Friday: Welcome Back, Baseball

Amidst all of the posts I have written this week, I neglected to mention the biggest news: Spring Training has started. Baseball is back.

I don't care that this is "only" Spring Training--the fact that the outcomes of the games don't matter does not bother me. As the immortal Sandy Koufax said, “People who write about spring training not being necessary have never tried to throw a baseball.”

Hearing Eric Nadel's voice crooning over the airwaves for the first time in five months was the best moment of my week. I was hanging on every word between his trademark phrases that bookend every game: "Hello there everybody, I'm Eric Nadel" and "So long, everybody." And just think: we have at least seven more months of this. Everyday. (I love football, but who likes to wait a week between games?).

I love everything about the start of the baseball season. Everything from stadiums overplaying baseball classics like "Centerfield" and "Glory Days" to baseball and softball games springing up in parks all over town. From freeing your gloves from their winter hibernation to hearing Josh Lewin's latest pop-culture reference. It's all great.

Forget March 21 -- or whenever spring "officially" starts. New rule: Spring starts when baseball starts (and winter begins when baseball ends). Sounds good to me.

Here's to a great 2009 season in Major League Baseball (and hopefully in Texas Rangers baseball, too). In the words of the late great Harry Caray, "[the] season is coming, the good times are gonna roll.”

Welcome back, baseball.