Some Random Thoughts from Spring Training

I'll admit it. I've been an awful blogger the past couple of weeks. I'll spare you the excuses.

Anyway, now that Spring Training is a few weeks old, I've had a couple of thoughts that keep repeating:

• I wish the Yankees would do something about the fact that Derek Jeter is not going to be able to play shortstop for a whole heck of a lot longer. They've got a couple prospects at the lower levels, I think, but I would love to see if perhaps they considered trading some of their surplus pitching talent for a closer-to-ready SS...unless the kids the Yankees have in their system really are supposed to be that good...but, given that you never hear them mentioned in the nearly the same breath as Jackson, Montero, Romine, et al, that doesn't bode very well.

• Posada's been swinging the bat well. I wonder how many people remember that in last spring training, in the first game against USF, Posada hit a triple?

• I wouldn't worry too much about the pitching right now--and here I'm talking about the starting. All you need to worry about is whether or not they stay healthy. Don't go too much on Spring Training performances--remember how good Canó was in March and how bad he was in April?

• As the economy continues to collapse and enters downright scary-as-hell territory, I have to think that it might soon become very possible to see ticket prices, at least from fan-to-fan selling, come down a tad. Granted, no, you still won't be able to afford tickets for Opening Day, but the prices for the Cubs exhibition games, at least the ones I've seen, aren't too bad (until you consider that face value is 1923 prices, but we'll ignore that). I'm still hoping to magically land a ticket (or two) for Friday night, but I have to go to a conference all day on Saturday, which is a shame since I'd much prefer the day game.

• If you haven't seen it, PBP was mentioned on the New York Magazine website here the other day, under the appropriate named linked 'fanatic-blogs'. My inappropriate sense of self-importance grows ever larger.