The Major League Baseball season opens tomorrow with a new league for the Houston Astros, San Francisco seeking a third World Series title in four seasons and the New York Yankees hurt, but dangerous.
The six-month campaign starts with the Astros playing host to the Texas Rangers and Houston moving this year from the National League Central to the American League West, giving each league three five-team groupings.
That means inter-league games, once unheard of until the best-of-seven World Series title showdown in October, are now to be played almost every night of the season after being reserved for only select dates in recent years.
San Francisco’s dominating pitchers, including standout Tim Lincecum and left-hander Barry Zito, will be counted upon to keep the Giants in contention, while last year’s National League Most Valuable Player Buster Posey and Pablo Sandoval provide batting power.
However, the Giants will have to contend with the big-spending Los Angeles Dodgers, whose new owners have poured US$230 million into salaries this season, landing pitcher Zack Greinke, southpaw hurlers Ryu Hyun-jin of South Korea and reliever J.P. Howell, while relying on Matt Kemp to lead the hitters.
Baseball’s biggest spenders, the Yankees, have faced injury and controversy in the off-season.
New doping allegations have surfaced surrounding Alex Rodriguez and a Miami clinic. Curtis Granderson is sidelined until May with a broken arm, while Mark Teixeira has a wrist injury that might need season-ending surgery, Derek Jeter is coming off ankle surgery and relief ace Mariano Rivera is back after surgery for one last season before retirement.
Unless C.C. Sabathia can spark the pitchers and Robinson Cano can stabilize sluggers, the Yankees could have a long season in the American League East.
Rising in that division are the Toronto Blue Jays, who landed last year’s NL Cy Young Award winner R.A. Dickey and Mark Buerhle to pitch, doping-disgraced outfielder Melky Cabrera and shortstop Jose Reyes in a bid for their first trip to the playoffs since winning the 1993 World Series.
Detroit third baseman Miguel Cabrera comes off the first Triple Crown season since 1967, leading the AL with a .330 batting average, 44 home runs and 139 runs batted in.
Taiwanese world No. 1 women’s doubles star Hsieh Su-wei on Saturday overcame a first-set loss to win her opening match at the Madrid Open. Top seeds Hsieh and partner Elise Mertens of Belgium, with whom she last month won her fourth Indian Wells women’s doubles title, bounced back from a rocky first set to beat Asia Muhammad of the US and Aldila Sutjiadi of Indonesia 2-6, 6-4, 10-2. Hsieh and Mertens were next to face Heather Watson of the UK and Xu Yifan of China in the round of 16. Thirty-eight-year-old Hsieh last month reclaimed her world No. 1 spot after her Indian
EYES ON THE PRIZE: Armed with three solid men’s singles shuttlers and doubles Olympic champions, Taiwan aim to make their first Thomas Cup semi-final, Chou Tien-chen said Taiwanese badminton star Tai Tzu-ying yesterday quickly dispatched Malaysia’s Goh Jin Wei in straight sets, while her male counterpart Chou Tien-chen beat Germany’s Kai Schaefer, as Taiwan’s women’s and men’s teams won their Group B opening rounds of the TotalEnergies BWF Thomas and Uber Cup Finals in Chengdu, China. World No. 5 Tai beat Goh 21-19, 22-20 in a speedy 33 minutes, her fourth straight victory over the world No. 24 shuttler since they first faced each other in the quarter-finals of the 2018 Malaysia Open, where Tai went on to win the women’s singles title. Malaysia followed up Tai’s opening victory
Chen Yi-tung (陳奕通) secured a historic Olympic berth on Sunday by winning the senior men’s foil event at the 2024 Asia Oceania Zonal Olympic Fencing Qualifiers in United Arab Emirates. Chen defeated Samuel Elijah of Singapore 15-4 in the final in Dubai to secure the only wild card in the event, making him the first male Olympian fencer from Taiwan in 36 years and only the sixth Taiwanese fencer to ever qualify for the quadrennial event. The last appearance by a Taiwanese male fencer at the Olympics was in 1988, when Wang San-tsai (王三財) and Cheng Ming-hsiang (鄭明祥) competed in Seoul. The
Rafael Nadal on Tuesday lost in straight sets to 31st-ranked Jiri Lehecka in the fourth round at the Madrid Open, while Taiwan’s Hsieh Su-wei advanced to the semi-finals in the women’s doubles. Nadal said that he was feeling good about his progress following his latest injury layoff. Nadal called it a “positive week” in every way and said his body held up well. “I was able to play four matches, a couple of tough matches,” Nadal said. “So very positive, winning three matches, playing four matches at the high level of tennis. I enjoyed a lot playing at home. I leave here with