Up to #2

We’re now one day closer to breaking camp and everyone is becoming pretty anxious. There still seems to be a lot of decisions and moves that the organization is going to have to make. Every team from triple a down to the extended team has at least 30 players. By the start of the season each team has to be down to 25. If you take that into consideration it means that there are at least 25 guys that are still going to be released. The organizational guys who make the decisions say that this is the toughest time of the year for them, for the sole fact that they have to basically fire people. In the business world a boss has to let people go occasionally, in the baseball world the general manager has to let go about 50 people within a four week span. It’s pretty crazy to think of it like that.

Every team does it differently when it comes to releasing guys. Some teams leave notes in lockers to go see the farm director, some teams have the positional coaches pull the players out of the locker room before they go out to the field, and other teams wait until everyone’s out on the field and have the trainers go out and get guys and bring them back to the clubhouse. There’s not a good way to do it, but it has to be done.

When we got arrived at the clubhouse today we were greeted with a drug test, our second one since spring training started. Our first drug test was conducted by MLB; today’s drug test was conducted by the Florida Marlins. If you fail the drug test performed by the MLB you receive a 50 game suspension, if you fail the drug test from the Marlins they hand down consequences depending on the severity of the positive test. There are some guys that get nervous with these tests; I’m not one of them.

Today’s game was once again against the Cardinals. I ended up going 0-1 with a walk, hit by pitch, and a fly out to the left fielder. I hit 3rd in the order and DH’ed. We don’t really keep track of the score of these games but I’m pretty sure that we got outscored today. Travis Mitchell, an outfielder in the Cardinals organization who had signed with Missouri but never ended up making it there, hit a homerun against us today.

Speaking of the Missouri Tigers they jumped up to #2 in Baseball America. I hope the university as a whole and the town of Columbia realizes how great of a thing this squad has going and comes out to support their Tigers!

Movie Update:
Death Sentence- Kevin Bacon plays a father who sees his oldest son slain by gang member in an initiation ritual. The whole movie is basically about Bacon seeking revenge on the gang while protecting his family. This is one of the best movies that I’ve seen in a long time.
My rating: 8.0

Thanks for checking in; hopefully I’ll be bringing some good news tomorrow.

*When no one believes in you look deep inside your soul and you’ll find a believer.