Opening Day News and Notes for the Dodgers

April 4, 2010 By chris

Can you feel it in the air? That sense of springtime anticipation when hope springs eternal. It can mean only one thing…Opening day is tomorrow! And it seems so fitting that today is Easter, as we look ahead to the rebirth of the Los Angeles Dodgers in 2010.

Today the team is in Pittsburgh, going through final workouts and preperations before tomorrow’s 10:00 a.m. PT game against the Pirates. Just a few notes before the action kicks off tomorrow morning:

Dylan Hernandez tweets that Garret Anderson has selected No. 9 for his uniform, replacing No. 00. Charlie Haeger will wear No. 49 and Carlos Monasterios will wear No. 37.

Josh Rawitch has a bunch of small updates from Pittsburgh, and reveals that Andre Ethier has a small knee bruise. The injury won’t stop him from playing in the regular season, but it is why he missed the last couple Spring Training games.

Josh also confirmed that the team will purchase Russ Ortiz’s contract on Monday and put Cory Wade on the DL (Wade has been sidelined since surgery in late-March). Per Rawitch, “[Torre] likes having 12 starters, especially without Kuo and Belisario on the active roster.”

And finally, Tom Hoffarth of The Daily News has a great Q&A with Vin Scully. There really can’t be anyone more modest or simply enjoyable than Vin Scully, can there? He reminds me of my grandfather, and I could listen to him read the dictionary. I know this is the most well-known fact of all, but we are SO lucky to have Vin Scully in our lives (a tip ‘ the hat to Jon Weisman for calling attention to Tom’s article).