

I have, as you know, been enjoying warmer weather than most of you for the whole winter, but this past week was really the first week when I felt spring, you know, that deep-in-your-soul kind of rebirth that makes you crave to hear the words "Play Ball!" The season of baseball's beginning is precisely what makes it so different from other sports. We've been frozen all winter, suffering through a colorless void, artificial heat, and static electricity while scraping windshields and suffocating from cabin fever.

But we know all of that is about to end when our bat-wielding heroes go south to scrap off the rust in preparation for another grueling season. It doesn't matter if you're a Yankees fan with perennial hope for a winner or a Pirates fan for whom a winning season has about as much of a chance as peace in the Middle East (it could happen) - just the sight of those shiny new uniforms in Spring Training photos is physically stimulating and mentally warming.

Even with the decade of the aughts being a disaster for the Cincinnati Reds, I can't say it was the same as being a Pirates fan. At least we had good offenses over the decade. At least there was always an outside shot that we could play baseball in October. At least we had a 2004 Sports Illustrated cover. At least we had 2006 when hope survived into September.

BUT.

This year.

2011.

We are expected by many to repeat a division championship!

It has been 7442 days, 15 hours, 3 minutes and 10 seconds at the time of this posting since the Cincinnati Reds last won a World Series. Here's to hoping I can take that countdown off the page come November. Do we have a real shot? You can bet on it.

The R...ed...s...are...o...n...the...ra...di...o...

Wow, was it great to hear Marty's voice on that first day of radio broadcast for 2011. But I only got to hear it after an adventure in what poor internet service can be. I made another MS Paint video to illustrate this adventure. I've enjoyed doing this, and I'm working on another solely baseball-related one. Perhaps I will make this a regular feature throughout the season. (Maybe I'll even get some real software instead of using MS Paint? Software donations?) Even though because I used MS Paint the pictures are pixelated,it is still better viewed with a full screen.




Music is:

ATB First Love
Smetna (from The Bartered Bride)
Beatles Revolution 9
Breeders Cannonball
Clap Your Hands Say Yeah Underwater (You and Me)
John Fogerty Centerfield
Beatles Norwegian Wood

Cross posted on my travel blog, Travellingrox.

[NOTE: Make no mistake, without net neutrality laws, American telecomms companies will be free to turn the American internet into one that resembles the mess Lebanon's is. Support net neutrality.]

Ping! Part 2

A few years ago I attended a University of Maryland baseball game on a day that tried to disguise itself as spring. The grass was green and he sky was blue and the hot chocolate was a light, watery brown. Oh, we all tried to keep up the charade, but by the third inning we had put on our winter costumes and shifted our seats periodically to escape late afternoon shadows.

Today was much warmer than that day, but I still fought a winter breeze while surrounded by snowcapped mountains, determined to keep my sleeves rolled up and remain outside in the sun. Suddenly, I was struck by memories of playing softball in high school, of January gyms, February frosts, March mud, trying to get outside for practice, waiting, waiting, waiting for the good weather, sometimes pretending, the bulk of sweatshirts, the swish of windbreakers, the thud of a pitch in the mud, playing on brown grass.

Ping!

Not quite the crack of the bat, but a batted ball all the same. Sometimes those days don't seem like they really happened, the uniforms, the big yellow school buses with mud caked floors and angry drivers, thrown bats and helmets (yes, that was me), strapping on the shinguards, throwing out baserunners, oh, so much dirt and dust and mud. I've lived double my life since then, skipped much of the last two winters, and haven't played an organized sport since rec league soccer in DC in 2004. But spring, well, spring is always the same wonderful feeling, and every year the sight of Spring Training photos is warmth for the soul.

Thawing

Um...Spring Training...and the Reds come in as...defending NL Central Champs?

Anyone else still feel like it was all a dream?

I had a brief experience with winter a few days ago, that bitter, biting, bonechilling feeling that all who have lived in the Midwest and other wintry places know too well. The temperatures in Beirut are like those in Florida and Arizona at this time of year, but in the Bekaa Valley, sandwiched between snowcapped mountains, a version of winter wraps itself around the towns and villages and fields that sit eagerly waiting to be sown. Yesterday back in Beirut I sat by the sea and read a book trying to recall what bronze skin looked like, but despite having spent winter among palm trees and mild temperatures, I always felt it was winter in that extra-corporal sense. Winter, I think, if you're in a snow-free place, is a state of mind, and that state of mind lacks something: baseball.

I love this tidbit from Hal:

Baker was expansive about a number of subjects on Day One and looked at an Ohio writer with a tan and said, “What’s that, freezer burn?”

One of the many things that makes baseball so awesome is its start at the rebirth of the northern hemisphere when we stop shivering and start wearing fewer layers of clothing. Color starts to sneak back into the world, replacing the browns and grays with a crayola of life. The world is returned to us - no longer are we confined to our cabins waiting for winter to leave. It is going, forced out by the orbit of the Earth, and baseball is holding the door wide open for it.

Boy, this season is going to be fun, isn't it?

Today I wore shorts and a t-shirt for a couple of hours while sitting on the balcony, and there was one magical word to describe the spring air and the brilliant sunshine: baseball. Next up: tan.

HAHAHAHAHAHAHA

HAHAHAHAHAH. HAHAHAHAHA. AHAHHAHAHAHAAH!!!!

Why am I laughing? Because it's 65 degrees here and you're all buried under snow! HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!

I saw a little girl carrying a baseball bat and ball a couple of days ago. The sight of it reminded me that it's almost time! Now that the winter distraction that poses for a sporting event is over, focus will turn to baseball!

March 5 will be the test run to see if I'll actually be able to watch the games, as it is the first televised Spring Training game. Is the timezone in Arizona one or two hours different than in Florida?

Poor Votto

Our Canuck seems pretty down that Canada has been eliminated from the World Baseball Classic. It's the biggest surprise of the tournament thus far. Right now Italia is playing Venezuela and I'm rooting hard for the Euros to beat Team Chavez. It would be nice for a European team to get some recognition to elevate the sport on the continent I wish I called home.

But - back to Joey. He's tasted it, that excitement of high level competition. He played in the best baseball game of his life on Saturday, and he's not going to be able to settle for losing.

I'm starting to really get excited about the 2009 Cincinnati Reds. I was down on them all winter, but, you know, spring, rebirth, all that flowery jazz, the sweet fragrance of freshly mowed grass and the photos of verdant heaven and bare arms in daytime...I can practically hear the crack of the bat.

Soon!
___

Think warm! (It's not working)

It's a bummer that more games aren't on the radio, television, or internet. You would think in this day and age of media orgies that it would be possible to televise every game, even if it just meant sticking a camera behind homeplate and letting it run with only the sounds of the game for audio. Just give us a streaming internet feed or a webcam or something. We're all freezing our butts off and a lot of us are buried under snow (not me thank god) and it would be a sort of mental medicine if we could just get a look at a baseball game and some palm trees.

I'm not feeling all that great today and I was thinking about how there was a case of whooping cough in my six-year old cousin's class and the county health department had to send out letters to the parents of all the kids in the schools warning them about it. I thought pertussis was pretty much a dead disease because of vaccines. Turns out though, that it's making a comeback because kids aren't getting vaccinated as a result of the cost of health care in this country. Some parents simply can't afford it. The pols are right when they say we don't have a health care system in this country; we have a sick care system.

No, I'm not gonna get whooping cough because I had my DTPs all those years ago when medical care was for people instead of profits. But I do start whooping every time the Reds make a baserunning blunder. They've been caught stealing six of ten times this spring and have gotten thrown out trying to take an extra bag several other times. That was already a problem last year when we were actually talking about how we have the worst third base coach in the history of base coaches but now that we have all of these guys who are supposedly fast, Toothpick wants to run even more, which just means we're gonna be running ourselves out of games. That's Havoc!™

With all of these baserunning blunders, maybe it's a good thing we can't see the games.
___

The Reds Are on the Radio!

Finally, another game on the radio, though it's at night. I had a ticket for this game against Boston, but life got in the way and I couldn't go. I'll try not to think about it.

The Reds are 2-1 in Spring Training at this point, but what's 'at this point?' At this point, it's just stretching, right? Warming up the muscles. Spring means nothing. But a lack of meaning doesn't detract from the happiness in hearing "And this one belongs to the Reds" after a game.

Love looking at the AP photos. Nice to see Joe the Player and not Joe the Announcer. Wouldn't it be nice if Jones could give us a year of the Minnesota Twin Jacque Jones and not the Chicago Cub/Florida Marlin/Detroit Tiger Jacque Jones? Imagine if Jones, Chris Dickerson, and Johnny Gomes were duking it out all year long for that leftfield spot, the competition taking their games up to another level? There is a lot of potential on this team. I look at the retreads that had success under Jocketty for the Deadbirds, and I think, hey, guys like Jones, Gomes, Hernandez, and Ward really could help this team. Everything just has to click.

If you do plan on going down to Sarasota, don't buy cheap flip flops made in China. Seriously, don't do it.

WE WIN! WHEEEEEEEE!

Ah, baseball. There's no other sport like it. None in the world. We wallow in the cold and darkness of winter for so long, and then, just a sip, a sip of what's to come, the warmth and light of spring, a meaningless game that means everything.

Oh boy, here we go.

I fight it all the time, the optimism, the inability to be pessimistic even in the face of the most dire of rational predictions. That's baseball. Every year, even though we know we may driving on retreads and bald tires, there's always that phrase in the back of our minds, that campaign slogan of hope, that thing that makes us come back year after year after year no matter what happens: Maybe this is the year.

And sometimes, well, it is.

Eric Davis recently stated that he thinks this team is like the 1990 team. I don't doubt him. I mean, come on. That team had no superstars, just a bunch of guys who clicked, who made it work, who came together and put an improbable run together that lasted all the way to the end. Of course, future Hall of Famer Barry Larkin was on that team. But he was only in his third full season, and let's face it, he wasn't our "favorite Reds player ever" back then. He was just starting out.

Oh man, I am so excited for this season to start. On paper, we don't measure up to other teams, do we? But this is baseball. You can eat your paper halfway through the season.

Shoot, so many ifs...but sometimes ifs just work, sometimes ifs become whens and dids.

Maybe this year...
___

Fun with Spring Training photos

Michael E. Keating at the Enquirer has been posting his photos from Sarasota on the Cincinnati.com website (although they're really tough to find). I spiced them a little.

I thought it was mean that Norris Hopper drove his truck over Yonder Alonso's new Corvette.

I can see the ground

This is the first day I’ve really felt like spring is coming. The snow is gone in places where there were no drifts. The air has been warmer for three days in a row. The sun is out at dinner time. And ballplayers are starting to pack their bags for next weekend.

It’s about this time when you realize how long is the off season. It may seem like the season is long, especially when your team stinks, but the off season is, well, an eternity. Just think of all of the things one must suffer without baseball – cold, darkness, grayness, barren trees, high heating bills, cabin fever, icy roads, scraping windshields, empty washer fluid, getting out of shape, pre-Oscar movies, the excesses of Christmas, f00t-b@ll season, squeaky basketball shoes, hockey at Wrigley Field, bad free agent signings, worse trades…about the only good thing about the off season is that we don’t have to listen to Joe Morgan or Tim McCarver or Clownboy.

Right now, us baseball fans are sipping through a chewed up straw to get any drip of baseball that may be there at the bottom of the cup we found in the gutter of winter. Playing Bull Durham. Reading The Natural. Watching old games we’ve already seen and already know the outcome. Checking every website that may have any word about our teams. We know it’s coming. It’s like Christmas Eve that lasts two months. Saturday is like the start of Advent. By the time our Holy Opening Day comes around, we’ve been starving for so long that one sip of real baseball makes us drunk.

Won’t be too much longer now.
___

Life Lessons from Spring Training

A guide for newbies:

1. If you’ve never been to Florida and you’ve haven’t been out in the sun all winter, even if you normally tan well, don’t overdo the sun. Your face may just swell up like a balloon – on the right side if you were sitting on the third base line at Joker Marchant Stadium in Lakeland. Use ibuprofen for the swelling. Afterwards, your face will fall off, but at least it never hurt.

2. Don’t buy the Cincinnati Reds American Lager. It is an amber made by Crudweiser and costs twice as much.

3. Don’t bother bringing lots of stuff for autographs. Despite the fact that signing is a part of the game, most of the players think they’re too good for us common folk to acknowledge our existence. Retired players and Brandon Phillips are exceptions. Then again, if I had to deal with people like that woman who kept screaming “I’m gonna tell your mother!” at Adam Dunn when he didn’t look at the crowd, I might not look at the crowd either. (Eric Davis actually came over to her and told her to tone it down.)

4. When collecting sea shells, make sure you aren’t picking up living things. Like five baby clams, some scallops, a small octopus, a few cowries, and some sort of sea worm. They end up stinking when they die.

5. Remember it’s still winter, even if it is called “Spring” Training. Nothing like wearing a sweatshirt on your only full day at the beach. The water off Siesta Key was warmer than the air, which had gale force winds that aroused the sand to sting your legs. Make sure you bring long pants and a jacket, especially to games when it looks like it could rain.

6. Don’t expect it to be like a real game. I was amazed at how many people got upset when the starters came out in the third and fourth innings. But those were the younger touristy folks – the old folks know how to watch a baseball game, and there were a lot of them. There was none of that getting up and down during innings, no whining children with parents who won’t tell their kids to sit in their seats, and not a lot of cell phones or drunk people. There were also no gimmicks or videos or 500 mascots with their big heads blocking the view as they roam the stands. While I appreciated all of this immensely, I couldn’t help but feel a sense of loss knowing that once the season begins, so will these annoyances.

7. Don’t ever assume a pop up is going to stay in play. I waited a split second too long as I sat in disbelief that a foul ball was blowing my way and missed the catch, only to turn around and grab it on the carom. Second foul ball I’ve gotten in my life. But man, is it tough to catch those high pops when the wind is whipping around the stadium. I’ve never seen a ball blow like that.

8. Read Ernest Hemingway while you’re down there. It makes the whole Florida experience come to life. You can almost pretend that Sarasota isn’t one continuous strip mall with a few retirement trailer parks and a couple of golf courses stuck in between and beaches full of drunken college students.

9. Don’t get to the ballpark four hours before game time. The minor leaguers don’t start their drills until 10am, and watching their drills gets old real quick.

10. Don’t get too depressed when you step outside the airport as you make your way home and you see the ground covered with several inches of snow, ensuring a quick loss of your tan over the next few days.

11. Have fun!

Sarasota in brief

The game was called after four and a half innings, so yeah, it rained. But it was 76 degrees. The PA announcer tried to cheer us up by telling us it was 30 degrees in Cleveland and 34 in Cincinnati. It worked. I'd much rather be getting rained on in a ballpark than getting snowed on somewhere else!

I have traveled to five continents, thirty-something countries, and thirty-two states in the US, but this is the first time I've ever been to Florida. My impression of Florida was that the only people who languished here were old people and tourists. I laughed as we got behind two seniors who were barely moving up the ramp as we disembarked the plane, my first experience on Florida soil backing up my idea, which hasn't left me since. The game yesterday was full of retirees, retirees who knew how to sit and watch a baseball game. There wasn't all of that getting up and down during innings or talking on cell phones or screaming, writhing children who get everything they want and spend more time on the playground than they do in their seats. It was enjoyable to be there, watching a baseball game surrounded by others who were watching a baseball game and who wanted to watch a baseball game.

Ed Smith feels like a minor league stadium with Little League fields behind it. It was full yesterday - there were rumors of a sellout but there were still a few seats around. Once the rains came, there were plenty of seats.

We arrived at the complex early to check out the happenings. The minor league pitchers and catchers were there for their first day of practice. The only names on the backs of shirts that I knew were Viola, Klinker, and 2007 number one draft pick Mesorosco. I watched him hit a bit before I abandoned him for the "real Reds" who had come out to take BP.

I've taken plenty of photos, but we're getting ready to head over to Lakeland to see the Tigers take on the Phillies so I'll have to post them later along with a full description of yesterday's baseball experience. The Reds are down in sold-out Fort Myers today to take on the Red Sox. It's beautiful right now, sun is shining, weather is sweet. The sun that hid from us yesterday is sure to sting us with redness today.
___

I wore shorts, a t-shirt, and flip flops

Enjoying your snow and ice up there in the North??? :)

Saw Ed Smith Stadium today but arrived in Sarasota much too late to visit or to go to the beach. But man, is it awesome to be wearing summer clothing...it was 83 degrees today! Can't wait for the game tomorrow! I hope Corey Patterson breaks his leg!

STUPID WAYNE! STUPID, STUPID, STUPID. PUT YOUR BEST TEAM ON THE FIELD!!!!!!!! COREY PATTERSON IS NOT ON THE BEST TEAM!!!!!! STUPID, STUPID, STUPID.

Man, does this stupid signing piss me and Reds country off. I was willing to give Dusty Baker the benefit of the doubt. This puts me over the edge. Should I go to the ballpark tomorrow with a FIRE DUSTY sign already? (And yeah, Wayne only signed him because Dusty told him to.)
___

Thinking back...

Do you think that if you imagine hard enough, you can't transplant yourself someplace? I mean, I could almost feel the warm Florida air while listening to today's game, at least until Gary Majewski came in to pitch. That always makes my stomach turn.

I was sitting in a place with five Reds pictures hanging in it. One is a treasure, a photo of the Big Eight sitting on a tractor with the words "big red machine" on it. It is signed by all of them. To the left of it is a picture of Rose - it isn't labled, but I'm sure it is number 4192. Bruce Bochy is catching and everyone at Riverfront is standing, even the Reds in the dugout. Next to it is a photo of Bench tagging out Willie Stargell at home. On the other side of the autographed photo is the picture of the Big Red Machine celebrating on the mound after winning a World Series. At the far end is a photo of some players standing on a baseline during the national anthem.

I think about the guys we have now, the younger guys like Dunn, Phillips, Bruce, Votto, Encarnacion, Bailey, Cueto, Volquez, Burton, Roenicke and wonder, can the Reds ever come close to that again? Can the Reds field a team whose starting lineup included three Hall of Famers and two more who should be in the Hall?

I'm only sad that I missed all the glory. I was born too late.

Grapefruits are better than cactuses

I've never looked so forward to a Monday in my life.

I suppose Monday isn't going to be so pleasant, what with the plane trip to Sarasota and all. I hate flying. I hate flying more than anything I've ever experienced. And I love baseball to that extreme, so I'm going from one to the other almost immediately.

Not having subscribed to MLB.TV and Gameday Audio yet, as I don't know if I'll be in Cincy for the season or not and don't want to waste money on it if the Reds games will be blacked out, I had to rely on telepathy to figure out how today's game went. I hate not being able to listen to the games. Some things that happened:

Scott Sauerbeck, a Miami grad, was awful, walking 4 and giving up two hits in 1 inning, which led to 3 runs, 2 of them earned. Fortunately for the Reds, we have a guy named Jay Bruce to start an eighth inning rally. Bruce led off the bottom of the 8th with a single. Freel followed with a walk, which, contrary to the rather loud and archaic opinion of one Dusty Baker, is just as good as a single. Reds ended up tying it up but Tom Shearn gave up a run in the ninth and took the loss, dropping the Reds to 1-2 in fruity league play.

Homer was a bit wild in the first but got out of it and pitched a perfect second.

Drew Anderson had two hits. Don't worry, his full name is not Andrew Anderson. Just Drew. He's number 83.

FROPPER WATCH: Hopper was 0-1 but had a sacrifice fly. Freel was 0-1 with a walk and a run scored. FUTURE HALL OF FAMER JAY BRUCE was 1-2 with a run scored. I guess it was an equal day for the centerfield competitors. GRAPEFRUIT LEAGUE TOTALS: FROPPER - 1-11 with 1 BB, 1 R, and 1 RBI. BRUCE - 4-7 with 1 R.

MAJEWSKI WATCH: Did not pitch, ERA still 162.00. But Scott Sauerbeck did his best Majewski impression.

TODAY'S QUESTION FOR DUSTY: Shouldn't Jay Bruce be starting so he can face the MLB pitchers and prove that he should be starting on our holy Opening Day?

Tomorrow the game's on the radio. My ears will be there.

And yes, I know the plural form of cactus is cacti. So what?

...and this one belongs to the Reds!

Reds defeat the Twinkies 6-1.

Who is this Lincoln fellow?

Even the most devout followers among us sometimes have to ask "Who the heck is that?" when we see the box scores or hear the name announced on the radio. Yesterday, I had to ask who Andy Green was. (He's a guy who killed the Pacific Coast League in 2005 but ended up getting sold to Japan last year.) Today I looked at the box and saw old Abe's name down at the bottom of the list of pitchers, so I looked him up. Turns out his name's not Abe, it's Mike. He last pitched anywhere in 2004 for the Deadbirds. He came up in 1999 as a starter for the Twinkies and found himself pitching in relief for the Sea Thiefs in 2001, where he posted a 2.68 ERA in 40.1 innings. In 2002 his ERA rose to a still respectable 3.11 ERA in 70.1 innings, but the bottom fell out after that. He had right elbow surgery in 2005.

Imagine being a kid, dreaming of pitching in the big leagues, working your butt off, starring in high school and getting drafted. Imagine the thrill of putting your ink on that first contract. Imagine working your way up through the minors, toiling on bumpy fields, riding beat up buses across endless acres of cornfields, talking to the guys who've been to The Show with a glimmer in your eyes. Think about the feeling you'd have when you finally put on a Major League uniform for the first time, stepping onto the greenest, softest grass you've ever had the pleasure of feeling. Finally, you get your chance to play, and you have some success at it.

Then your arm falls off.

I don't know who Mike Lincoln is. He may be a jerk for all I know. But there's always a soft spot in my hardened heart for people who have bad breaks like that. I hope someday he is able to pitch in the Majors again. Just not for the 2008 Reds.

FROPPER WATCH: Freel and Hopper went a combined 1-4 today (Freel got the hit). Bruce had his second hit today. That brings them to FROPPER 1-8 and BRUCE 2-4.

MAJEWSKI WATCH: Majewski did not pitch, ERA still 162.00.

Good news. I finally got my laptop back from the shop, though in a vastly different form. Gone is my Photoshop. Gone also is my corporate security with a lifetime of updates. But my music was saved, hallelujah. It's probably what crashed my system in the first place since it takes up about a fourth of my used disk space. But I blabber. My point is that I will be able to write my reports from Spring Training next week! Yay! And you better believe I'm going to rub it in when I'm sitting in 75 degrees while y'all are freezing your butts off beneath an avalanche of snow and ice! :)

Majewski still stinks, but...

it was awesome to hear live baseball today, the sound of Marty's voice, the announcement of players names, all of it over the old radio waves.

I woke up this morning to blindness from light bouncing off the snow and through my window thinking I just didn't want to face another winter day. Then I remembered the first Spring Training game would be broadcast and hopped right out of bed.

Some thoughts I had during the game (and yes, I know the first Spring Training game means absolutely nothing):

Start Jay Bruce. Start him on Opening Day, and IF he isn't ready, send him down later. But why on Earth would you NOT put your best team on the field? Forget about arbitration clocks. (Bruce had one of the team's two hits. Freel struck out twice and Hopper was 0-2, so it's Bruce 1-2 and Fropper 0-4.) We're trying to win THIS year. PUT THE BEST TEAM ON THE FIELD.

MAJEWSKI ERA WATCH: 162.00 I know, I know. It's the first Spring Training game. But this guy should have been working his butt off over the winter and if he didn't and that's why he was lit up, then he's in the wrong and if he did and still was lit up, well, give him a couple more chances in early spring and then just get rid of him.

Did I mention how exciting it was to listen to live baseball, to feel the game and spring deep in the soul, even as snow flurries float from the gray skies to the blankness that lays across the Ohio landscape?

Jeremy Affeldt. Five ground ball outs in two innings? Very good for GABP. If only he could do that all year. Nice to see some good pitching there, and he pitched against what was pretty much the Phillies' Opening Day lineup. I sure hope we get our three million dollars' worth.

BASEBALL!

Chris Dickerson. I haven't liked that guy since he (could have been someone posing as him, I guess) wrote a nasty comment on my blog when I said he'd never be more than a fourth outfielder. With Bruce and Stubbs, I don't see any future for him with the Reds, especially with a glaring deficiency in his game. I guess I'm just wondering why he's considered a prospect when he has such a fatal flaw.

Todd Coffey. This slimmer version of The Toad better prove me wrong, because right now I'm not feeling much love for the guy. Thing is, it seems to me he really works hard, so maybe he'll get it together. I'd like to see a bullpen of Cordero (9th), Burton (8th), Weathers (7th), Bray(7th) , Affeldt (6th and long), Fogg (6th and long), and Belisle (6th and long) with a rotation of Harang, Arroyo, Bailey, Cueto, and Voloquez. That, I know, won't happen (at least not this year), but us dreamers can dream loudly, can't we? And hey, if Coffey can finally start mixing pitches and make use of that good stuff he supposedly has, by all means, put him in the pen. Regardless, it's so nice to see that we have some options this year!

It's funny listening to Spring Training games when the game is winding down and you don't know which team is batting and which team is in the field because you don't recognize the names.

PUT THE BEST TEAM ON THE FIELD! BEST TEAM. BEST. JAY BRUCE.

WOOHOO, IT'S BASEBALL!

Wednesday

I'm starting to get excited like a child on Christmas. Oooh...I can't wait to turn on the radio on Wednesday and hear Marty's voice!

Apparently Affeldt gets the start. Logical, considering he is battling for a spot in the rotation. I'm rooting for a rotation of Harang, Arroyo, Bailey, Cueto, and Voloquez, but I do realize it is farfetched for this early in the year. But hey, the future is bright!

My crisis of faith I was having last week has been assuaged. I am brimming with optimism, an optimism driven by my half-packed bags and the enthusiasm I am feeling for the glimpse of the 2008 season I get to see next week in one of 19 states I have never set foot in while traversing from sea to shining sea over my 31 years.

Two more baseballless days...

A crisis in faith

More snow.

I'm not made for this. I was born on a beach in Oceanside, California. I saw my first Reds game at age one in Jack Murphy Stadium. I hate snow. I have no patience. I worry too much.

I worry about the Reds rotation. I worry about the bullpen. I worry that we'll keep three catchers, that Juan Castro will make the team, that the young guys will be benched for older, suckier veterans. I worry we'll trade for some hasbeen or neverwas "leadoff" hitter. I worry our homegrown talent - Homer Bailey and Johnny Cueto - will be traded and our twenty year drought of homegrown pitching will continue. I worry Jay Bruce won't get a fair shot at playing center. I worry that Toothpick's ego will cast long, blinding shadows over the field.

In both 2006 and 2007, I had high hopes for my team. In the former year, we were eliminated in the last weekend of the season, thanks to the offense shutting down after a quarter of it was traded away. Last year was a disaster, thanks to the bullpen. This year, though my optimism is still on the radar, I feel anxiety more than excitement. Guess the heart can only break so many times.

We love baseball because it is a game of rebirth. Every year when it's still light at 7pm and buds begin to appear on shivering trees, a new season begins. None of us, even those who are Devil Rays fans, doesn't think to himself, "This could be the year," even if we wouldn't say it aloud for fear of being mocked by others (who also secretly harbor the same feelings.)

I want to believe. But old schoolers control the question marks and dangle strange, frightening quotes in front of the Cincinnati media. It has to be tough for the members of the Reds front office with New Media breathing down their necks, when bored, office types are connected to the internet 24/7, when Average Joe and Jane have access to such a wealth of information that he and she know as much about the game as those who run it. But the oldies need to adjust or die out, just as they should in politics (if only people would stop electing the same failed political dinosaurs who continue to keep this broken system broken.) A lot of the quotes in the media from Dusty and Wayne and Daugherty and a few others seem to be coming from the history books. The dinosaurs died out because they couldn't adapt to change. Or a large meteorite crashed to Earth and destroyed them. Or they froze to death, which given today's weather is quite easy to imagine.

Give us a sign that it's not going to be more of the same old, same old. Remember when Jerry Morron pinch hit Juan Castro for Josh Hamilton? Toothpick said Jeff Keppinger would be third - yes, THIRD - on the depth chart behind Gonzalez and JUAN "HANDS OF LEAD AND BAT OF FOAM" CASTRO. Might as well let Fidel come to bat. He's not doing much these days, anyway.

Put the best team on the field, Reds. Forget that veteran stuff, that sitting young guys on the bench or burying them in the minors so you don't start their arbitration clocks garbage. Jay Bruce is better than Ryan Freel and Norris Hopper combined. Joey Votto is the future, not Scott Hatteberg. Homer Bailey, Johnny Cueto, Edinson Voloquez, and Matt Maloney are the future of a killer rotation, not Josh Fogg and Jeremy Affeldt. Juan Castro has no business being on a Major League roster, especially one that contains two super utility guys in Freel and Jeff Keppinger. And we sure as heck don't need three catchers. We tried that before and it failed miserably. Twice. Fool me once...

I'm tired of losing, tired of disappointment. I want to believe. But old school doesn't cut it in the new school world. You have to have a mix of both. Sure, the little things are important. You have to hit the cutoff man. You have to be able to judge fly balls. You have to get to third on a fly ball hit to right if you're standing on second base with less than two outs. But you can't ignore the numbers.

A glimmer of hope sparked a semi-smile on my face.

Manager Dusty Baker doesn’t necessarily think the Reds need to go slowly with Jay Bruce, even though Bruce is only 20 years old.

“Who says they need to be eased in, No. 1?” Baker said. “I wasn’t eased in. Junior (Griffey) wasn’t eased in. A whole bunch of guys weren’t eased in.

Ahh...a glimmer, a spot of light and warmth in the winter of my heart...perhaps the baseball gods have not abandoned me after all.

Is it March 3 yet? I envy those in Florida right now!