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Hacksaw’s Great Sports Weekend PODCAST

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“BASEBALL TOPICS ON THE TABLE”

Love the opening of spring training, a truly breath of fresh air.

I grew up in a baseball family on Long Island.  I loved watching spring training games as a kid, the Yankees and Mets from Florida, on TV back to my house where we were always coming out of a snowy-cold winter.

My first trip to spring training was when I worked in Cleveland, went to Tucson to cover the Indians.  You know winter weather in Cleveland.  And then you land in Arizona, cactus, sunshine, and games at Hi Corbett Field.

Loved my first Yuma experience with the Padres, and then when they moved to Peoria.

The best however was my first trip to cover the Dodgers at Vero Beach.  Dodgertown, the fields where Jackie Robinson and Sandy Koufax worked out.  Holman Stadium.  Meeting Tommy LaSorda, Vin Scully and taking in the heritage of Dodgers Blue baseball, where they trained as far back as 1948.

So cool.

What I saw, what I think after day one of exhibition baseball.

PADRES..Bad flashback, giving up 8-runs in the 1st inning and six more after that in a (14-1) opening day loss to the Dodgers in the Cactus League.  Reminded me of Andy Green’s regular season debut against the Dodgers, a (15-0) thrashing in a regular season opener.  In fact LA swept the 3-game series.

PITCHING..The only thing that counts is how Joe Musgrove feels the next four days after his 1-inning struggle, 24-pitches, 4-runs allowed, no outs recorded.  This is work in progress coming off a winter of rehab for the shoulder capsule issue.

HOT…Yuki Matsui came from Japan with quite a reputation as a closer.  First outing for the Padres, 1-inning, no hits, 3-strikeouts.  That was impressive.

DODGERS…Not wanting to tip their hand, they change their mind and do not start Yosh Yomamoto.  Hide him till regular season opener in South Korea.

THE LINEUP…A 14-run outburst and the Dodgers did this without Ohtani-Freeman-Muncie-Smith in their batting order.  Of course virtually all the damage was done against minor league pitcheres.

YOUNG ARMS…Impressive start from last year’s rookies who were overwhelmed  when they were pushed onto the mound.  Gavin Stone and Michael Grove were dominant against the Padres.

ESPN..Spring training for them too.  All the excitement of opening day in the Cactus League was wiped out by technical problems on the field.  Their sideline reporter had mic problems right at the start.  And they had hot-micd Fernando Tatis, but he has mic problems, his answers sounded muddied, and who wants to listen to his 6-word answers for all 26-minutes of the top of the first.  Would rather have had a sideline reporter to quick dugout interviews during the game with a wide variety of both Dodgers-Padres players and the managers.

On we go with the rest of the Cactus League-Grapefruit Circuit games coming this weekend.

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