Ready or not, the first baseball game is going to start early Saturday - and I mean early at 1 a.m. Las Vegas time.
That's because the Dodgers-Diamondbacks are playing two games in Australia, both on Saturday if you go by American time. The games are going to be played on a revamped cricket field in Sydney.
The rest of the baseball teams don't open their season until March 31 or April 1. That's when baseball should start.
Nothing against Australia. But regular-season major league games should not be played there, or any other far away place. It's fine for exhibition games, but these games count in the standings. Zach Greinke had it right about messing up a routine.
I recently flew from Germany to Las Vegas. That's a 12-hour direct flight. It took me more than a week to recover from the time change and jet lag. Flying straight to Sydney from the West Coast is around 20 hours. Sydney is nearly 7,800 miles from Phoenix. There is an 18-hour time difference between Sydney and Las Vegas.
So while the Dodgers and Diamondbacks get to pose with kangaroos and koalas right now, they are going to be messed up when they return to the States. A week to recover before playing again might not be enough for their hitters. So keep an eye on betting the under in their first few games back.
(Editor's note: Nover's Daily View is written commentary provided exclusively to Pregame by Stephen Nover. Stephen has been on the sports gaming scene for 30 years. Stephen has parlayed a 20-year career as an award-winning sportswriter, part-time oddsmaker for legendary linesmaker Roxy Roxborough, co-host of the former Sunday Night Stardust Line radio show, teacher of a football handicapping class at UNLV and author of two sports gaming books and a book on fantasy football, into becoming one of the top handicappers in the country.
A native of Wisconsin, Stephen covered college and pro sports for daily newspapers in the Midwest, South and West, including 13 years at the Las Vegas Review-Journal. Stephen is The author of two sports gambling books, "Las Vegas Sports Beat" and "Sports Gaming Beat", along with a book on fantasy football titled, "Winning Fantasy Football."
Stephen taught a football handicapping class in the fall of 2004 at UNLV and was the co-host of the Sunday night sports betting radio show "The Stardust Line" for many years building up a lifetime of outstanding sources and connections.)
On the handicapping front, I have a rare Triple Star college basketball play going today, my first one of the NCAA Tournament. I am 7-3 on my last 10 Triple Star college basketball plays and 23-11 on my last 34 Triple Star plays. It can be found here: /pregamepros/pro-bettor/bettor.aspx?id=7746#capper.
As always, no bad luck!