Wednesday, May 21, 2008

The most exciting thing about baseball is...

When Chicago Cubs catcher Geovany Soto hit an inside-the-park home run against the Houston Astros, I said that it was the most exciting thing to see in baseball.

Then, newly acquired center fielder Jim Edmonds made one of those patented "Jimmy Baseball" over-the-shoulder catches to rob Hunter Pence of what could possibly have been an inside-the-parker for the Astros.

I said that was one of the best catches I've ever seen, even though a keen eye would take notice that Edmonds misjudged the ball off the bat.

However, those two amazing plays took a backseat hours later when Boston Red Sox lefty Jon Lester no-hit the Kansas City Royals.

We're a month and a half into the baseball season, yet we've had a lot of top-notch plays happen already.

Minnesota Twins center fielder Carlos Gomez hit for the cycle (single, double, triple and home run) against the Chicago White Sox. Gomez was the prize that came to the Twins from the New York Mets in exchange for Johan Santana.

The White Sox have been excruciatingly close to not one, but two no hitters already this season. Lest we forget about Mark Buerhle's no-no in 2007.

Heck, even the struggling Cleveland Indians had their own highlight reel play when infielder Asdrubal Cabrera turned an unassisted triple play.

However, if there is such a thing as the low-light, Dusty Baker and the Cincinnati Reds take the cake.

If Dusty isn't asking sluggers Edwin Encarnacion or Adam Dunn to put down a sacrifice bunt, his team bats out of order. Something my little league team never did, and they had ME on the team!

All of those things are more interesting than anything I've ever seen live.

Want my list? I don't care, I'm going to give it to you anyway. It will seem biased, but a lot of the baseball I've seen has come at either Wrigley Field or Comiskey Park.

  1. Mark Prior out duels Greg Maddux in Game 3 of the 2003 NLDS. There's nothing like playoff baseball at Wrigley Field.
  2. Sammy Sosa and Moises Alou hit back-to-back jacks to beat the Reds in April 2004. This happened after the Cubs batted out of order (again, under Dusty Baker's watch because he doesn't know how to pull a successful double switch.)
  3. Carlos Lee's walk-off winner against the Cubs in 2000 at Comiskey in 14 innings. Sammy Sosa erased an 0-fer night with a game-tying home run against Keith Foulke. But Courtney Duncan got lit up by El Caballo.
So, what's the most exciting thing in baseball?

- LMed

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