Blog: April 12-April 18, 2010

April 12, 2010. During the home opener pregame ceremony, we got to see two coaches we seldom see in uniform. Assistant hitting coach Mike Aldrete, wearing #61, usually spends the game in the batting cage. Per MLB rules regarding the number of coaches in the dugout, I'm not sure he can even be on the bench in uniform during a game. And Mark McGwire was wearing his familiar #25. Every time I'd seen Mac before today, he was wearing a red sweatshirt in the dugout. And during today's game, he was in a short sleeve windbreaker... Freese was using a black Old Hickory bat... The Cardinals Authentics Store and the Cardinals Care auctions at Busch are no longer issuing LOAs with game-used and signed items. Items now will have MLB holograms affixed to indicate authenticity.

April 14, 2010. Just eight games into the season, and we already have a "nothing new" to report... I did notice that Holliday has a dark dirt/tar spot developing on the right side of his helmet. The Cards' clubhouse staff typically takes pride in keeping the batting helmets clean, so they must have orders from Matt to let the grime accumulate... Bryan Anderson was called up today and assigned #16... I've dropped the Google search bar in the left column and replaced it with one from Yahoo. It seems to do a better job of searching the blog archive.

April 15, 2010. As has become the custom on Jackie Robinson Day, every player and coach on the team wore #42 today. The #42 jerseys will once again be raffled off at local Mobil on the Run locations. Details here. As far as I could tell, every player who saw action wore a Cool Base jersey, except for Pujols and Molina... McGwire was wearing a jersey instead of a sweatshirt or windbreaker... Matt Holliday used a black Marucci today, his first departure from Sam Bat this season. Here's a shot of Holliday's dirty helmet, mentioned yesterday... Finally got a good look at Craig's bat and it, indeed, appears to be an A-Bat... Bryan Anderson swung a natural LS M9 for his first MLB at bat. Obviously, he made his debut wearing #42, not the #16 that was given to him.

April 16, 2010. Holliday used a new bat tonight, a black Old Hickory... Got a good look tonight at the black bat Carpenter has been using. It's a Marucci... I have the 2010 uniform number list up to date, but still need to tackle the numerical and alphabetical lists.

April 17, 2010. Some games are just painful to watch, but I do it anyway for the sake of this site. Today's game (or should I say tonight's game) was one of them. And after 20 innings, two position players pitching and one pitcher playing outfield, I have only two things to report. Blake Hawksworth had his first MLB at-bat; he used one of David Freese's black Marucci bats. And Jason Motte had his second career plate appearance. He used a black LS ash model. Both whiffed in extra innings with the based loaded. Painful... Interesting that Motte was swinging a maple Marucci bat in the on-deck circle, but traded Carpenter for an ash LS when it was time to hit. That suggests the bat Motte used might have been a Carpenter model... Holliday used three brands in the game -- Old Hickory, then Sam Bat, then Marucci.

April 18, 2010. Ryan Ludwick used a Gwynn-finished Rawlings (with a gold band) for the first time this season. But, after swinging it the entire game, he switched back to his black Rawlings in the 8th inning -- and hit his first home run of the season, a game winner.