The Rights of Spring

At long last, the first weekend of March. The dreaded groundhog has made his appearance a few weeks back and . . . who cares if he saw his shadow or not? It always stays cold and snowy for another month anyway, damn rat-like varmint. But all that is behind us, it’s now March. The gods are about to reward us for the harsh winter by bringing to us, straight from the desert, Your Chicago Cubs!!! Live at 2pm Central Time on Saturday, March 1st, WGN-TV comes through with the first televised broadcast of 2008.

After 68 inches of snow and 350 days of sub-zero temperatures this winter, the anticipation is high. Our Boys of Summer are back! Lock the kids in their rooms, send the wife out to the mall, it’s baseball time! Sweet Lou leading the way in the first step in putting an end to the 100 Year Drought. ‘Click’ goes the remote and before me unfolds the beautiful green of the baseball lawn, the supercharged high blue sky of Arizona and the Superstation graphics laying out the starting line-up. Hold on, what’s that? Starting at firstbase, Micah Hoffpauir? Who? (Hey Abbott was right – Who really is on first!) At thirdbase Alex Cintron? Are you kidding me? Starting at shortstop is Ronny Cedeno? Hasn’t he been traded to Baltimore about six times this offseason? Rightfield is home to Sam Fuld? I know he’s competing for an outfield position, but he’s one-third too far west in the outfield. Where’s our newest Japanese import? Where’s the guy that actually makes me wish Harry was still broadcasting? “And now batting is Kouse-kouse F**k-a-dom-me. Hey Steve, can you believe the FCC is letting me say F**k-a-dom-me?”

Where is DLee, Ramirez, The-Riot, and Big Z?

I know it’s the first weekend game of Spring Training and none of this means anything come October, but c’mon Lou! We’ve had a dismal winter and are chomping at the bit to see our Men in Blue. At least for two or three innings, give us the good stuff. Let Zambrano air it out for an inning and then bring in the scrub pitchers. We need something to cling to when we watch the next weather forecast that truly makes us believe the Home Opener on March 31st will be snowed out.