The idea
February and March have always been a special time of year for me. As Winter turns to Spring, anticipation of the upcoming baseball season builds day by day. I know I'm not alone in this feeling, there are millions of people out there itching for the baseball season to get here. It's with this in mind that I went about putting together Spring Training '08.
As you're clamoring for information about your favorite (and least-favorite) teams, sometimes the mainstream media leaves you wanting. They don't devote as much ink to baseball in the newspapers, most of the games aren't televised. If you aren't paying close attention, you may not even recognize the team that takes the field on opening day. That's where this site comes in.
There are people out there who go above and beyond in their chronicling of a team's offseason and preseason fortunes. They live and die with every roster decision. They scour the wires for any story even remotely related to their team. They're human agregators, commentators and historians. We know them as bloggers. Spring Training '08 is a clearinghouse for all of that knowledge.
Our goal is to get a blogger per team to give us a look at each team's lineup, rotation, bullpen and most importantly, the key battles which will be fought on the fields of the Grapefruit and Cactus Leagues. Throughout Spring Training, there will be updates with all of the breaking news and featured analyisis from the bloggers.
The community
Possibly the best thing about Spring Training is the lowering of barriers between players and fans. The ballparks are smaller, more intimate. The players linger after games and practice to sign a few baseballs. It's my hope that you, the readers, will share these rare moments to help enrich the site and give any fan who can't make it to Spring Training a taste of the experience. If you do get to a game, or a practice, bring your camera and send your photos, videos or even just stories to this
e-mail address. We'll post the photos (with credit to you, of course) on the home page and the respective team pages. Good stories will get their own blog post. I want this site to be as interactive as possible.
Using the site
To recap, here's what the site is going to offer from the day pitchers and catchers report until opening day...
The
home page will consist of featured blog posts, breaking news stories and a slideshow of pictures sent in by readers or taken by our bloggers. As your entry-point to the site, it will give you a quick overview of what's new on the site, and an easy entry into individual team pages (the logos on the left of the page).
Each team will have it's own destination as well. On team pages, you'll find a cheat sheet to Spring Training written by a blogger and updated throughout the Spring, as well as all news stories, featured posts and photos relating to the team. Here's an example of a team page:
New York Yankees page. You can follow the links at the bottom of the page or the logos in the sidebar for the rest.
Feedback
As always, your feedback is welcomed. Please send any suggestions to me at this
e-mail address. If you'd like to contribute to the site in any way, you can use that same e-mail address.
I hope you enjoy using the site as much as I'm going to enjoy maintining it.
Brian Ward
Founder,
Blogs By Fans
Team Coverage
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