Star Struck

About a week or so has gone by now and spring training is in full force. The day starts early in the morning and often doesn't end until late in the afternoon. Every morning, 7 days a week our alarm goes off at 6 and I am to the park by about 6:45. The day usually starts with a little time in the training room to stretch and get ready for practice. Position players have early (8 A.M.) hitting or defense pretty much every day and all 170 or so guys come together to officially start practice at about 9 or 9:30. We go through a stretching routine, do some sort of defensive drill and take batting practice until about noon when we take a break before playing games.

Our first two days of games have been against the Angels and the A's and although I have been practicing with the Rookie/Low-A team the past couple days, I have gotten a chance to get some playing time. The first day I played a few innings at first base with our AA team and went 1-for-1 with a single up the middle and a walk. Oh yeah, Greg Maddux was there too if anyone knows who that is. Today, I played with our Hi-A team for three innings and got two more at-bats and again went 1-for-1 with a double and was hit by a pitch. We had a guest appearance in the line-up by Aramis Ramirez (a.k.a. the Cubs' third place playing All-Star). He was down seeing some pitching and was an awesome guy to be around.

Camp so far has had its ups and downs but the last couple days have ended well and I hope the trend continues over the next couple weeks. Until then...

JP

First Taste of Spring Training

It's that time of year again. The snow is starting to melt (finally) and spring training games are all over the TV. All of this means that it is time for the minor leaguers to report to spring training as well, and being as this is my first, I am excited. The past six months have been the longest I have gone without being a part of an actual baseball team since I was probably 4 or 5 so I was very anxious to see where I was going to stack up with the other guys.

Pitchers and catchers reported Saturday and the official report date for position guys is Wednesday, but I came out Sunday afternoon to get a little early work in before the whole minor league system was here. The sunny and 70 degree weather I was expecting has been nowhere to be found so far as Sunday, Monday and Tuesday have all been in the 50s with rain.

Even with the rain, I have been able to get out with a few of the guys that are already here and do a lot of what I wanted (hit, take ground balls, etc.). I'm feeling pretty good so far and it will be crazy when all 160, or however many there are, minor league guys arrive starting tomorrow. I'll keep everyone updated how the first couple days go and any stories I might have...

JP

p.s. -- I almost forgot to mention something. We all have Cubs jerseys with our last names on them so I was pretty excited just to see what 'Petraitis' was going to look like on the back of an official Cubs spring training uniform. Unfortunately I'm still waiting because when I looked before I left the clubhouse today, the name on the back of my jersey was 'PetraLtis'. Oh well, I can dream.