Reflections: 2010 Bucs/Pilots DH opener

Hello baseball fans. As you may know, yesterday marked the first contests between the Bucs and Glacier Pilots of Anchorage at Mulcahy Stadium. It was a beautiful, sunny summer day in Anchorage...or so I hear. I was on the road traveling from Montana to Portland and my day was far less sunny. More like driving through the world's longest car wash. Of course, that meant that I couldn't take in the games, or get them on the radio. My next recourse was to have a good buddy who has expressed interest in potentially contributing to this blog live-blog the games for you, but I was too busy packing to get that set up for him in time.

But on a monumental occasion such as this, I can't let things pass me by without a few words on the matter. So after immersing myself in the recaps & box scores, here's my thoughts...

Just to set the record straight, this was a seven-inning home/away twin billing for the teams, for exhibition purposes. Despite the fact that they're both ABL teams, the results aren't part of the "league" standings. This is kind of a departure for the league which usually ships up a few traveling teams for its warm-up series. As stated in a recent ADN article on the matter, this is mostly due to financial reasons; it doesn't pay to import teams up to the great white north with the economy and traveling costs the way they are these days. With the exception of the Heroes of the Diamond military all-star squad, the ABL has turned to internal options, such as this match-up.