So much for the high Soriano drama.
The game was scheduled to start at 12:05 according to the St. Louis mlb.com web site, but as I arrived there were a great many other cars driving into the parking garage for Roger Dean Stadium in Jupiter, Florida. It turns out that the game started at 13:05 as normal, so I was in luck to catch the opening pitch. How was I to know that a web site would post Central Times; the stock phrase is "ALL times eastern". We have a saying in Fort Lauderdale, you might have it there in D.C. as well; it goes, "Fool me once, shame on...shame on..." Well, anyway, it's a pretty neat saying.
I admit I was distracted from keeping my head in the game by my choice of standing in the very neat little field-level porch down the left field line at Roger Dean Stadium, talking to a couple Nats fans near me. Neither was I keeping score, so all those reports were from memory. I know a couple had some errors, but they can be corrected by consulting the box scores. My interest was providing breaking news; unfortunately most of it was not so good for Senators fans.
As the Nats were the visitors, they would bat first. The scoreboard already had the number 12 posted as the due batter and I thought that was Soriano's number. Nobody was in the on-deck area as the grounds crew completed their field preparations, and I overheard a couple fans with W caps on talking about how they would boo the nightlights out of him even if he did play today.
The public address announcer said his welcomes, then we heard "Leading off for the Washington Nationals, the left fielder...number 12, Alfonso Soriano" A great many people down in the bleacher area of the stadium were giving out cat calls and generally dogging the guy as he stood in.
He took the first pitch for a strike, then sent the next one high and deep towards the 400 foot marker, where it was caught at the edge of the grass for the first out of the game. He's known as a free swinger, so I guess anything near the plate will see him hacking away.
He made a nice catch of a fly ball in the bottom of the first inning, then later in the game backed up a bounding ball in the hole at short to start a double play. He also hit a double down the left field line that landed right in front of where I was standing, except I had headed for quieter parts to record one of these reports for yous, so I missed it. So for now he is out of the dog house, but nowhere near inside by the fire. At least he didn't stink up the field today, but he left tomorrow and future games as an open possibility in an interview just aired on ESPN.
Damian Jackson backed up on a high fly ball, then watched it drop onto the grass a few feet in front of his outstretched glove. I don't know where Soriano was at the time, as I was too livid to see anything but red.
Then we witnessed yet another of the Nats' patented Keystone Cops "hot potato" scenes between 2nd and 3rd as the ball simply had no handle on it, Jackson lunged for it on the ground and fell flat on his belly, then shoveled wide to Zimmerman at third and I think it went wide there: two errors on one play.
This is the same Little League caliber play that I walked into last Friday against the Orioles. I know it's Spring Training, but these guys look like they have never taken any infield drills in their entire lives. One good thing that the World Baseball Classic has pointed out is that fundamentally sound defense can go a long way towards winning ball games. Buck Martinez noted this morning on MLB Home Plate on XM175 (a GREAT resource for baseball fans) that a lot of major league clubs don't even take infield practice at all, so if the Nats are in that pile of dung it is showing in a big way right now.
I thought Frank Robinson stood for hard work on the fundamentals, but you wouldn't know it by watching the early innings of some of these Spring Training games. Along about the fourth or fifth innings they seem to settle down, of course that's also about the time when they make substitutions. Coincidence? Possibly. Alien influence? Definitely.
I doubt that I will make any more Spring Training games, at least for the D.C. team 3 hours north in Viera. Perhaps the Orioles because they are right here in Fort Lauderdale, but you know how we feel about their owner. I guess I will leave this blog up as an example of what can be done, but don't expect any more activity here.
Thanx for listening!
Bote Man
OUT
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