It's time to play the music
It's time to light the lights
It's time to meet the Muppets on the Muppet Show tonight.

Yes, it's Opening Day -- or, to be more precise, tonight is Opening Night for the Cardinals and Mets -- so it's time to cue the music (not just anthems) for a Hall of Names team that reminds us, for all the court room battles, for all the medical drama, for all the behind-the-scenes clubhouse headlines that drive the sport during the off-season (and sometimes, during the season itself, unfortunately), baseball is all about fun.

That's right, it's an all-Muppet team. Now, to be sure ...

Box veteran Mike Denyszyn returns to provide our look at the Sox in poetry and prose. Thanks and take it away, Mike D.

 Here's the roster.  Towers will be the 5th starter, Zambrano is in the bullpen.  Accardo, Janssen and Marcum are in the pen.

Rosario has been designated for assignment and will almost certainly be traded.

Minor league action gets going next Thursday.   Teams were scheduled to be announced today with most teams flying out to their host cities on Monday.  We learned today that Chip Cannon and Sergio Santos will be headed to New Hampshire to start the season.  The Blue Jays also recently signed Wayne Lydon's return and released several players.  Luke Hopkins, Danny Hill and David Hicks retired.

Yesterday, the Roster looked at the Jay offence, and this morning, it was the pitching and defence. It is time for some Friday afternoon fun. We asked the Roster to supply their win predictions, and keys to the season in a sentence or two.

Yesterday, the Roster dissected the Jays offence. Less fun, but just as necessary is today's look at the pitching staff and defence.  We welcome #2JBrumfield to the Roster. #2JB will be joining the minor league crew in 2007 and makes his debut here.

As part of their "Catch Spring Fever" promotion, the Bloor Cinema is showing "Spaceman: A Baseball Odyssey" tomorrow (Friday) night at 7 p.m. Bill Lee will be in attendance and take questions after the movie. Brownies not provided.

The Batters Box Roster convened for its biannual meeting in mid-March to talk about the Jays. The virtual sandwiches were stale, the beer was flat, but the conversation was, as usual, lively. In Part 1, we mooted about some questions about the Jay offence.

A look at the Vegas lines for team wins this season.

These aren’t your father’s San Diego Padres. In fact, they’re not your last girlfriend’s Padres. They’re not Bruce Bochy’s Padres, for the first time since 1994. This year they’re not Jake Peavy’s or Chris Young’s, no matter how much the hopes of this team may ride on those three right arms. Maybe they’re Trevor Hoffman’s Padres, but they’re always going to be his Padres until he retires. So, whose Padres are they in 2007?

[I am pleased to post Roster alumnus Craig Burley's Pittsburgh Pirates Preview. Take it away Craig...]

Last year, I began my Pirates preview as follows:

In about 2009, the tone of all Pirates previews will have changed. By that time, the tone will either have become noticeably more respectful or will have blown over the fine line between failure and utter despair. The Pirates have not made the playoffs or finished with a .500 record since Barry Bonds played for them.

The Pirates lost 95 games last year, something that they had done only one other time since 1992, when they last made the playoffs under Jim Leyland (and lost the NLCS on Francisco Cabrera's game-winning single in Game 7)...

To say, as many are, that the Pirates look like a team on the way up is not accurate. This is a team still just trying to halt, never mind reverse, terminal blood loss. The way up is the other way.

The 2005 Pirates committed the three cardinal sins of a baseball team. They were bad, colorless and unambitious. But in all three cases, it wasn't as bad as it might seem.

I could write exactly the same phrases this year, and be correct on nearly all accounts. The Pirates lost 95 games, the Pirates were bad, the Pirates were colorless, the Pirates were unambitious. The Pirates are a year closer to (and two years away from breaking) the Phillies' record for most consecutive seasons below .500.

Over the past three years, the pre-season New York Yankees previews have all forecast, incorrectly in each case as it turned out, a Bronx Bomber World Series trip.

Let's step back a little and ask a regular-season-level question of this ever-changing pinstriped ballclub. How do they stack up against the rest of the A.L. East? Getting into the playoffs is really the whole point of the regular season, and as the Red Sox, and more recently the seemingly overmatched Cardinals, have shown, once there, anything can happen.

So, do the Yankees "get there" in 2007 to see what happens?

Just a few days of spring training left. The starters seem to be in place now. The battle will be for the final couple bullpen spots.

Come and join us at the Harbour Sports Grille (Yonge and Lakeshore, a few minutes walk south of Union) on Monday - 12:45 onwards.  As Coach says - tell your boss you've got a Doctor's Appointment, and watch Surgeon General Halladay put on a clinic.

(Liam, our Designated Pinch-Hitter, would like to express his regrets for the delay in submitting his look at this year’s Rockies. Which was fine. Then he started asking if the Box would reimburse him for his Expenses…. We all had a good yuck about that. We’ll let him tell the rest of the tale.)