Good morning everyone. I know exactly what kind of morning it is in Seattle because that's where I am right now. It's my mid-spring training break, so I'll be taking a week or so off. This makes up for the lost vacation week when the whole Erik Bedard deal broke, so no need to be sending me emails asking about my health. Everything's great. For all of you conspiracy buffs, this has nothing to do with me railing against MLB for its video restrictions yesterday. It was all planned months ago. I'll be hopping on another plane later this afternoon and will actually be touching down in Maui Mariner's backyard for an hour or so before connecting onward to a nearby beach spot.

Unfortunately, when we drew up our coverage schedule back in December, we had no idea that today's contest would feature Erik Bedard against Tim Lincecum. Such is life. Come mid-August, you'll have a vague recollection that today actually existed and will probably be on to bigger and more meaningful games when it comes to your favorite team.

So, we thought we'd give our intrepid NFL beat writer, Jose Romero, a taste of what the baseball life is all about. He's a good writer, is perfectly fluent in Spanish and has some interesting stories he plans to do. He will also be filling in on the blog. I really do appreciate him helping us out. Please, be nice to him.

It's been a great spring so far. One of my most fun when it comes to coverage because of all the diversity of what we've been doing on a multi-media scale. I can't wait to get back and begin the countdown to the regular season. Keep on reading. Don't be afraid to flood Jose with comments and questions. Can't have him thinking this baseball gig is a cakewalk.

By the way, an interesting post by DMZ in USS Mariner yesterday about the impact of possible press fallout on teams as the reason for them being reluctant to sign Barry Bonds. For what it's worth, I agree with him. Not that the press is generating all the "Bonds as clubhouse cancer" stories out of thin air -- plenty of his ex-teammates have gone on-record in the book Love Me, Hate Me to discuss what Bonds is like in a clubhouse -- but that yes, any team signing Bonds would be in a heap of trouble. DMZ also brings up Buck Weaver as a bad dude. There's a pretty good historical debate about that one. Here was my story on Weaver from back in the 2005 World Series that the White Sox won. Enjoy.