Thursday, May 22, 2008

The season is finally here

Well, sorry for the lack of posts during the spring training period for the Silver Sox. Unfortunately, with the season starting earlier at Peccole than last year, I was pretty busy through spring training.

But the season is here and I'll have a full report from opening night as the Sox start the first of 44 home games this season.

Now looking at that schedule, there are quite a few double headers...6 that are scheduled so far. It looks like the team had a problem getting games on Sundays as there is only one the entire season. That probably accounts for all the double headers since there were five Sunday games in the original schedule the team had. They had a magnet schedule night to open the season but it isn't listed anymore so I assume all those things are related.

As for doubleheaders, I don't like having so many for the GBL. The reason is that the rules of the GBL indicate that the first game will be only seven innings unless it is a day night double header. Since the games start at 5 and 7, I assume these aren't day and night doubleheaders. From a statistical standpoint it is 24 lost innings or almost three games gone. But it also feels funny going to a game decided in 7 innings. For men's baseball, I really haven't seen that since little league. The GBL prices are pretty fair so I won't complain from that standpoint but you are paying full price for that 7-inning game so take that for what it is worth. And with full price being charged for each game, how many people who would normally attend two games on two nights now only attend one? They just don't seem like a good idea but since the GBL guys know this better than I, again, I have to assume they lost the use on the park on most of the Sundays during the season or they wouldn't be doing it.

The schedule also has six three day breaks in addition to the all-star break so if there is one benefit to all the double headers, the guys will get some extra rest. Maybe it will make a difference as the season wears on.

As far as the team goes, the squad looks pretty solid. We'll see how paper translates to the field starting tomorrow. But with four AAA guys (including two who also saw big league action) as well as a solid outfield of Senreiso, Flowers, and Wright, things look pretty good. We lost some speed with Victor Hall not coming back but I think the overall experience level of the team is a little better.

As for returnees, Carlos Madrid and Juan Senreiso are it. Maurice Coles, Chuck Sindlinger, Shawn Balteff, and James Johnson among others tried to come back for another season but were cut. But Jeff Leonard put his stamp on the team right away so it is clear that we are not the team of last year.

And finally, I want to applaud the Silver Sox for actually spending the money to go get two coaches. They tried player coaches last year and we saw how that went. I think this is the way to go. Let the players focus on playing and the coaches focus on coaching.

Anyway, that is all for now. See you at the yard.

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

SSFAn,
I look foward to your take on opeing day, KOLO TV reporter said only 100 people braved the cold waether to watch...

S.Sox

Keith K. said...

Thanks for the comment. I think it was slightly more than that...but not much. Are you headed to the park tonight?