Opening Day (Night) At Last, Yankees Win

Finally: Baseball is back. It was Opening Day at last. Or Opening Night. And even that got cut short, for reasons that no one in the stadium could control.

But it's results that count.

Before the game between the New York Yankees and the defending World Champion Washington Nationals at Nationals Park in Washington last night, both teams took a knee, in recognition of the Black Lives Matter movement. And, instead of the usual lining up on the baselines for player introductions on Opening Day, they held a black tapestry, again in solidarity with BLM. This was before, not during, the playing of the National Anthem.

There are currently 2 BLM signs at Nats Park, which is just 3 miles from the White House. A BLM logo was also drawn on the pitcher's mound.

Dr. Anthony Fauci, head of the fight against COVID-19, threw out the ceremonial first ball. It was an awful pitch, way off to his left. True, he's 79 years old, and he's been busy. But he's from Brooklyn. Baseball should be in his blood.

On the other hand, we're not paying Fauci to play baseball, and we're not paying Giancarlo Stanton to find a vaccine.

What we are paying Stanton to do is get hits with men on base. If he can do that, as he has done seemingly so rarely in his 1st 2 seasons with the Yankees, then the rest of baseball is in trouble.

With 1 out in the top of the 1st, Aaron Judge hit a double. And then Stanton hit a tremendous blast to left-center, 459 feet from home plate. Already, the Yankees were up 2-0.

Gerrit Cole made his Yankee debut. He allowed a home run to Adam Eaton, but that was the only hit he allowed. He struck out 5 and walked 1.

The Yankees got to Max Scherzer again in the 3rd, with Judge doubling home Tyler Wade. Then they loaded the bases in the top of the 5th, and Stanton singled home a run.

There were 5 innings completed, making it official if there was inclement weather. Sure enough, in the top of the 6th, the umpires called for the tarpaulin. They waited about an hour before calling, it, and, with the weather reporters not encouraging, called it.

It must be weird for John Sterling to be on the radio and get the word. He might be like, "Well, they just called it, because of the weather. So, ballgame over, Yankees win. The-e-e-e Yankees win."

Yankees 4, Nationals 1. WP: Cole (1-0). No save. LP: Scherzer (0-1).

The teams will take today off, and then play again on Saturday night at 7:15, with James Paxton starting for the Bronx Bombers, and Stephen Strasburg for the... uh... District Destroyers. They go again on Sunday afternoon at 1:00. Patrick Corbin starts for Washington, and this is where the Yankees had hoped to start Masahiro Tanaka, but, due to that line shot off his head a few days ago, they decided to scratch him from his 1st start of the season. So Sunday's starter is undecided at press time.

The Mets open at home this afternoon, at 4:00, against the Atlanta Braves. In the other direction, the Phillies open at home tonight, at 7:00, against the Miami Marlins.