Opening (The Skies) Day

Dbacks scheduled to open in Cincinnati in less than ten hours, but a rainout looks probable; delays for sure. You can check current Cincy weather on top of the sidebar, right. Tuesday is an off day, but it's expected to rain then as well.

Also want to call your attention to the colorful widget just below that, which I expect to use quite a lot this year. If you click on the little word "schedule" (bottom left), it brings up a scrollbar calendar of the Dbacks 2008 games. Click on any future game to get a detailed preview, or a recap with box score (for completed games). The widget links to an ESPN page, which appears chock full of good game info. Let me know what you think as the season progresses.

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March 31 Update 10:57 PM - Piecoro said earlier they should get the game in despite the weather, but raining kinda hard at 10:43AM

Starting Lineups (per Nick) :

Diamondbacks
Young, CF
Hudson, 2B
Byrnes, LF
Jackson, 1B
Snyder, C
Reynolds, 3B
Drew, SS
Upton, RF
Webb, P

Reds
Patterson, CF
Keppinger, SS
Griffey, RF
Phillips, 2B
Dunn, LF
Encarnacion, 3B
Hatteberg, 1B
Valentin, C
Harang, P

11:55AM -- GAMEBLOG - Player intros, sounds like delay will be about an hour. Reds 132nd opening day, Dbacks tenth. Nice pregame video and recollections from Arizona's inaugural game from Jay Bell and Ken Phelps.

Harang wearing Nuxhall jersey. Nice touch. First pitch to CY is a called strike. Caught looking.
Hudson safe on E-5, high throw from Encarnacion. To second on wild pitch to Byrnes.
Eric 6-3 on hanging breaker. CoJack RBI single up the middle on another hanger. Snyder pops to right. 1-0 Dbacks

Webby gets a weak grounder to first, and whiffs two on changeups. Webby no hits, 1 walk through two.

CY cracks 2nd deck homer to left; fastball. Byrnes follows to center. Both solos. 3-0 Backs. Harang pitch count in mid sixties after three

I know nobody's reading, and I've never been one for live blogging. It's just feels really nice to focus on the actual game again, instead of all the noise, MLB i$$ue$, etc. There is actually a game in the middle of this.

Valentin hit a double to the base of the RF wall, but he dogged it and is standing on first. Reynolds has whiffed twice, but finished the third with a solid barehand grab and throw on a dribbler.

Reds score a pair as CY misplays a groundball gapper by Phillips into a triple. Hudson sweet over the shoulder grab in short center off Hatteberg, stops the bleeding.

Harang settling in, retiring the order 1,2,3 in the 6th. Each team only has three hits. Dbacks up one, but I feel like game may come down to Dbacks bullpen. Webb's looking good, whiffed first two batters in the sixth, but his pitch count is nearing ninety.

Jeff Salazar cracks another solo, deep in the RF pen, off RP Burton. Just a few days ago, I suggested it was unreasonable to expect Dbacks to lead all MLB in pinch hit HRs again this year. Maybe I spoke too soon. 4-2 Dbacks. Mad Scientist, indeed.

Qualls and Pena hold, with thx to Oh Dawg. Lyon closes it out. Webb wins, Harang L, Lyon save.

Postgame Observations:

For all last year's talk about luck and random variation, today's opener reacquainted Arizona fans with several familiar themes:

Close Game (4-2)
Good starting pitching (Webb 6IP 2 ER 3H and 4BB )
Excellent D (CY misplayed a 2B into a 3B, but Reynolds & Hudson turned 3 likely hits into outs)
Lousy batting average (.152)
Solo homers (3, count 'em, three)
Pinch hit homer (Salazar)
Lights out bullpen (3IP 0 ER, 0 H, 0 BB, 1 HBP)

Sutton and Grace got off to a good start, pointing out little things like CY laying off a couple outside breaking balls he might've whiffed on last year, or Hudson calling off an onrushing CY in the field, prompting Chris to deftly avoid Orlando with a last minute slide. Any announcer can point out Valentin loafing a double into a single, but Grace and Sutton focus on smaller details, and when they do that instead of the schtick, are actually very good. It wont last, but they were fun to listen to today.