I'm spending way too much time on The Weather Channel these days. I mean, I know what it looks like outside my door. I can see that. But I don't know what's in the forecast now or tonight in Chicago, Cleveland or, even though it's not all that far away from lovely Bristol, Conn., Boston and New York. I think I know as much about the wind patterns affecting the cumulous clouds over Denver as I do about Todd Helton's splits.
Why does this matter? Well, if you play in daily leagues, as I do, or even weekly ones to some extent, it's clear the weather has played a significant role in the season already. It's become commonplace to check out the bottom line on ESPNEWS around the time "Scrubs" is scheduled to begin and see a game or two has already been called off. No big deal? Try telling that to the fantasy owners who lost their first week in head-to-head leagues when the Indians had more games cancelled than completed.
Ichiro Suzuki and Grady Sizemore lead off for major league teams and do it well. Well, they haven't done it enough so far, through no fault of their own. They were second and sixth, respectively, in at-bats in 2006. These games will be played, so they might do that again. But currently Sizemore is tied at No. 196 (with half the Indians, by the way) in baseball for at-bats, with 22. Sizemore has fewer at-bats than Joe Borchard, Juan Uribe and 22 major league catchers, including Paul Bako. How many of you just opened another browser to look up not only which team Bako plays on, but who he is? Ichiro, by the way, has 18 at-bats. That's normally a weekend for him.
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Eric Karabell
