After being treated to 25 early games during the opening week, our evening viewing reduces down to nine games this working week.
However, there are some interesting contests to look forward to, including the opening game of the first Yankees-Red Sox series of the season on Friday.
All times are in BST.
Monday 16 April
16.05. Tampa Bay at Boston (Shields – Bard) * ESPN America
The week’s first ‘early’ game is an especially early one, indeed it’s already finished as I’ve got around to writing this ‘preview’. The Rays prevailed 1-0, with James Shields earning the win thanks to 8.1 shut-out innings. It’s a shame I accidentally left him on my fantasy team bench, then.
Tuesday 17 April
No early games
Wednesday 18 April
17.10. NY Mets at Atlanta (Dickey – Jurrjens) * ESPN America
20.40. Pittsburgh at Arizona (McDonald – Hudson)
R.A. Dickey got the better of Jair Jurrjen and the Braves on 7 April. Dickey put in another good showing in his next start against the Phillies, while Jurrjens produced his second straight disappointing start against the Brewers on Friday 13th. We’ll see if those trends continue or are reversed on Wednesday.
One person who wants to find a change of form is the D-Backs’ Daniel Hudson. He’s given up 10 earned runs over 10.1 innings during his first two starts of 2012 and will be hoping that a home start against the Pirates can help him get his season back on track.
Thursday 19 April
17.40. Chicago Cubs at Miami (Samardzija – Nolasco)
18.10. LA Dodgers at Milwaukee (Harang – Wolf)
18.45. Cincinnati at St. Louis (Arroyo – Wainwright) * BBC 5 Live Sports Extra and ESPN America
19.10. Baltimore at Chicago White Sox (Hammel – Floyd)
We’ve got four early games on ‘get-away’ Thursday and both ESPN America and BBC 5 Live are focusing on the NL Central match-up between the Reds and Cardinals. Adam Wainwright has lost both of his first two starts on his return from Tommy John surgery and was clubbed for eight runs by the Cubs last time out. It can be a long road back from elbow surgery and Wainwright will simply be looking to provide his team with a decent platform to build on in his third start of the year.
Meanwhile the Dodgers’ Aaron Harang wants to pick up exactly from where he left off after his 13 strike-out appearance against the Padres last Friday.
Friday 20 April
19.20. Cincinnati at Chicago Cubs (Bailey vs Volstad)
20.05. NY Yankees at Boston (Nova – Buchholz) * ESPN America
We end the working week, and more importantly start the weekend, with games from two of the most iconic venues to be found in world sport. Wrigley Field and Fenway Park host games between the Reds and Cubs and the Yankees and Red Sox.
All of these games are available to watch live via the MLB.TV subscription at MLB.com. The early games being shown on ESPN America are highlighted above, while the full ESPN/ESPN America schedule can be found on their website. BBC 5 Live Sports Extra can be found on digital radio, digital TV and on the BBC.co.uk website (coverage on the website is only available to UK residents). The complete schedule for this week’s MLB games can be found on MLB.com.
While theres sure not an overwhelming selection, its something.
Are the games which are not shown as ESPN America or Radio 5 Live extra freebies on MLB.com? I couldn’t work it out.
Hi Damien.
The above list shows all games that start before midnight UK time, rather than freebies on MLB.com. Games which aren’t on ESPN America or BBC Radio can be watched or listened to via the MLB.TV paid-for subscription, although MLB.com does do one free game a day. Normally that is a later game (i.e. an evening game in the States, so early hours of the morning for us in the U.K.), but they do occasionally go for a game starting earlier than that and it’s a good suggestion for me to mark those up as well in future.
The Mets-Braves game on Wednesday is available for free this week.
Hope that helps