You wish, Yankees.

With Spring Training here, it’s time for the most important part of any Major League Baseball preseason – checking out what kind of free stuff teams will be giving away this season. Naturally, most major market and successful teams worth a lick will be giving away the standards like t-shirts and hats, but teams that don’t do as well in drawing fans are sort of like fat girls in the bedroom, in that they need to be better at… certain things.

No team knows this better than the Tampa Bay Devil Rays, who are trying to gain more fan support not only for the sake of making money, but also to secure a new stadium deal. Of course this means that the team would need some pretty sweet freebies for the Rays faithful, and according to Tampa Bay Times beat writer Marc Topkin, Rays fans will be getting only the best this season.

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Baseball season is officially upon us, and that means only one thing — the return of The Dugout, the Internet’s longest running and most critically acclaimed webcomic about baseball players with pun screen names pretending to curse at each other over AIM. Yes, this is still a thing.

And to celebrate Major League Baseball splitting Opening Day up into like 40 smaller, less important games over the span of a month and at least one ceremony meant to humiliate Muhammad Ali, the normal Spring Training event we like to do has been replaced by Opening Days, a Dugout maxi-series that will span all 25 teams and let you find out what your favorite players are up to in 2012.

There are still only 25 teams, right? Well, 25 important ones. Or was that 5 important ones?

Anyway, whether it takes me a month or I’m still writing Opening Days segments into 2013, here’s episode one: The Tampa Bay Rays.

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Since being the man to scoop up Derek Jeter’s 3,000th hit last Saturday, Christian Lopez has become a baseball sensation because of his good fortune, great attitude, and ultimately how he’s being screwed over by the IRS. Lopez, of course, happily volunteered to give the milestone home run ball to Jeter, asking for nothing in return except for a chance to meet the New York Yankees icon. The Yankees said , “Screw that” and gave the 23-year old four season tickets for the rest of this season, including the playoffs and World Series, and they’re throwing in the first batch of autographed Jeter 3K memorabilia for him, too. But that’s when the IRS stepped in and said, “Not so fast.”

Luckily for Lopez, who sells mobile phones for a living, some companies are rewarding the selfless manner in which he simply gave the ball back. Miller High Life has offered to throw a party for him and donate the proceeds to paying off any taxes he owes from accepting the Yankees’ gift (Miller will pay the whole bill regardless of how much a party raises) and CEO Mitch Modell of Modell’s Sporting Goods has joined sports memorabilia dealer Brandon Steiner to raise $50,000 for paying off part of Lopez’s $150,000 student loans. I know, I’m baffled by that one, too.

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