Long wait over; it's finally opening day for M's

Opening day doesn't announce itself meteorologically. There isn't some drastic change in the air temperature that gets us out of houses and out to the ballgame.

Our internal clocks just seem to know. Baseball fans have a sixth sense that tells them it's time to get going.

At this point in the spring we've watched too many games with shortstops wearing No. 77 and studied too many box scores with names we didn't recognize.

The best line from this year's spring training came from the Mariners' Hall of Fame announcer Dave Niehaus, who was watching a intrasquad game in Peoria and was asked by The Seattle Times' baseball reporter Geoff Baker how he would broadcast that game.

"I would call it numerically," Niehaus said.

Numerically?

Niehaus explained, saying something like, "Yeah, you know, 82 is in the windup. Seventy-four hits a ground ball to short and 66 picks it up, throws to first and gets 89 by a step,"

On opening day you don't have to call the games numerically. You can tell the players without a scorecard.

For a sports fan, this is the best time of year. College basketball is in the final leg of the great celebration of its sport. Brackets are filling up like reservations at Canlis.

The Masters is looming and the possibility of Tiger Woods winning the Grand Slam is as real as the azalea bushes around Amen Corner.

But opening day trumps all of them.

Opening day isn't just about today. It means something important in our lives is back and is going to be with us for the next seven months, every day, as dependable as the phases of the moon.

This day is as whimsical as the snowstorm that hit furiously for about 10 minutes one year in Baltimore as I shivered in Memorial Stadium waiting for the Orioles to play the Texas Rangers.

It is as unpredictable as Kiteman, a hang glider the Philadelphia Phillies once employed who was supposed to sail off a ramp built in the upper deck in center field and glide to home plate, delivering the first baseball of the season to catcher Tim McCarver.

Instead, a gust of wind blew Kiteman off the ramp and he crashed into the center field seats, while McCarver sheepishly skulked back to the dugout looking like Bill Murray in "Caddyshack."

This is the season of hope. Even teams like Kansas City and Tampa Bay look dangerous. The entire American League, in fact, looks like the NBA's Western Conference.

On opening day, outfielders Mike Morse and Charlton Jimerson celebrate their good fortune. They were upset winners in the Mariners' spring-training job fair.

And speaking of upset, nobody deserves to be angrier with the Mariners' decision to keep only 11 pitchers than knuckleballer R.A. Dickey, who pitched well enough to earn a roster spot, but was sent to Class AAA Tacoma on Saturday.

In the chill air of Safeco Field in March, the Mariners begin their most promising season since 2001. But with that promise comes all of the requisite anxiety.

Was the quicker bat first baseman Richie Sexson showed in the Arizona desert a mirage or an omen? Was Eric Bedard's roughed-up spring something to worry about?

Is second baseman Jose Lopez back? Can the right-field platoon of Morse and Brad Wilkerson deliver? And can Jose Vidro be the answer again at designated hitter?

Will third baseman Adrian Beltre's injured thumb hold up through the 162-game season? And, in West Tennessee, will reliever Brandon Morrow quickly fix what's wrong and get back into the Mariners' bullpen, where he is needed desperately?

It's dangerous to go into the season with so many questions, but in the imperfect AL West, the Mariners have the best starting rotation and, in J.J. Putz, the best closer.

They begin the season, I believe, as the favorites in the West.

But opening day offers no guarantees. Ask the Chicago Cubs.

It is a mixture of jitters and joy. It is a reunion with a pal who will take us through the long lush days of summer and back into the chill of early autumn.

It is the beginning anticipation, waiting for the Red Sox and Tigers, the Yankees, Angels and Indians to come to town.

It is baseball, returned from its hibernation, a day that should be celebrated like a national holiday, the firing of the starter's pistol to begin the magical, marathon march to October.

Steve Kelley: 206-464-2176 or skelley@seattletimes.com. Check out Rough Cut, his weekly vodcast, at www.seattletimes.com/sports