Exhibition Game Thread: Test Runnin’

Baseball in New York is finally back. It’s been six long months since the city last hosted a game featuring big leaguers, and even though tonight’s game is just an exhibition, who cares? It’s baseball in New York.

The star of the show will undoubtedly be the New Stadium, which will experience the tender lovin’ of a Major League game for the first time tonight, even though the game doesn’t count. The weatherman says to expect some showers throughout the evening, but the baseball gods have a way of taking care of these things. Remember, the final game at the Old Stadium was threatened by rain, but come first pitch there was nothing but blue skies and sunshine.

Lou Piniella and his Chicago Baby Bears will help christen the new place in what amounts to nothing more than a test run of all the services and neat little features. Between tonight and tomorrow the bigwigs will get an idea of what needs to be improved before the season starts, and then while the Yanks are on the road the next two weeks, that stuff will be taken care of. Beautiful, ain’t it?

Here’s the starting nine:

Jeter, SS
Damon, LF
Teixeira, 1B
Matsui, DH
Posada, C
Cano, 2B
Nady, RF
Ransom, 3B
Gardner, CF

On the mound is number forty, Chien-Ming Wang.

Both YES and the MLB Network will be carrying the game; first pitch is scheduled for 7:15. Enjoy folks.

Note: Long-time RAB reader and commentor Arman Tamzarian asked us to pass this along (no, that’s not his real name):

I’m a Program Manager with Larkin Street Youth Services in San Francisco. I’m running a half marathon to raise money for the program, and am looking for sponsorship help. Larkin Street has been working with homeless youth for the past 25 years in San Francisco. Larkin Street not only works with youth ages 12-25 around housing, but has a whole division teaching resume building, interview skills, job retention, and getting youth jobs. Larkin Street works to move youth out of the system and into independence.

You can find his sponsorship page here, and you can also find more info about Larkin St. here. Even if it’s just a couple bucks, please consider helping out.

Photo Credit: Flickr user matt.hintsa