This is the last day of practice before the 2010 Cactus League season officially begins on Wednesday against the Mariners. I didn’t take a lot of pictures today, was more interested in watching the game than anything. Even though the game was for “fun,” it was great to see baseball without a cage, screens, tarps, fungos, and a thousand balls being thrown around at the same time.

Diamond Notes:

- I don’t know if you remember John Bowker’s debut at AT&T Park a couple years ago. My wife and I were at the yard that series and man did he make a first impression. 7RBI’s in his first 2 games, going 4-6 with 2HR’s. That was classic, we had so much fun ragging on the Cards fans those couple days.

Today made me flashback to that weekend, because John went yard in his first AB and it was huge. Crushed it to RF and no doubt if you didn’t see it, you heard it. Looking forward to see how he does this Spring, we definitely need his pop as long as he can be consistent.

- Darren Ford is a speed demon. He drove a line drive to the left center gap and the term “eat my dust” was applicable. It was almost like a cartoon where the legs just look like spinning wheels. He turned it into a triple, but he probably could have kept going and it would have been a close play at home.

- I haven’t payed as close attention to the infield drills as I should have, but I did see Freddy Sanchez taking some ground balls at 2B. Looked pretty decent to me, obviously not line drives to his right or anything, but the throwing motion was smooth and on target. Hopefully he’s ahead of schedule.

- Mark DeRosa also took some hacks during coaches BP. To me, it didn’t look like the wrist was bothering him too much. He got solid contact and drove balls to the gaps.

- I love watching Buster Posey take BP. As you have read from most of the beat writers, his swing is just fluid and effortless but he drives balls out of the yard. I like watching him for another reason though. I don’t know if it’s on purpose, but he hits to all fields almost in succession of every pitch. First he’ll pull a homer to LF, then he’ll get robbed by the stadium’s dimensions in CF getting caught at about 420ft, then he’ll hit one to the home bullpen in right. You have to respect that kind of control, it’s a beautiful thing.

- Most of today’s photos are of Madison Bumgarner. Madison has never pitched on the main field and always practices on field 2 which hasn’t allowed me to get any photos of him throwing. He had a bullpen session today to prep for Wednesday, but also did some warm up pitches on the grass in RF during the game. As you may have read, he had been away from the team to be with his family back home. Our thoughts and prayers are with him and his loved ones.

Tomorrow’s an off day so I’ll see you on Wednesday for the first in game coverage!

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Tell it Goodbye…