Discarded Peanut Shells – the ghost of maple bats

June 24, 2008

* The splintering maple bats issue is rearing its head more prominently as Major League Baseball is beginning to do something about the danger issue. If by “having a meeting” is doing something. I suppose any resolution remains to be seen. Even commenter ‘greg’ over at the DC Sports Bog mentioned an incident last night at the Nats game. (I totally meant to post about the Saul Rivera/Pete Orr shoe incident, but Steinberg did a much funnier job with it. )

Vlad’s broken bat single was freaky to observe live. That piece of wood shot out of his gloveless hands toward Bergie in 0.448 seconds.

I do not, however, endorse the following option presented as a solution along with the possibilities of thickening bat handles or banning the maple bats altogether:

[...] and/or extending the netting that protects fans from behind the plate to beyond the bases

Noooooo!!! Of course, wouldn’t that be tidy to solve their fan photography annoyance ;-) (hopefully no one at MLBAM reads this blog….) I finally won (through an auction) President’s Club seats and am eagerly anticipating checking out the high roller section, but wondering how the camera will work out behind the net. Hopefully since we’ll be closer than when I was in the PNC Diamond Club, the net will be less obtrusive. I’ve seen the pros standing on the President’s Club platform, so photos must be possible from there. But if they extended the nets past the baselines, ugh… My photographic life from the stands would RIP.

* Ryan Zimmerman has updated his blog and says he hopes to be playing again this season. He also enjoyed the Pacific Northwest. Nothing about his auction date. I wonder if he’s gone on it yet? Hee!

* Sadly, Nick Johnson is indeed out for the rest of the season. Heal quickly, Nick! That really really stinks.

* For my lunch decisions, I went with “both”. Jim Bowden didn’t take either of my two questions, but answered about ten by someone with the nickname of wilnieves. Bummer! (both that it wasn’t the real Wil Nieves and that mine and others’ questions were rejected in favor of an abundance of this person’s) Apparently negotiations with first round draft pick Aaron Crow have been disappointing. Uh oh. Here’s a snippet of the rest:

More on the Tim Redding Q&A later…

* Paul Lo Duca is starting in left field tonight – this could be interesting! Willie Harris is at 2nd. So both Wily Mo Pena and Felipe Lopez are riding the pine tonight…

Posted in Baseball - General, Injuries, MLB, Washington Nationals