As loyal viewers of the YES Network are well aware the Carribean Series is in full swing, with the Dominican Republic beating Mexico 10-6 on Friday. Baltimore’s Miguel Tejada (above), apparently satisfied that the Dominican Republic has surrounded him with enough decent players, hit a 3 run HR in the fifth inning.
Later that evening, Venezuela defeated Puerto Rico, 6-1. Former Mets IF Marco Scutaro connected for a 2nd inning grand slam off Jim McGrane.
YES’ coverage is on tape-delay and has all the signal clarity you might associate with the channels attempts at showing taped Manchester United matches once upon a time. Conversely, MLB.com is offering a webcast of each game in the tournament and the video/audio quality compared favorably to their last few seasons’ worth of MLB games online. The English-language feed wasn’t working, which is a shame. My Spanish is pretty bad, so I have no idea why Puerto Rico have “MC5” on the back of their jerseys. Verizon’s gaudy sponsorship of the Dominican Republic squad, I understand, but I didn’t think the surviving members of the MC5 were so flush with cash they could splash out on this sort of thing.
In college baseball, defending National Champions Texas dropped their season opener, 4-2 to the University Of San Diego. San Diego starter Josh Butler held the Longhorns to 2 singles over 5 innings while striking out 5.
In Division III action over at that baseball temple called Keller-Fazholz Field, Concordia University dropped a 12-6 decision to visiting Houston-Baptist. Slow-moving traffic in the southbound portion of I-35 can sometimes catch Concordia’s matinees, but my better half reminds me it is against the low to drive slower than 25mph.
Rounding out this pathetic excuse for an update on amateur baseball in the greater Austin area, Div. II’s St. Edwards (11-3 losers yesterday to Central Missouri State) will yank the curtain on the home portoin of their 2006 campaign next Friday when Central Arkansas comes-a-calling. The jobless and/or desperate are advised that admission to St. Edwards games was a mere $5 last season, and unless they’ve really gotten greedy between last year and this, dogs are allowed in for free.
If you catch a foul ball, however, you’ll probably have to give it back. Kind of like seeing a game in Japan, except the concessions aren’t as tasty.