Verlander And Snell Ready To Open 2019
Baseball is back. As Frank Deford wrote in his classic Spring Has Sprung (here), “Opening Day. There is only one, and it’s in baseball. The theater has opening nights scattered here and there about the calendar, and there are various opening days of…the fishing season, the race meeting, the NFL season. But there is only one Opening Day, when grandmothers drop like flies and dreams are born anew.”
The Rays will open the season at 4:00 against the Houston Astros who send Justin Verlander to the mound. The Rays will counter with 2018 Cy Young Award winner Blake Snell.
Rays Lineup:
Austin Meadows – RF
Tommy Pham – LF
Ji-Man Choi – 1B
Brandon Lowe – DH
Yandy Diaz – 3B
Joey Wendle – 2B
Willy Adames – SS
Kevin Kiermaier – CF
Mike Zunino – C
About The Lineup:
Kevin Cash likes to alternate the handedness of his lineup, but against Houston three of the first four hitters are left handed. “It’s Verlander. We’re going to try to bunch up as many guys as we can. We’ll probably do that for the bulk of the season.”
He also added that the Astros bullpen is extremely right handed. As a matter of fact, the only lefty they have in their pen is Framber Valdez who has pitched all of 37 big league innings.
