Curtis Granderson's Bat And Glove Propel Yankees To Opening Day Win

Happy Opening Day Yankees fans! I'm sure I can speak for all of us when I say that today was a truly awesome day. Baseball is back. The Yankees won. All is right with the world.

As I do every year I took time off from work to watch the opener. I got together with a couple of buddies at a local watering hole for the game. You can't go wrong with beer, burgers and baseball.

The Yankees didn't play their best baseball today and quite frankly I didn't expect them to. I was pleased with what I saw and what I saw was good enough for the win. CC Sabathia was far from mid-season form but he was effective. Things could have got real bad real fast there in the 2nd inning when CC loaded the bases with no outs. But like a good pitcher does he got out of the jam with little damage. Overall a very solid 1st outing for CC. The big man usually gets better as the weather gets better. If that holds true, based on today's start he's going to have one heck of a year.

Great job by the Yankee bullpen. I guess we know now how Girardi is going to play it. It looks like the blueprint is Joba or David Robertson in the 6th/7th, Soriano in the 8th, and the great one to bring it home. My buddies and I were a little nervous when Joba took the mound. He kind of looks like a fat Sergio Mitre, doesn't he? Am I the only one who thinks that? Anyway, he had a solid inning. Half of us were expecting a meltdown. Joba has a lot of work to do to earn back our faith in him. Today was a step in that direction. I think Rafael Soriano is going to have a lights out year. He looked pretty sharp today. He could represent the most solid bridge to Mariano Rivera that we've seen in awhile. Speaking of the great one he's still the man. As if there was any doubt. I can't think of a better way to end the home opener than with Mo picking up the save.

It was good to see Mark Teixeira get off to a good start. Hopefully he can keep it up. I'm cautiously optimistic that he can. Pretty good day for A-Rod. On base 3 of 4 times and he came a few feet from going to deep. You know things are working for Alex when he hits the ball with power to right CF. I thought for sure that ball was gone and on a better day weather-wise it probably would have been. My only criticism of A-Rod is that he should have been busting it out of the box on that shot. He should have been standing on 3rd.

I think the biggest surprise today was the play of Russell Martin. I was shocked when he stole 3rd. I was more shocked when he scored from 3rd on a shallow sac fly. Who knew the dude had such wheels? He was quite the catalyst today.

Player of the game honors goes to Curtis Granderson. He came through with the big swing and picked up $20 for his charity. Allow me to explain: like I did last year with Nick Swisher's charity, I'm donating $ to Granderson's Grand Kids Foundation every time he goes deep. $15 per HR. Others have joined in to donate as well. You can check our progress in the upper left and if you want to chip in you're more than welcome. CG was also pretty slick in the field too. I thought there was no way that he was getting that ball that was hit over his head. He definitely had the best day in my opinion. Looks like his oblique is fine. Thank God and knock on wood.

Overall a great day. A great win. 1 down, 161 to go. I really wish there was a game tomorrow. I'm kind of bummed there's not. Oh well. There's a lot more baseball left to be played. Giggedy giggedy giggedy.

Did I just write my 3rd post in 3 days? Yeah, I think I did. Wow.

Peace, love and Pinstripes,

J-Boogie

Opening Day Is Finally Here

Hey hey what do you say? I'm so happy it's Opening Day! It's been a long offseason. Made even longer because I didn't pay much attention to the offseason, or to Spring Training for that matter. I don't know why but I just couldn't get into it. I think I saw or listened to about 2 games worth of baseball. I feel so far removed from the Yankees right now. Starting the season is just what the doctor ordered. Or so I hope. Having 3 kids at home all under the age of 4 makes paying attention to anything hard.

Like I do every year I took half the day off from work. This is going to post at 10:30 so roughly t-minus 1.5 hours before I'm out of here. (Hey boss - if you're reading this I wrote it on Wednesday with a scheduled post time of Thursday. I would never blog on the clock.) I can't wait to get together with a few buddies and watch the game at a local watering hole. I'm really jealous of everyone in NYC right now. Attending a Yankees home opener is definitely on my bucket list. I envy you all.

As I mentioned above I paid very little attention to spring training. I caught a little bit here and there, read some stories and/or blogs every now and then, so I know a little of what's going on and how people are doing. Is it enough to write a pre-season blog post on, not even close. Here's all I'll say: I'm very pleased with this year's team. I like how the scrap heap pitchers have performed. I think A-Rod is going to have a MONSTER year. I think Teixeira won't slump in April. I think the Captain will bounce back. I'm glad they dealt Sergio Mitre. I miss Andy Pettitte. I think we'll see good A.J. much more than bad A.J.. Mo is, was, and will always be God on the field. Nice summary? I think so.

So there you have it everyone. My "the season is starting" blog post. I give it a C-, C at best. I'm a little rusty. I need to go through a few "minor league starts" to shake it off. It's my full intent to be an active blogger this season. I make no promises as it's tough to with 3 little ones taking up so much time but I'm sure as hell going to try.

I hope everyone had a great offseason and is ready for what I think will be a season for the ages. It's almost go-time. The march to #28 is officially underway. Make us proud boys.

Enjoy the opener.

Peace, love and Pinstripes,

J-Boogie

2011 Predictions & 2010 Predictions Revisited

It's that time of year again. Time to make some predictions for the upcoming season. I'm not really sure why I make these. I'm never right. First, let's take a look back at last year's predictions: I predicted that the Yankees, White Sox, Rangers, Phillies, Cardinals and Dodgers would win their respective divisions with the Red Sox and Braves winning the wild card. I hit on 3 of the 8 and correctly picked 4 of the 8 playoff teams. I also predicted each team's win/loss record. I got exactly none right. Of the 30 teams I correctly placed the Tigers, Indians, Royals, Rangers, Brewers, Astros, and the entire NL East. 11 out of 30. That's bad. I correctly put the Yankees and Rangers in the ALCS though I had the Yankees winning that series as well as the World Series. I didn't pick any of the major award winners either. I think the best prediction I made was that Robinson Cano would win the AL MVP. So close. So as you can see my success rate with these predictions isn't that good. But who cares, right? Why let that stop me? So here goes, minus the win/loss records. AL East:

1. Boston Red Sox*


2. New York Yankees**


3. Toronto Blue Jays


4. Tampa Bay Rays


5. Baltimore Orioles

AL Central

1. Detroit Tigers


2. Minnesota Twins


3. Chicago White Sox


4. Kansas City Royals


5. Cleveland Indians

AL West

1. Oakland A's


2. LA Angels


3. Texas Rangers


4. Seattle Mariners

NL East

1. Philadelphia Phillies*


2. Atlanta Braves**


3. Florida Marlins


4. New York Mets


5. Washington Nationals

NL Central

1. Cincinnati Reds


2. Milwaukee Brewers


3. St. Louis Cardinals


4. Chicago Cubs


5. Houston Astros


6. Pittsburgh Pirates

NL West

1. San Francisco Giants


2. Colorado Rockies


3. Los Angeles Dodgers


4. San Diego Padres


5. Arizona Diamondbacks

* = best record

** = wild card

Playoffs

1. ALDS: Yankees over Tigers, A's over Red Sox


2. NLDS: Braves over Giants, Phillies over Reds


3. ALCS: Yankees over A's


4. NLCS: Braves over Phillies


5. World Series: do you have to ask?

Awards

1. AL MVP: Alex Rodriguez


2. NL MVP: Albert Pujols


3. AL Cy Young: Jon Lester


4. NL Cy Young: Roy Halladay


5. AL ROY: Mike Moustakas


6. NL ROY: Freddy Freeman


7. AL Manager of Year: Bob Geren


8. NL Manager of Year: Fredi Gonzalez

There you go. Maybe this year I'll have a better success rate with these. As long as I'm right on the World Series winner, I'm happy.

Feel free to share your own predictions. If you offer up some criticism all I ask is you bring something other than telling me I'm stupid. Put some thought into it.

14.5 hours til the 1st pitch of 2011!! Let's do this.

Peace, love and Pinstripes,

J-Boogie

Doing It For The "Grand Kids"

Hey everyone. We're less than 2 days away from the start of the 2011 MLB season. I can't believe it. It seems like just yesterday the 2010 season ended. Time certainly does fly. Thank God for that. I must again apologize for my long absence. I'm finding it very tough to find the time to blog with 3 little ones at home. It's very tough. Now that the season is starting I hope to ramp it up a little more. Which brings me to this.....


Some of you may remember from last year that I tried to organize a Yankee fan fundraiser to benefit Nick Swisher's charity, Swishes Wishes. In short, every time Nick hit a home run, we added money to his total. 12 of us combined to donate $41 for every HR, with a little extra thrown in. If everyone lived up to their pledge and sent in their donation (it was on the honor system) then his charity received $1249. Not too shabby. I want to do the same thing this year for Curtis Granderson's Grand Kids Foundation.


Per the site, donations to the Grand Kids Foundation will go towards grants to schools nationwide to help fund educational field trips, art initiatives, science initiatives and the increasing need for foreign language software. The foundation also supports inner city baseball programs through equipment donations. Seems like a great cause.


If you want to contribute, please let me know. I'm going to again track the overall amount on the blog and I'd love to add all pledge amounts to the total (see upper left of blog). I encourage you to participate as it's for a good cause, but no one should feel as if they have to. the more the merrier. I also have no part in collecting any money. It's on the honor system. I am just spreading the word and drumming up support.


My pledge is this: For every HR Curtis hits I will donate $15 to his charity.


I'm looking to donate about $300-400 to his charity. He hit 24 bombs last year so that would have resulted in a $360 donation. Nobody should feel they have to match me. Last year we had people pledge $3 per HR. No amount is too small. If anyone wants to make a pledge, which again you'll be responsible for sending in, please let me know. Just drop me a comment, a tweet, or shoot me an e-mail (see upper left). Again, the more the merrier and no amount is too small.


Thanks in advance. I appreciate it.


Peace, love & Pinstripes,


J-Boogie