MLB to be shaken awake
Story lines are aplenty, but all eyes will be on the Angels first
Baseball returns from its sleep-inducing offseason early next week with a wakeup jolt.
Thirty major league camps will open in Florida and Arizona for the start of spring training, vying for attention with a rogue camp in Bradenton, Fla.
Financed by the players union in response to the owners’ scarcity of interest in the current crop of free agents, the island of misfit millionaires adds another intriguing story line to what looksto be a wild spring.
Despite their best intentions, baseball’s owners somehow find themselves in great shape heading into 2018.
The constant carping about pace of play, the increasing number of tanking teams and the antagonistic attitude toward its own players haven’t dulled interest in thenational pastime.
Thepast two World Series were seven-game classics won by teams executing near-perfect tear-downs and rebuilds. Aaron Judge and Giancarlo Stanton are now in the same lineup with the Yankees, and 23-year-old Japanese star Shohei Ohtani brings his high-wire actto the Angels.
Home runs are back in vogue after a record-setting 6,105 balls cleared fences in 2017, presumably without an assist from modern chemistry. Extended netting should make all 30 ballparks safer for fans.
And the possible return of bullpen carts has piqued the curiosity of even the most jaded curmudgeons. With baseball back in business, here are some of the story lines we’ll be following this springand onward.
• Ohtani, the best young player in Japan, is a pitcher-slugger hoping in his rookie season to become the reincarnation of Babe Ruth. It all starts in Tempe, Ariz., where the national media will converge, leaving the Cubs to train in relative peace for once.
Just relax, Shohei. No pressure at all.
Ohtani likely will start out in the Angels rotation and figures to play in the outfield or at designated hitter when he’s not on the mound. The Angels ultimately might go with a sixman rotation, as Ohtani pitched only about once a week in Japan.
It was revealed after the much-hyped signing that Ohtani had a small, first-degree UCL tear in his right elbow, which could lead to a more conservative game plan. Either way, everyone in the United States and Japan will be watching his every move.
• With so many teams in the same rebuilding mode, one of them is bound to surprise everyone and compete for a wild-card berth. Remember a half-dozen mediocre teams were in contention in August 2017 for the second American League wild-card playoff spot. It’s not that hard if a team hangs around .500.
Perhaps the White Sox can be the chosen one, assuming Michael Kopech and Eloy Jimenez come up and all the prospects click as the Cubs did in 2015. The Brewers fast-forwarded their rebuild last year and are now a team with which to reckon.
The Pirates insist they’re not tanking despite trading ace Gerrit Cole and center fielder Andrew McCutchen.
“In our minds, a rebuild implies you’re looking five years down the road,” general manager Neal Huntington said. “This team is going to show up ready to go in spring training, ready to compete, ready to defy odds, just like that 2013 Pirates team did.”
Stranger things have happened.
• “Bullpenning” has become the norm in the postseason, with managers going to the pen early to avoid having starters face hitters the third time around. “Bridge” pitchers to get from starter to closer are now a hot commodity, and the Dodgers’ Brandon Morrow went that route to nab a closer’s job this year with the Cubs.
The Rockies, meanwhile, signed former Cubs closer Wade Davis, ignoring the freeze to improve their chances. They spent a hefty $106 million on their bullpen in the offseason, also adding Bryan Shaw and re- signing Jake McGee. Along with Mike Dunn and Adam Ottavino, the Rockies bullpen arguably is much more important than their rotation.
It’s a bold experiment to say the least. But nothing else has worked at Coors Field over the years, so why not give it a shot?
• The Yankees’ surprising acquisition of Stanton must have been a dream come true for commissioner Rob Manfred.
Love them or hate them, the game is simply better when the Yankees are the Yankees. With two mammoth, pinstriped sluggers hitting back-to-back, the Bombers should revert to their former role as baseball’s Evil Empire, the way it oughtabe.
Judge last year became the first rookie in history to hit 50 home runs. Stanton took a shot at Roger Maris’ old-school record of 61 homers before winding up with 59. It’s similar to Kevin Durant joining Steph Curry, where every game is a happening.
• Nostalgic sports writers love to wax poetic about the days when relievers entered games in golf carts decked with giant baseball caps.
There’s no real reason whywe loved them so much. They’re just primped-up golf carts after all, but it’s just partof our DNA.
Perhaps that’s why the union’s proposal to look at bringing back the retro bullpen carts — under the guise of speeding up the game — has made every writer giddy. As long as they keep mascots out of them and have cool roofs, bullpen carts can be the salvation of baseball.
Trust me on this one.