The Longest Winter

If you cared to go back in my history with this blog, I’ve never been one to get all romantic about the start of spring training, and certainly rarely cared to mark the occasion with a post. Everyone is 0-0 … hope springs eternal … yada yada yada. I love baseball but I’m a terrible romantic. Maybe it’s the Mets fan in me that’s been burned year after year. But it seems more pointless than ever when half the team has been in Port St. Lucie stretching for the last two weeks.

Usually its the cold weather that gets me more and more interested in baseball. Hell, spring training games are great because baseball is being played. But one of the worst feelings in the world for me is flipping on a game, seeing 82 and bright sunshine warm up my television screen, and then having to go outside in blizzard warnings and polar vortexes. So while baseball can warm my heart it can also be a cruel tease. Like I said … I’m a terrible romantic.

But having back surgery this past October has given me a severe case of cabin fever. And for the past six weeks I feel I’ve been doing nothing but stretch. So I guess that makes me sort of qualified to report on this portion of spring training, since I’ve been doing stretches on tables, mats, with big large plastic spheres, and straps. It sounds like a 50 Shades of Grey spinoff, but it’s just life. Just like it’s life for our favorite forty. Except they’re doing it to get ready to beat the Nationals more than four times. I’m doing it to make sure I don’t end up in a hospital again eating hard boiled eggs and drinking half size cans of ginger ale. (Though after two days in a hospital bed, those small cans of ginger ale are the greatest things on planet earth.)

So on this … February 19th, 2015 … I sit here (upright thankfully) at my keyboard to tell you that I’m ready to bring it on. The injury reports, the unnecessary hype, the panicking over Wilmer Flores hitting .120 against guys wearing uniform numbers like 91 and 95 (or if he’s pitching against the Yankees, pi … since they’ll be running out of numbers soon.) Bring on all of it. There will be enough to get excited about this season. But most of all, just heading out to the park will be the meat of the order, and that’s what I’m more than ready for. Because it’s been a long winter.

Longer than usual.