The Red Sox new pitching phenom ( Fee-Nom ) Daisuke Matsuzaka, better known as Dice-K, makes his debut in Kansas City this afternoon. There hasn't been this much attention paid to a Japanese guy wanting to take a hill since that contest on an island called Iwo Jima.

OK. It's a mound not a hill. And the Americans took the hill on Iwo Jima. You want good sports writing, read Bob Ryan's stuff in The Globe.

Dice-K is huge. He's a rock star. Expectations are high. I'm dying to see how he does, and what the sports talk radio guys on WEEI have to say about it all tomorrow. Ah baseball! It's here. It's cold and it's windy and the forecast is for more of the same. But it's here. Baseball is back and I love it.

Dice-K, by the way, has this pitch called the " Gyroball. " Scribes are saying there's nothing new under the rising sun. They say the Gyroball is nothing but the old screwball. Or maybe more like a combination slider and split finger fastball.

Whatever they call it, it's going to be fun to watch. Here it is, game three of the season and there's already a post season feel to it all. We'd better savor it. It might just be the only post season we'll have.