Opening Day Live Blog!

Well, the time has finally come. Opening day is upon us! After a beautiful performance by Derek Lowe last night, its time for Sabathia to make his. I will be blogging the game all day to keep you all updated.

(2:15) Here are today's opening lineups:

New York Yankees

Derek Jeter SS
Johnny Damon LF
Mark Teixeira 1B
Hideki Matsui DH
Jorge Posada C
Robinson Cano 2B
Xavier Nady RF
Cody Ransom 3B
Brett Gardner CF

Pitching: C.C. Sabathia LHP

Baltimore Orioles

Brian Roberts 2B
Adam Jones CF
Nick Markakis RF
Melvin Mora 3B
Aubrey Huff 1B
Ty Wigginton DH
Luke Scott LF
Greg Zaun C
Cezar izturis SS

Pitching: Jeremy Guthrie

Just some quick notes, on opening day in their career, The Yankees are 62-43-1 and in his 5 opening day starts, Sabathia is 1-0 w/a 4.23 ERA

(4:07) The game is about to begin. Teixeira got lots of boos as expected. Ramiro Pena had the biggest smile on his face that I have ever seen a Yankee player have. That was nice to see. Not expected is the orange runway from center field to introduce the Oriole players. Pretty unnecessary. Come on, you're the Orioles. Even if you were a good team, its bush league. Especially when you add in the little kids with the Oriole flags. Lets get this game underway!

(4:25) The first pitch to Derek Jeter is a......... strike and the season has begun! Yankee baseball is back! More updates to come

(4:31) Jeter had a fantastic first at bat of the season battling through about 8-9 pitches and eventually getting a single. Unfortunately they couldn't get him in. Here comes the $170,000,000 man

(4:46) Sabathia had a difficult inning. Gave up a single to the 1st batter, threw two wild pitches. He threw a lot of pitches, but thanks to a heads up play from Cody Ransom and a solid play from Derek Jeter, he worked out of it. Looks like were gonna be seeing some of the bullpen today.

(4:55) Posada got hit in the foot, Cano pops out (is this 2008?) X-Man strikes out on 3 pitches (Anyone know how I feel about Nick Swisher?) and Ransom flew out to right. Nothing doing for the Yanks. Sabathia stands at 19 pitches. Lets have a short inning.

BTW, as the game goes on, if there are scoreless innings, updates will not be posted. From here on out, only the important stuff. These blogs may have character limits.

(5:00) Much easier inning for the Big Man. 3 up, 3 down. that is what we like to see.

On a side note, has anyone seen the trailer for Drag me to Hell? Looks pretty scary and its good to see Sam Raimi getting back into horror. I personally cant wait for Observe and Report. It will be one of the most hysterical/offensive movies ever made and I cant wait. OK, back to baseball.

(5:04) Leadoff single by Gardner, lets see what he does with it.

(5:07) Hit and run on a bounce and Gardner gets to 3rd. Runners on the corners, no outs. Damon, Tex and Matsui coming up.

(5:08) Sac fly by Damon. 1st Yankee run of the year. 1st of many.

(5:18) 1st base stolen on Posada this year. Wasn't his fault though, it was stolen on Sabathia. Our season rests on the shoulders of that man. I'm confidant.

(5:24) Hit, stolen base, walk, triple. That's how you score 2 runs. Adam Jones is one of the best young players, forget that, one of the best players in baseball today. Remember the name Adam Jones everyone. Sac fly will add another run. Orioles up 3-1 after three innings.

(5:33) Melvin Mora makes an amazing play to end the inning and take away a double from Cody Ransom. Moving onto other matters, former Yankee and proud AARP member Tony Clark has two home runs for the Diamondbacks today. Also, if the Yes Network shows another commercial for Wolverine, I am going to single handedly make sure that film never gets released. Ease up Yes Network!

(5:38) Sabathia cannot find the plate today. In 3+ innings, he already has 3 walks. Lets hope he pulls it together

(5:44) After letting the 1st two runners on, Sabathia worked out of trouble. Again. I know its only the first game, but its been four innings and C.C. is a power pitcher, can we please have 1 strikeout?

(5:52) Damon triples with 2 outs, Tex walks and Matsui pops out. Nothing looking too great today so far with this team. Also, in the dugout, Sabathia has a large heating pad over his stomach. Why? The announcers are confused as well, and if Michael Kay doesn't know something, what are the odds any of us do?

(5:55) Lead off double by Brian Roberts. Gardner shouldn't have caught it, but he definitely could have

(5:56) See above, only take out double, Brian Roberts and Brett Gardner, and add single, Adam Jones and Cody Ransom

(6:01) Jones tries to steal 2nd, Jeter covers, bouncing hit to short that cant be fielded because Jeter is at 2nd base. Run scores, 4-1 Orioles, no outs, runners on 1st and 2nd, Albaladejo begins to throw in the bullpen

(6:05) Cody Ransom should have made that play. Should have been ruled an error but it wasnt. Kind of ridiculous. Aubrey Huff gets RBI ground out, Sabathia is not looking good today. Cant find the strike zone at all. Intentionally loading the bases for Luke Scott. Lets hope for the DP

(6:12) Sabathia walks Luke Scott with the bases loaded and his day is over. 6-1 Orioles. Albaladejo(y) coming into pitch. I'll give you Sabathia's line once it is determined based on what Albaladejo does.

(6:16) Albaladejo gets Zaun to pop out to center and Gardner makes an accurate throw to nail the runner at home. Inning (finally) over. Sabathia pitched 4 1/3, gave up 8 hits, 6 Earned Runs, walked five, 2 wild pitches and struck out ZERO. Terrible debut for Sabathia, simply had no command. He will be fine this year, but you would like to see a better start to begin the season. Replay shows runner was actually safe at home, but, were Yankee fans so who cares!

(6:20) Posada hits the first Yankee homer of the year. It ties him w/Don Mattingly for 8th all time on the Yankee list. 6-2, Cano walks. Maybe we can get something going here.

(6:22) RBI Double by Nady. In a shocking turn of events, a fan touched the ball, but the the ump actually allowed Cano to score. Very nice. Now 6-3 Orioles all in a matter of minutes.

(6:30) Jeter gets a single up the middle, but a terrible base running mistake by Nady ends the inning. Swisher? Swisher? Bueller?

(6:45) Albaladejo and Coke both looked good. 6-3 Orioles after 6 complete innings. Im sure Phil Coke will come out for more.

(6:49) Single by Damon and a home run for Matsui. Matsui has looked good today. Teixeira is getting booed so badly by his hometown team. Ive been to dozens of Yankee/Red Sox games and I don't think I've ever heard booing this bad. 6-5 Orioles, this is turning into a game. Posada just walked on 4 pitches. Cano coming up to bat.

(6:57) Cano single, Nady up with 2 runners on. Lets earn that spot. (Even though he did have that RBI double)

(7:02) Nady grounded in to a double play.

Sorry, we had some technical problems. Swisher had a pinch hit double. Pena pinch ran. Gardner bunted him over, Jeter grounded out, Damon walked and Tex went 0-4 after he grounded up. Phil Coke gave up a homer that just made it over the fence. Things aren't looking good for the Yanks. 8-5 after 7 2/3

Lots of technical problems yesterday. Yanks lost 10-5. Albaladejo and Coke (in my opinion looked good) CC and Tex looked terrible (no need to panic) and most importantly, Posada and Matsui looked healthy. Also, the team really showed some fight after being down 6-1

You would like to have a better opening day, but even though many people wont find them, there was a lot of positive in yesterdays game.