oh, but we've just begun

Well, it is the end of May and I'm not ready to give up on this baseball blog yet. In fact, I'm just about to get started. The end of student life for me means more time to write and pay attention to various sporting things (this has been an interesting and exciting NBA playoffs... not that we endorse that sort of thing on here). As the baseball season is very long, I usually pay no attention to the first month and its fast starts because it almost always won't matter in the long run. And even though the second month is a better gage, it gives us just a fewmore answers.

Now of course, the third month, with the all-star break giving us time to pause for reflection, is when you should really start paying attention. But still, with what is going on now, as Memorial Day closes and we head into June, we have reason to pay attention to baseball. Here's a few of my notes (i.e. ramblings) why...

- the Detroit Tigers are still in first place, and their pitching staff is holding up well. Sure, it probably won't last, but then, the White Sox kept up their hot start last year and held on. With the Tigers and Chisox both doing well, they have sufficient motivation to keep it up for the rest of the year, much as the Indians and Sox did last year.

- at time of posting, the seperation in the AL east between Boston and New York? Zero games. Ya gotta love that. The best race to watch all season....

.... and the Blue Jays are a few back, despite their pitching problems.

- the NL west, which last season almost gave us the first non-strike division to have zero teams over .500, has EVERY team over .500, and the Rockies were leading it for a while. Now Arizona, similarly mocked at the start of the season, is in front.

- speaking of that, the entire NL is doing much better than expected this year. There's a host of playoff contenders, and they held their own in interleague play....

....and that group of contenders includes the Phils, trudging along and staying in the race.

- also, the Atlanta Braves might finally NOT win the division. That makes me smile, even if it's not the Phils who take them down.

- I can't believe I'm the first person on here to (recently) post this, but Roger Clemens officially came back to the Astros today. Even though the league is tougher, as I just said, he gives them a good shot of getting back to the series. I knew when I saw him pitch here against Mexico that he would never go out like that. Even though the Astors have struggled lately, he can give them a huge lift, and they have to be considered extremely dangerous to get another wild card.

- amazingly, as good as the NL west has been, the AL west is falling apart. The Rangers have hung in only because Oakland and Local Team with Regional Issues have both struggled. And Seattle still sucks and might even get rid of Ichiro. Of course, I'm thoroughly enjoying the Angels' demise - I can't have any respect for these fans. I just can't.

- oh, and no one cares about Barry Bonds. Not at all. Even the media have stopped hyping him up - I didn't even hear about 715* right away, I had to read about it.


See? There's reason to care about baseball again. I'll be continually updating this for however long it before I get a job that takes up every ounce of free time I have (and then I'll sneak on here at work and complain). Swing free, mis amigos.