Brewers 1, Giants 1: Hart Broke

Carlos Gomez drove in Jonathan Lucroy with an RBI single. Lucroy was 2-2 with a double, so I guess we can assume that he is seeing the ball well early in spring. Which is what is important because, really, the results don't matter this early in spring.

What we want is players making good, clean swings on balls. We want them to start getting back into shape and work off the rust and see the ball well and all the other little cliches that still hold true. Basically, we want them getting ready for live game action when it actually matters.

For pitchers, results matter even less right now, though there were some good ones today. Randy Wolf started off the game and pitched two perfect innings with a strikeout. Zack Greinke followed him and gave up three hits (Oh no, he's getting hit hard!) in two innings, while striking out two hitters. John Axford then pitched an inning and gave up three hits in one inning while allowing San Francisco's only run (good thing that long term contract hasn't been agreed on yet!) Michael Fiers, Marco Estrada and Juan Perez gave up just one hit between them.

But we don't really have any idea how well any of them pitched. Radio broadcasts provide a limited picture and there was no television. Were all these guys throwing strikes or just getting lucky? Right now, that's all they are basically working on--throwing strikes. Breaking balls, changeups, secondary pitches, that will all come later.

The most important news coming out of the day is bad news. Corey Hart will miss spring training for the second straight year and might begin the 2012 season on the DL following arthroscopic surgery on his knee following a small meniscus tear. The injury happened after Hart reported to camp, according to Tom Haudricourt.

It's clearly an unfortunate thing to happen to Hart and the team, but there are a couple silver linings. The first is that it happened early, so Hart hopefully won't miss much, if any, of the regular season. The second is that, with Ryan Braun not suspended, the Brewers have Norichiki Aoki available to replace Hart. This injury actually gives the team a great chance to get a long, extended look at Aoki. That's certainly a good thing.

But injuries could potentially devastate this team. With Prince Fielder gone, the Brewers will need their key hitters to all contribute and losing one of them could be disastrous. Again, though, the injury happened early enough that Hart shouldn't miss much time. Without the opportunity to get some swings in through spring training Hart could be a little off for a couple weeks when he returns, though.

In Hart's first 21 games after returning from a spring training injury last season, he hit .237/.275/.329 with no homeruns before hitting three long balls in his 22nd game. His second set of 21 games, Hart hit .316/.395/.618 with six homeruns, including that three homer game. Three weeks of Hart not hitting well after a week or two weeks of him not being around at all would be unfortunate. Hopefully he won't start off as slow when he returns this year.

Rickie Weeks was also scratched from the lineup with shoulder tightness. I think it's safe to assume that he should be alright within the next couple days and the team is just being very safe with him early on, though.