Dodger Thoughts

“The crack of the bat! The roar of the crowd! That’s right — baseball’s back!” And I see no better way to celebrate than running this Newsradio clip about Opening Day. Bill McNeal forever …

• The 100th anniversary of the Ebbets Field groundbreaking was Sunday, and Chris Jaffe put it some context at the Hardball Times.
• Tweet of the day Sunday: Eric Stephen of True Blue L.A. tried to pass the blame to autocorrect for the following:
  

  Catcher’s dream: Matt Treanor gets to call balls an strikes while bathing Clayton Kershaw in the intrasquad game

• J.P. Hoonstra has joined the springtime beat coverage of the Dodgers, representing the Los Angeles Newspaper Group (Daily News, etc.). Here’s his notebook from Sunday, led by Clayton Kershaw.
• Ernest Reyes of Blue Heaven continues to supply us with vintage Dodger clips.
• More from Reyes: a 1943 photo of Roy Campanella in Mexico.
• The National League West is previewed by Jay Jaffe and Geoff Young for Baseball Prospectus. It’s not exceedingly pretty.
• Fangraphs ranks the 2012 Dodger catching the worst in the majors. I still find it hard to believe this possible when your starting catcher has a career .360 on-base percentage in the majors and .406 in the minors.
• In his spring debut, Arizona pitcher Trevor Bauer exceedingly impressed Keith Law of ESPN.com. More signs that Bauer could have a Kershaw-like effect on the Diamondbacks.
• Who is the greatest character on The Wire? Alex Pappademas of Grantland sets up a 32-player bracket. The seedings are highly questionable, however.
• My summary of The Lorax: Good for kids, but disappointing for this here grown-up. No matter where you stand on the Seuss or environmental spectrum, the premise seems stretched beyond what it was meant for. For a new movie that’s truly for all ages, try The Secret World of Arriety.