Spring mischief

Box scores like this raise questions about mischief in spring training. Here are two teams that will play each other twenty times during the regular season. The season starts tomorrow. Obviously there's nothing to play for and there's a lot of incentive to dog it and hide your best pitches from the other team.

But that's not all. Earlier in spring training, do you think pitchers attempt to mess with the other team's roster? If you are a Cub, and you see Chris Truby outhitting everyone, would you feed him a meatball just to cause trouble? "Wow, that Truby is awesome. You guys will have to keep him." Obviously you don't do that if you are locked in a battle for a rotation spot. If your job is secure, though, wouldn't you do some little things like that to cause trouble for your division rivals?