In the airport bound for St. Louis, and wanted to give you a few things to chew on for your Sunday night/Monday morning slacking pleasure.  A new poll says that 56 percent of fans don’t like Bud’s home-field advantage idea.  This concept is extremely unpopular among players and managers; they don’t like that an exhibition game determines something more important.  I’d bet that an anonymous survey of clubhouses would yield something like a 99.9 percent disapproval rating. What do you think?

Also, there was an interesting piece in the New York Times comparing umpires to judges, on the eve of the Sotomayor hearings.  I don’t agree with all points, but the author gives you something to think about.

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Keep checking in, I’ll do my best to update you as news happens over the next few days.  I’m always forgetting to advertise my Twitter account, maybe because, despite my 12-year-old looks, I’m not a big fan of anything that feeds our national CrackBerry addiction.  Call me old school, but I don’t care what you had for breakfast. But I admit that the technology will actually come in handy this week, because news will probably come up when I’m away from my computer.

Speaking of news, I wouldn’t be shocked if the Phils announced a Pedro signing this week.  That is no more than an educated guess, because the front office won’t say anything about this.  But Charlie let it slip yesterday that the organization came out of Friday’s simulated game thinking that Martinez looked better than last season.  They’ve seen him twice now, so that part is done with. This whole thing could still fizzle, but my money’s on a sold-out Pedro start in Reading or Allentown within two weeks.

And you know what? Why not.  Signing Pedro would not preclude the team from reeling in a bigger fish later, and it would give them insurance if someone like Moyer regresses, or if Rodrigo Lopez’s shoulder is worse than he admits. This isn’t Pedro versus Halladay; it’s Pedro versus Rodrigo. I’d say a 2009 Martinez, with his intelligence and vast repertoire, has more upside than a 2009 Lopez.

Now, you could legitimately ask, what about Andrew Carpenter or Carlos Carrasco? All I can say is, for whatever reason, the team seems to have decided internally that those guys aren’t the ideal choices right now.  Keep in mind that the front office knows its players more intimately than we do, and they must have reservations about stuff, readiness, makeup etc.  I can tell you that high-ranking people were very strongly considering giving that first Rodrigo start to Carrasco.  So if Pedro doesn’t work out, and Lopez’s shoulder doesn’t heal, we could still see a young guy soon.

Okay. Off to a stadium named after a beer company, to watch a three-hour ad for an insurance firm that includes a home run contest. Also, I will interview athletes plugging various products, some of whom will play an inning or two in a game that everyone seems to agree should be meaningless.  Don't get me wrong, I love baseball and am lucky to have a job covering it.  But you wouldn't believe how many emails I've received this week begging me to cover this or that PR event.  It makes you wonder what this thing is really about, and it kind of makes you want to go out in the yard and have a catch with a loved one instead...