All hail Helen!!

All hail Helen!!
Helen Carmona and your humble blogger

Friday, March 14, 2008

Woof! Woof!

My second helping of crow in 24 hours....

I had to laugh when I heard David Cone say on the air that these were "the dog days" of spring training, just before the Yankees played a game the other day. (For the record, Cone's voice usually makes me wince, so I should rejoice at any moment where he makes me giggle.) But dog days? During spring training? Give me a break....

But now I think Cone may have been on to something. I've mentioned in previous posts how life may have been better before every spring game was made available via cable television, which invited every amateur analyst with a keyboard to start hacking out instant copy detailing the euphoria, or the panic, that followed these premature demonstrations of what may or may not lay ahead for the season. Now that I've entered the blogging fray, and every day brings with it a new sense of anxiety over getting up-to-date posts on the site as quickly as possible..... I know what Cone meant.

These are, after all, just spring games. And some outings, like today's Phil Hughes start against a split Cincinnati squad, just don't ignite the fire. Certainly, we'd all like for something momentous to happen. (And anyone who says the recent dust-ups with Tampa weren't fun is lying.) But when nothing of consequence occurs, what's a blogger to do?

Derek Jeter told YES Network's Michael Kay (according to a Kay remark on the air last week) that he felt spring training was about ten days too long. Again, I laughed a bit, remembering that I heard the same claims from NFL players who bitched about training camp schedules. (I laughed then, as well, until I learned that the NFL used to play six -- frigging six! -- preseason games. That seems unduly harsh.) And now I think Jeter may have a point. Pitchers, certainly, need the time to build up shoulder endurance, but do we need thirty spring games?

Maybe the players really do need that many games, and maybe Jeter and Cone are just whiny, bitchy, over-paid jocks who'd rather be in Costa Rica promising one-day dream contracts to Hollywood stars than working (not quite) like dogs in the heat and humidity of coastal Florida. (I don't really think they are whiny or bitchy....) But trying to find something compelling in every spring training game, I feel a little bit of their pain.

Of course, Jeter could just quit if the games are that big of a drag, and I could just walk away from the computer. I'm not sure why he stays ($$$$ cha-ching! $$$$), but I just couldn't do without seeing the daily, obligatory YES close-up of Goose Gossage's moustache.

Can we give that thing a one-day contract? If Billy Crystal can foul off a pitch, then Goose's 'stache might actually have a chance to get on base.

0 comments: