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