Washington-Nationals

[caption id="" align=“aligncenter” width=“500” caption=“I guess it gets right to the point…”] [/caption] Despite their motto for the year, visible in the picture above, the Carp have not managed many wins this season. 7 April 2010 NPB Hiroshima Carp (1) at Yakult Swallows (7). The Carp fall to 2-8-0 in last. Go Carp! Rakuten Eagles (6) at Nippon Ham Fighters (3). The Eagles continue to hammer the Fighters. Nice work guys. 5-8-0 in 5th, two wins back from 4th. ...

[caption id="" align=“aligncenter” width=“500” caption=“There’s always optimism on Opening Day. Look at the huge smile on Teddy!”] [/caption] 3 April NPB Yomiuri Giants (6) at Hiroshima Carp (5). The Carp fall to 1-6-0 and are last in the Central League. Softbank Hawks (10) at Rakuten Golden Eagles (6). The Eagles take a hit to 3-7-0 and are in fifth place in the Pacific League. 4 April NPB Yomiuri Giants (10) at Hiroshima Carp (3). The Carp fall to 1-7-0 and look awful in last in the Central League. Softbank Hawks (3) at Rakuten Golden Eagles (2). The Eagles fall to 3-8-0 and are still in fifth place in the Pacific League. ...

This morning I went and bought a ticket to watch the Nationals play the Red Sox in an exhibition and noticed a pretty neat feature: Mobile Phone Tickets. The gist is that you buy your ticket, get a text, and that text can be scanned for your entrance to the ballpark. Absolutely brilliant, but then I noticed that they charge $1.75 for this service. Why? ...

Another year, another season! 2010 looks to be another good one. The Marlins don’t look like they’re about to run away with their division, but the Rays have a fighting chance this year. I’m getting ahead of myself, so let’s back up and go through this division by division like we do every year. AL East After a (glorious) season where the Yankees didn’t make it to the playoffs for once, the Bronx Bombers came back with a vengeance and took it all. The Yanks may have lost Damon and Matsui, but they’re still in a strong position in the AL East and look poised to make the playoffs in the division. Players are getting older on that team and the pitching isn’t as strong as they’d like, but, barring some kind of major injury, I stand by that prediction. ...

I’m WAY behind on writing legitimate content on this site, but I hope you’re enjoying all the videos. I wanted to mention a few things: The opening pitch at Nationals Park will be tossed out by Barack Obama this year! I’ve managed to secure a ticket for the game. Our Nation’s team was 3-2 when Bush attended ballgames, but I’m afraid that they’ll probably start out Obama’s record with a loss against the National League Champion Phillies. Should still be fun to see him make that toss in person. ...

[caption id="" align=“aligncenter” width=“500” caption=“They’re off to a poor start, but hopefully they’ll start to bounce back soon”][/caption] This is a new idea I had to help me better track the records of the teams that I follow. Check it out weekdays if you care about the Marlins, Rays, Carp, Golden Eagles, Nationals, or Orioles. Since Japanese games are played 13 hours ahead and that can get pretty confusing, I’ll just post the scores on the day they happened in GMT -5 ...

It’s still just under two weeks before the MLB baseball season is set to start, but the NPB has already gone and started its season. To be more specific, the Pacific League started its season last Saturday, but their second series won’t begin until the Central League starts on Friday. Are things looking good for my favorite squad? Nope, they’re 0-3 in their first series against the Orix Buffaloes. Tanaka and Iwakuma had pretty solid starts, but the run support wasn’t quite right to make either game a win. ...

Stephen Strasburg finally made his Major League debut in spring training yesterday and he was everything that the Nationals could have hoped he would be in two innings. After receiving 15 M$ before ever throwing a pitch, you’d certainly hope he was amazing, but will he make the starting rotation? His first two innings had two strikeouts, two hits, and no earned runs, making him somewhat of an oddity on a Nationals pitching staff that averages an over 10.00 ERA so far in spring training. Strasburg’s fastball was in the 96-98 MPH range over the 27 pitches he threw, with a few changeups around 91 and a wicked 81 MPH breaking ball. The man seems like he can pitch so far, but we’ll have to see how he does over the rest of spring training. ...

It’s time for Wednesday Morning Quarterback, your weekly sports round-up. Remember last week when I said the Marlins needed to start doing better for the rest of the season? Seems they took my urgings seriously. Counting Wednesday, the Marlins are 4-2 ( good), with two of those wins coming from teams above them on the wild card ( great). They’ve also got a streak of 13 straight games with ten or more hits ( wow). At this time of writing, the Marlins are two back on the wild card and 4.5 back on the division. If they keep this amazing run up, they just might make it to the playoffs this year. ...

It’s time for Wednesday Morning Quarterback, your weekly sports round-up. Baseball, sad as I am to say it, is nearing the end of its season. As pre-season stories begin to flood my RSS reader I can only lament the loss of the pure baseball period. That time of the year where the only professional sport being played in America is my favorite time of year. Turning on Sportscenter will only yield tiny stories and not spend long segments on the state of some team’s offensive line. ...