Furcal “questionable” for opener

Grady Little just said Rafael Furcal is “questionable” for Monday’s season opener at Milwaukee — which means, of course, that he probably won’t play. Grady said Furcal should be ready shortly after opening day, but that still leaves the possibility — or perhaps the probability — that he will open the season on the DL because it can be backdated to March 23, which means he still could return on April 7 at San Francisco. And that also would solve, at least temporarily, the question of what to do about Wilson Valdez, who is having a spectacular spring but for whom the Dodgers don’t appear to have a roster spot. Grady said a final decision on Furcal will come Saturday.

Dodger Stadium never looked so good

The grass is perfectly manicured (kudos to Eric Hansen and his crew), with the familiar diamond pattern mowed into the outfield. The sky is perfectly blue, without a cloud in sight, and the San Gabriels are in clear view. Probably going to cool off considerably by game time, but it’s great to be here again. The team is already on the field for stretching at 3:33 p.m., so I guess they’re treating it like just another spring training game, which is what it is. But it’s still going to be a great night to be here, so come on out if you don’t have plans. If nothing else, it would be a good chance to test out the new parking plan.

Sorry about the comments not posting

And all this time I thought you were ignoring me. Turns out that under the new blog format, which has been in place for about a week, I actually have to APPROVE of the comments before they are posted, which explains why they haven’t been posting since we started the new format. My apologies to all for my lack of responses. Hopefully, I have fixed the problem, and your comments will be posted more quickly in the future.

You gotta check this out

Hello, Southern California, it’s great to finally be home. Anyway, as anyone who has been reading this blog all spring knows, I’m a HUGE proponent of the Dodgers moving spring training to Arizona. But there is a part of me that will always miss the charm, the ambience and the history of Dodgertown, and I wanted to give you a link to a brief web video — marvelously put together by Eric Neel and Gary Bogdon, with a helping hand from a really good buddy of mine, Dodgers team historian Mark Langill — on the history of Dodgertown and what it means that the Dodgers are leaving. This is a must-watch, and it’s only a few minutes long, so take the time if you can. You won’t regret it. You can see it at the link below.

http://sports.espn.go.com/espn/eticket/story?page=dodgertown

These two might meet again

The Dodgers and Tigers played to a 3-3 tie today and won’t see each other during the regular season. But they might see each other again. When the Daily News’ baseball preview comes out tomorrow, you will see that your humble correspondent has predicted that the two will square off in the World Series. I picked the Tigers to win, but that’s just a guess, because the postseason has become such a crap shoot with so many teams now in it. But this Detroit team reminds me a lot of the Oakland club that lost to the Dodgers in the ’88 Series. The A’s were supposed to win that series handily, but thanks to Kirk Gibson and Orel Hershiser, they got steamrolled — eerily similar to what happened to the Tigers last fall against a clearly inferior St. Louis club, which won that series in five games. The A’s went back in ’89 and, sandwiched around the Bay Area earthquake, swept the Giants in the World Series. For now, I’m predicting a similar rebound for the Motor City Kitties.