Cliff Lee gives up eight and gets the win. Such a meaningful stat.

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tell that to ESPN, who no doubt enjoys having the proper season-lidlifter on sunday nights (australia/first-games-on-the-moon notwithstanding). if there's one thing bud's consistent about it's bending over for the major networks and giving them whatever they want and thensome ("this time it counts!" for the all-star game) so if ESPN has a nice big ol deal with MLB there's no way they're going to change that around, especially since MLB Network cut into espn broadcasting a whole bunch of day games throughout the course of a season.

i get what they do with the goofy opening day thing where they have one set of teams go on sunday night with monday off, most everybody goes monday with tuesday off (with the exception of one series, this year it's CLE/OAK) and then the rest start on tuesday. if you go back to the 2003 season opener between the cubs and the expos there was like 6" of snow comign down so they were able to push opening day back from monday to tuesday and at least get the field shoveled for the ~25-30 degree game. good lord it was cold out there. so at least in terms of having a little wiggle-room right off of the bat that makes sense.... not to mention i think a 2ndary aim of the three-day-thing is that on the second main tues/day those teams that didn't play on monday have a little more shine and national exposure cuz there's a good chance ESPN is airing their game. i mean, who doesn't wait with bated breath for the 2014 astros to get their moment in the spotlight?

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anyways, that said, opening series huzzah! clayton kershaw is prolly worse off than the "one start" they were talking about (supposedly it's the same injury that screwed up andrew cashner in 2012. great) and then brian wilson blows it to the daddies in grand fashion. samardzija and liriano spin gems leading up to todd walker's late heroics.... cliff lee is 1-0 with a 14.40 ERA as of right now, k-rod comes in and gets the save instead of henderson (????), and some dude named cody asche on the phillies decided to go and have a ballgame with a 3/4 4R 2RBI 1HR game. good lord! RA dickey still sucks, david price looks good, teheran looked ok, and don't look now but emilio bonifacio is going to be the difference maker in the cubs' lineup. and holy crap those "C U B S" road jerseys are god-awful this year.

oh and 6IP superman stephen strasburg gave up 4ER early but still rebounded to have a 6IP 5H 4ER 2BB 10K gem that'll give you a 6.00/1.17 start to the season. god bless america! god bless the national pastime!

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