As we officially enter the purgatory known as the “dog days of spring training” it’s hard not to become antsy. We can hear the sizzle of an upcoming season, but long to taste it. Whoever said patience is a virtue had to be a baseball fan around this time of year.
With opening day less than two weeks away, everyone-fans, players, managers, and sportswriters have grown tired of the monotony of spring training.
How many wind sprints can a player run and bullpen sessions a hurler throw? How much fine-tuning can a hitter before his calluses form calluses? Or, how much can fans discuss the probable Mets fifth starter and the identity of the 25th man before turning blue?
How many stories written about the upcoming campaign? It’s time to Play Ball, for keeps already.
Why does it take 30 practice games and seven weeks of training for the players to deem themselves game ready? For instance, a pitcher only has a finite amount of innings in his arm why exhaust them in March?
Certainly, the expectations have been lowered with the six-seven-inning stint becoming the norm. Does a young arm need that much preparation to throw 100 pitches? Maybe pitchers should revamp their regiments and start shedding the rust in late January.
If so, maybe the pitchers could be game ready by the last week of March instead. Then get rolling one week earlier.
Perhaps the schedule makers could avoid
Let’s face it there are only two important spring training dates: When pitchers and catcher’s report and when camp breaks. The rest is just filler.
The WBC did provide a bit of a diversion. Seeing some of the games best players representing their homelands a novelty that withered away when the games became snore-fests
However, David Wright’s clutch hit woke me up in my chair for a short while. The Nationalistic excitement tempered when I realized the star third-baseman was being suffocated under a sea of humanity. In essence, that underscored the prevailing theme of the WBC and spring training in general:
“Please God don’t have any of my players get injured and lost for the season in March.”
(Do any Jets fans remember losing Joe Namath in two consecutive pre-seasons? The disappointment that the season was over before it began was heart wrenching.)
Seeing Wright limp clad in a
Hopefully that will be all the drama left in an endless spring. Johan Santana provided some moments and all the other bumps and bruises, common in spring training, will heal.
Do what you can to survive the next 13 days. Fill out your brackets and enjoy the diversion of college hoops. Clean up the yard or take the kids to the movies. Personally, I plan to avoid the remaining
The following Monday it all begins for real in
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I dont understand why spring training is so long. I get so pumped up each year for pitchers and catchers to report and then after a couple of weeks I’m so bored and it just drags on and on. This year was the worst one yet. Nice post.
I just had this exact discussion with my friends on st. pattys day. They have to do something to shorten spring training, really it’s so boring.
Doug, you are a great writer and I enjoy reading your posts. Rather than having such a long spring training, baseball should have a three day mini camp in the winter (December), and cut spring training by two weeks.
The mandatory mini camp will help coaches identify out of shape players before they show up in February and give everyone a few days of conditioning which will help.