The greenest grass and the bluest skies you've ever seen.

"You know that when you win the first one, you can't lose 'em all." - Earl Wynn

"Ray, people will come Ray. They'll come to Iowa for reasons they can't even fathom. They'll turn up your driveway not knowing for sure why they're doing it. They'll arrive at your door as innocent as children, longing for the past. Of course, we won't mind if you look around, you'll say. It's only $20 per person. They'll pass over the money without even thinking about it: for it is money they have and peace they lack. And they'll walk out to the bleachers; sit in shirtsleeves on a perfect afternoon. They'll find they have reserved seats somewhere along one of the baselines, where they sat when they were children and cheered their heroes. And they'll watch the game and it'll be as if they dipped themselves in magic waters. The memories will be so thick they'll have to brush them away from their faces. People will come Ray. The one constant through all the years, Ray, has been baseball. America has rolled by like an army of steamrollers. It has been erased like a blackboard, rebuilt and erased again. But baseball has marked the time. This field, this game: it's a part of our past, Ray. It reminds of us of all that once was good and it could be again. Oh... people will come Ray. People will most definitely come." -James Earl Jones in Field of Dreams

The day has finally arrived. That void in a baseball fan's heart is about to be filled once again. The dreaded dead period from the moment the Super Bowl ends until MLB Opening Day has been survived another year. There is once again reason for hope. The popcorn poppers, cotton candy makers and hot dog cookers are being fired up. The mound is being adjusted for the home pitcher, either beating it down or building it up to his advantage. The bases are being securely placed in the basepath. The players are getting their lockers perfect with their good luck trinkets and lists of their goals for the year. Tailgaters are firing up their grills, many skipping work to take part in the tradition of Opening Day. The ushers are reacquainting themselves with their familiar section. The fighter jets are preparing for their flyovers. Even the mascots have their butterflies.

Opening day represents one of the greatest days of the year for baseball fans all around the country. It represents hope. Hope for a playoff birth, for a chance at glory, for a turnaround season. Every fan of every team, from the Royals to the Yankees, enters opening day with thoughts of October dancing in their heads. Writer Thomas Boswell even wrote a book about it, Why Time Begins on Opening Day, a great read for any devout baseball fan.

While opening day victories usually don't mean much as a forecast for how a team will perform throughout the season, the excitement and aura of the baseball diamond cannot be downplayed on this day of days. So take a sick day this Monday, tell your wife you'll mow the lawn or clean out the garage tomorrow, grab a 6-pack, sit in the easy chair and soak up the magic of Opening Day. Because on Tuesday, you might just be another Pittsburg/Kansas City/Tampa Bay/Florida fan talking about next season.

Sweet 16 preview

With the Sweet 16 kicking off tonight, lets take a look at the matchups.

West Virginia vs Xavier

Everyone keeps talking about Bob Huggins and his sharpshooting squad and how they will lead him to victory in this game. But no one wants to admit that Xavier's 3-point % is 39.1. WVU's is 35.9. Argument over. Xavier was picked to fall early by many people who watched the chaotic Georgia Bulldog team run through the SEC. Xavier has a legit shot at the Final Four. West Virginia may just be playing out of their league.

Elite Eight: Xavier

North Carolina vs Washington State

Not much to say or debate here. UNC could beat any team in the country the way they are playing right now. The Tarheels are averaging 22 more points a game than Wash St, and I don't think that the Cougars will have the legs to keep up. This one could be a laugher.

Elite Eight: UNC

UCLA vs Western Kentucky

All Cinderellas fall sometime, and this will be the end of Western Kentucky's run. Yes, UCLA squeaked by Texas A&M, but tonight they will dominate the boards and keep the score low. WKU plays a fast-paced game with high scores and UCLA will be looking to disrupt the flow of the WKU team. Plus, UCLA seems to have the officials under some kind of control, as the end of their games recently seem to have some very suspect calls and non-calls.

Elite Eight: UCLA


Tennessee vs Louisville

This will be undoubtedly the best game of the night. It's a shame that it starts the latest so there won't be as big an audience. The X-factor in this game will be Chris Lofton. He hasn't been his usual electric self in the tournament and if he doesn't turn it on against a grooving Louisville team tonight, then the Vols may see their run come to an end. The teams are very evenly matched, with a defensive edge to Louisville.

Elite Eight: Louisville

A few observations...

The Sox split the series with the A's this morning in a 5-1 loss that saw the team unable to overcome many of the same problems that were apparent yesterday. But why not start on the positive first:

The Good

Manny Ramirez appears to have completely skipped his annual slow start to the season. It's a wonder what showing up on time for Spring Training can do for a player! Even more so what working out hard in the offseason can do for a player! There is no doubt in my mind that despite how aloof Manny seems, he knew coming into this season that he could be playing for a new contract. Why else would he randomly hire Scott Boras with two team options left on his contract? Regardless of all of this, Manny appears to be in mid-season form, as he admired a home run this morning to deep left-centerfield. I am also wondering if Manny is attempting to one-up Barry Bonds, who is infamous for his slow exit from the batters box and even slower trot around the bases. Humorous? Kind of. Dangerous? Yes. Manny isn't going to get away with this kind of showboating all season and eventually he's going to take a ball in the ear.

The Bad

David Ortiz appears to be willing to swing at anything and everything a pitcher throws at him so far this season. The usually very disciplined Ortiz is off on his timing and doesn't seem to be seeing the ball very well. When he misses the ball, he's missing badly and when he makes contact, he's getting under the ball. He hasn't made solid contact yet in the two games to start the season. This is an even bigger concern seeing as how he doesn't get to go out and field a position where he can forget about his last at bat. He has to sit in the dugout and pine over what happened out there at home plate. Even worse, now he has an 18 hour trip back to America where he can think at length about his play on the field. I worry that Papi could be putting himself into a slump already this season. Hopefully, a few exhibition games before the next Opening Day (Monday) will do him some good.

The Disconcerting

In two games this season the Red Sox bullpen has pitched 10 innings. The starters have pitched 9 innings. That is not a very good ratio to start the season. For a team that entered spring training as being heralded for their deep starting pitching, fans have yet to see the rotation live up to the hype. The bullpen simply cannot be worn down this early in the season. The hype has slowly withered away since camp began, with Beckett hitting the 15-day DL, Schilling on the shelf until July and Wunderkid Clay Buchholz having a terrible showing in his spring training starts. Add in Matsuzaka's shaky two innings yesterday and Lester's inability to go more than 4 innings today and there are plenty of potential problems ahead. With that said, the bullpen has looked sharp, which is always comforting.

Final note...

Two days in a row now, Keith Foulke has cut through the heart of the Red Sox lineup like a buzzsaw. Twice striking out red-hot Manny Ramirez and never surrendering a run. Octavio Dotel couldn't even get Brandon Moss (who?) out. Though it may be too soon to say, Foulke appears to have revitalized himself and primed himself for a second wind in his career. Dotel should already feel Foulkey breathing down his neck ...

Has Manny left home plate yet?

See the image above? Manny held that pose for a good two minutes before he realized that his shot was not going to be exiting the confines of the playing field. Watching Manny slide desperately into second base after crushing a ball to dead centerfield confirmed to me that this is not going to be a repeat of 2005. This team is full of energy and entertainment.

Before this game, did anyone outside the Boston area know who Brandon Moss was? Doubt it. It was the strangest way to open a season that I have ever witnessed. A day after J.D. Drew says he wants to prove to Boston fans that he's a gamer and he's not fragile, he pulls himself from opening day. Didn't he just hit a pair of homers a few days earlier? As far as I'm concerned, Drew is stuck in fan purgatory right now, with a decision to be determined with time.

Some may be disconcerted with the way that Matsuzaka pitched to begin the game, but you have to consider the enormous amount of pressure he had on his back. His first return to Japan since leaving there with a complete game and 14 Ks in his final start. Expectations from his native country were likely unrealistic and inflated. Matsuzaka is easily Japan's proudest son and prodigy. He somehow surpassed Ichiro in popularity, despite the lack of Cy Youngs or MVP awards ... then again, Ichiro didn't win a World Series in his first year of American ball and hasn't won one yet. Dice-K recovered well from his first two innings of erratic play and went on to strike out 6 in 5 innings, keeping it close enough that the bullpen could take over.

This game also saw the return of Keith Foulke to the Majors from his short retirement. I can only hope that should Foulke pitch in front of a Fenway crowd this season that he receive a standing ovation. Lest Red Sox fans forget that Foulke pretty much sacrificed his arm and remainder of his career for that 2004 World Series ring. He pitched 97 innings in 2004, including 14 of those in the postseason alone. During that memorable postseason, he put up a microscopic 0.64 ERA, allowing one run and striking out 19 batters. Show some respect Dirt Dog fans.

So back to Manny Ramirez. The guy picked up 4 RBIs on opening day. I'm sure in his office on the corner of Hell Street and Demon Way, recently hired Scott Boras had a gigantic sneer on his face. So the A's decided to walk Ortiz, who went 0-4 and looked uncomfortable all day, for the man who struck with a 2 RBI double a few innings earlier. This is not the same Manny as last season. This is contract year Manny, and if the Sox are smart, they'll exercise those two options for 2009 and 2010. After that, Manny will be 37 and likely on the decline and the Red Sox can either sign him to a one or two year contract, or he'll just hang it up. He never seemed all that interested in baseball anyways. He did win 1,000,000 yen (about $10,000) for his efforts in today's game though.

And as for why Manny may have been confused as to why his double wasn't a homer?:

“Maybe if I used my American bat that ball maybe would have gone,” he said. “I thought I hit it good. I couldn’t use my bat because it wasn’t legal. Thank God I got some Japanese wood that I could use.”

They must make wood different over in Japan. I think I'm going to like Contract-Year Manny.

Tampa "Upset City" Bay

Thank God that we have the amazing Sienna-Villanova matchup to analyze coming up in the second round! It was a very strange day in the NCAA tournament, a record-breaking day, in fact. Never have four lower seeds beaten four higher seed the same day in the same location.

I have to admit, I wasn't surprised to see Drake fall to Western Kentucky. Drake had not made the tournament since 1971 and had never won a tournament game. I did not think that their season warranted a 5 seed. The game yielded the tournament's most exciting moment so far, as Ty Rogers hit the game-winning 26-foot trey as time expired. WKU is officially my favorite Cinderella in the tournament. I think their momentum will carry them past San Diego, but they will hit the wall against UCLA.

UCONN was a bit of a shocker. The Huskies had some bad losses this season (Providence, TWICE!), but San Diego should not have been able to handle a team with the size that UCONN has so easily. I blame this one on Jim Calhoun. Though UCONN is a media darling and probably overrated this season, Calhoun did not have his team prepared for the small guard play of San Diego.

Siena defeating Vanderbilt was puzzling as well. Vandy was arguably the best team in the SEC behind Tennessee this season and they lost UGLY tonight. Losing by more than 20 points to a relatively under-the-radar Siena team (they had the same record as Rider in the MAAC) is unacceptable. Vanderbilt laid a huge egg today, shooting 41% to Sienna's 56%. This loss could sit for a looong time in Commodore-land.

Lastly, we have Villanova knocking off Clemson. The same Clemson that almost beat UNC allowed Villanova to shoot back into the game after leading handily in the first half. Nova went 6-8 down the stretch to end the regular season and did not particularly shine at any time this year. Clemson no doubt will be a bracket buster for many people, some of whom had them all the way to the Elite 8 or even Final Four.

Here's predictions for Saturday's games:
Wisconsin over Kansas State in a very close game.
Washington State over Notre Dame
Stanford over Marquette
Xavier over Purdue
UCLA over Texas A&M
Kansas over UNLV
Duke over WVU
Pitt over Michigan State