ARLINGTON, Tex. -- The first game of the Major League Baseball season is more than 1/162nd of a schedule.
It's a time of new beginnings, handshakes and high, apple-pie-in-the-Texas sky hopes.
The build-up:
6 A.M. (CDT) Blue Jays catcher John Buck awakes at the team hotel in nearby Irving, Tex., home of the Byron Nelson golf tournament.
"I went to sleep watching film of the Texas Rangers hitters," Buck said. "I woke up and watched some more."
7:15 A.M. Buck takes a cab to Arlington.
8 A.M. The Jays first bus leaves their hotel. General manager Alex Anthopoulos, assistant GM Tony LaCava and pro scouting director Perry Minasian head for a workout to see University of Texas-Arlington Mavericks outfielder Michael Choice.
"We have to be the best looking group of scouts ever to attend a workout," LaCava jokes as all are suitably attired for the opener.
Also there are Jays scouts Brandon Mozley of Ozark, Mo., and Steve Miller of Plano, Tex., home of Willie Upshaw.
Scouts from the Philadelphia Phillies and Milwaukee Brewers are there also to see the projected first-rounder.
8:30 A.M. Walking through parking lots outside Rangers Stadium, I see tailgate parties underway. Fans are playing washers (like horseshoes tossed onto a board with holes) and ladder ball (a rope with a ball on each end is tossed toward a small fence with three ropes across it).
Off to the right sits the Cowboys' new palatial estate, looking as if a spaceship had landed.
"We mean no harm!"
9:07 A.M. Ricky Romero, who starts Thursday against the Rangers, heads to left centre to play long toss and then throw to his bullpen.
9:19 A.M. Rangers broadcaster Tom Grieve comes into the press box, dapper as ever for the homer opener. I tell Rangers vice-president John Blake that Grieve homered in the first home opener I covered. Blake says "1978?" Right. Or was it two homers? "I only hit two all year," Grieve said. Grieve homered off Rudy May with one out in the ninth to force extras and the New York Mets beat the Montreal Expos before 37,172 fans at Olympic Stadium on April 14, 1978.
9:30 A.M. The Jays' second bus leaves for the ball park.
9:50 A.M. John McDonald is in an empty dugout alone. He didn't travel to Houston, instead returning to East Lyme, Conn., to visit his ailing father. McDonald missed Sunday's workout because of the flu. He'll be last man off the bench for the opener. His cell phone rings. "How are you feeling?" It's dad.
9:58 A.M. Perry Minasian, Jays director of pro scouting sits in the Toronto dugout.
Different huh?
"Very different," says Minasian, who from 1989 until 2008 was on the Rangers side working from bat boy to manager Buck Showalter's assistant.
Buddy Bell would call Minasian "Little Inky" because he resembled Pete Incaviglia, who is announced three hours later as part of the Rangers alumni.
10:33 A.M. Minasian turns to LaCava in the dugout and points to the scoreboard in right: "You just missed me when the Rangers clinched in 1998."
LaCava: "Why are they now showing Pudge Rodriguez instead of you?"
10:39 A.M. Vernon Wells was a star with the Bowie High School Volunteers and was chosen fifth overall in 1997. He has 20 to 25 friends and families in each suite to watch him play.
10:41 A.M. Buck comes out of the dugout.
"Why is today's game different than a week or a month from now?" Buck repeated.
"Can't you feel the excitement? All the aches and pains are gone. Everyone has a batting average of zero. Every team is in first, except for the Yankees. This has a playoff atmosphere. There are zero stats involved, no one is saying 'man, that guy's really struggling.' This, this is baseball at its purest."
10:49 A.M. Security guard Michael Bennigar is in front of the Jays dugout.
"Sir, thank you for coming to the ball park, could you please get your feet off the dugout," he says for the first of 20 times.
10:51 A.M. Broadcaster Alan Ashby shakes Romero's hand. Romero is not pitching but hand shakes abound opening day. Paul Molitor once said on opening day in Seattle in 1993 "this is why we worked all winter, no one has ever hit 1.000 yet, but I'm going to try."
10:52 A.M. Omar Malave was signed by the Jays in 1980. After nine seasons playing, he began coaching and managing in the minors. This his first opener in the big leagues.
"My most special since 1981 with the Lara Cardinales in Venezuela, my first as a player," Malave says.
10:54 A.M. Manager Cito Gatson begins his daily press briefing explaining he has a cold, "probably caught it from Jerry Howarth."
"I thought of hitting Aaron Hill fourth, but Wells says he's comfortable there, we'll start this way," Gaston tells reporters.
11:04 A.M. Clint Hurdle, Rangers coach, says opening day is "baseball Christmas."
11:08 A.M. Former Jays coach Jackie Moore, with the Rangers coach, had his first opener in 1958.
"Where's Paul Beeston? I had a new set of cowboy boots for him and he doesn't show -- again," Moore said. "I've got butterflies. If you don't get them on opening day you'd better quit."
11:16 A.M. Wells hugs his best friend Michael Young by the cage.
They'd been friends since 1997 at class-A St. Catharines.
12:11 P.M. Howarth shows for the manager's show.
I have not seen him since Saturday when he could not speak because of laryngitis.
I told Gaston the flight from Houston to Dallas would be the most peaceful he'd ever had.
12:33 P.M. Gaston, of San Antonio, Tex., heads to the third-base line as player intros begins.
12:43 P.M. Michael Borts, lead singer of the Dallas Knights, sings the Canadian anthem and country singer Neal McCoy (who sings This Time I Hurt Her More Than She Loves Me and Billy's Got His Beer Goggles on) the American anthem as four F-16s from the 301st Fighter Squadron in Ft. Worth fly over.
12:43 P.M. A moment of silence for former Rangers right-hander Jim Bibby and front-office executive Bobby Bragan.
12:55 P.M. Roger Staubach, former Cowboys quarterbacks, throws the ceremonial first pitch.
1:07 P.M. Rangers' Scott Feldman throws a called first strike to Jose Bautista for the first pitch of the game.
3:50 P.M. Jarrod Saltalamacchia singles against a drawn-in outfield off Jason Frasor to cap a two-run bottom of the ninth in a 5-4 Rangers win.
