SeaSportsCamp - About Sports

And now we are down to 4 - for both NCAA men’s basketball and NCAA men’s hockey.

For basketball, it is the first time in tournament history that the final 4 is comprised of the 4 #1 seeds - Kansas, Memphis, North Carolina, and UCLA. On Saturday April 5, Memphis will play UCLA, and North Carolina will play Kansas. The final will be Monday, April 7.

For hockey, the “frozen four” consist of Boston College, Michigan, North Dakota, and Notre Dame. On Thursday, April 10 North Dakota will play BC, and Michigan will face off against Notre Dame. The final will be Saturday, April 12.

Red Sox Nation is quite taken with rookie outfielder Jacoby Ellsbury, the first MLB player of Navajo Indian decent (the subject of today’s trivia question). There was a very nice article about him in the Boston Globe Magazine yesterday (see: The Jacoby Factor, By Neil Swidey, March 30, 2008).

I did not realize that in only his 3rd major league game, on a pitch into the dirt that headed for the visitors dugout, Ellsbury took off from second to third and never stopped until he reached home to score. Red Sox fans are not accustomed to that kind of speed. Must have been all of the dragonfly legs that he rubbed on his feet when he was a kid.

Let’s hope that Ellsbury is “counting coup” doing things like that here in Boston for a long time.

Going into the 2008 season it has been 99 years since the Chicago Cubs last won the World Series (in 1908 against the Detroit Tigers). The 99 year Wold Series drought is the longest in MLB history. If the Cubies do not win it all this year they make it an even 100.

The last time the Cubs were even in the World Series was 1945 (for some historical perspective - World War II ended in 1945). In ‘45 the Cubs lost to the Detroit Tigers. The closest they have been since was in 2007 when they won the National League Central Division title.

Andy Roddick Saturday in his post-match conference in Miami, talking about a requested line-calling video replay when the Hawk-Eye replay system would not work:

The U.S. is on the verge of reaching the Fed Cup final and capturing the title for the first time since 2000. But Saturday at the Sony Ericsson Open in Miami, Lindsay Davenport revealed the U.S.'s chances have lessened considerably without the participation of either Venus or Serena Williams.

Rafael Nadal is the king of clay, but it is becoming increasingly clear he never will be on top of the throne in men's tennis.

Opening night for the 2008 MLB season is tomorrow, March 30, 2008 as the Atlanta Braves take on the Washington Nationals at Nationals Park, Washington, D.C..

Opening day (the western hemisphere version) will be Monday, March 31, 2008. Playing on Monday are:

• Royals vs. Tigers
• Blue Jays vs. Yankees
• D-Backs vs. Reds
• Brewers vs. Cubs
• White Sox vs. Indians
• Rays vs. Orioles
• Nationals vs. Phillies
• Mets vs. Marlins
• Giants vs. Dodgers
• Rockies vs. Cardinals
• Rangers vs. Mariners
• Angels vs. Twins
• Pirates vs. Braves
• Astros vs. Padres

I admit, I saw nothing of the match, and I honestly didn’t give it much of a look thinking Novak Djokovic would not lose to a qualifier named Kevin Anderson that he had never seen before today.

Over the past three-four years, has there been a major men’s tournament harder to predict than this year’s Sony Ericsson Open? Novak Djokovic, as defending champion and winner of this year’s two big hard court events is now undoubtedly the favorite to win the crown.

Well, in the process of fixing a bug with the 2007 GS totals, I decided it made sense to spend three more hours and add retrosheet-extracted fielding to the player pages. Retrosheet data is essentially complete back to 1956, so for those years forward, we now have. SB, CS, and WP allowed data for all catchers. [...]