FanHouse Jon Miller

So Steve Phillips has done two games in the booth for ESPN's Sunday Night Baseball, and I think he deserves a big round of applause from baseball fans everywhere. It's not easy to make Joe Morgan sound smart and Phillips has been doing it with ease since joining him and Jon Miller. Congratulations, Steve.

Of course, when not making Morgan look good, it seems that Phillips has spent the rest of his time backpedaling. You may remember that back in March Phillips said Cubs manager Lou Piniella did a bad job of handling Kosuke Fukudome last season, and that Piniella took exception to Phillips' comments. Well, like any good analyst would do, Phillips apologized to Piniella for having an opinion on Sunday before the Cubs took on the Brewers in Milwaukee.

ESPN's Sunday Night Baseball broadcast will kick off its 20th season on the air in 10 days when it opens the regular season on the night of April 5 in Philadelphia with the world champion Phillies hosting the Atlanta Braves.

Play-by-play announcer Jon Miller and color commentator Joe Morgan have been fixtures in the booth for all 20 seasons, but the big change to the broadcast this season is that for the first time they will have company. Former Mets general manager Steve Phillips will join Miller and Morgan this season.

The crew talked to the media in a conference call Thursday afternoon, and FanHouse was listening in. The highlights are after the jump.

Yesterday we found out about White Sox shortstop Orlando Cabrera's recent habit of calling the press box and arguing about errors he was charged with. The arguing worked, as both calls were overturned by official scorers, but Orlando's manager wasn't too fond of the way Orlando was handling things.

Ozzie Guillen stepped out of character and actually shared his thoughts and feelings with the media by expressing his concern about how Orlando's teammates and White Sox fans would react to the news he was so concerned about his statistics. Especially considering that the Sox are currently a first place team, and that it might make it seem like Orlando was more concerned with his next contract than the White Sox winning.

Well, Orlando did not appreciate Ozzie's concern.

"If it happens again, I will call again," Cabrera said. "I don't have to do it with other teams because they always had my back. They don't want to do it here, I can take care of my own business. If you have a problem with what I did, come to me and say something. Don't go to the media to send a message, because he didn't send any message."

"I never had anybody complain about that stuff. If there was a major-league player who tells me he's not selfish, he's lying. Everyone is selfish about numbers, because that's the only thing people cannot lie about. That's it. It's not a big deal. I don't know who's trying to make this a big deal. Maybe it's the media, maybe it's the manager. And nobody is complaining about that stuff. Nobody cares about that."

This could get interesting.

I'm a bit shocked this video is still up considering MLB dispatches its YouTube police rather quickly.

So, at least for now, enjoy the above footage of a groundskeeper at Shea Stadium getting a surprise from a kitten. I enjoyed this as much as Jon Miller did. Which is to say, I enjoyed it a lot.

Meanwhile, Joe Morgan appears lifeless.

(HT: Home Run Derby. Also seen at Awful Announcing.)

As much as I hate the Sunday Night Baseball crew over at ESPN they're still 100x better than Joe Buck and/or Tim McCarver, who you can expect me to make fun of in due time.

Check out the conversation between Joe Morgan, Jon Miller, and Peter Gammons after the jump.