My tickets to Opening Day

Please understand. I skip work every year for one early afternoon in April to breathe in the spring air, have an excuse to swill a beer at 1:35 p.m. on a Monday afternoon, and hear how the Baltimore Orioles will have another outstanding, albeit building, year.

It's probably the greatest time of year outside of the NFL Draft, Wildcard weekend, March Madness, and the World Cup.

But still, I wouldn't miss it.

So, this year I think I'd like to get tickets to the "real" opening day between the Oakland Athletics and the Boston Red Sox. Thanks to technology, I already eyed up a destination package (all the goods: Airfare, hotel, tickets, etc.) for only $4,999. Barring my current reality, I'm really looking in to it.

No matter. Even though the game will go off at around 6 a.m. Eastern Standard Time, I'm sure I can access it. I looked over the web to see if there is indeed a market for people like me and to no surprise, there is. I can get two different packages this year thanks to mlb.com.

Mind you, I'm not a Red Sox fan so my money will be well spent trying to help the Orioles find their way out of the AL East this season. The Baltimore Orioles and Major League Baseball want my fandom to be appreciated and recognized. They are offering season packages to watch all of the 162 Baltimore Oriole games online. I called MLB.com to ask about pricing and packages and it sounded like a great deal (and also like they have a very sophisticated online purchasing system. With all of this, it surely takes a great information system to make sure when the first pitch is thrown, everybody who signed up for these packages are getting their baseball fix.

Packages were $119 per year or $19.99 per month for the 700k streaming video that the guy on the phone guaranteed me would be worth it. Or, for all you turtles out there: Only $89.99 per season or $14.95 per month for the roughly 350-400k streaming video. I'm sure you'll lose a bit on your fast ball watching on that one.

Of course, then again, if I'm watching the Orioles play the Red Sox on my 350K streaming video that may mean the scorching fastballs might lose a bit and we'll actually hit some of that Red Sox pitching this season.

Play ball.