With WRC, WTTG, Townhall.com, Washington Times, Comcast SportsNet, CNN and Associated Press among the eight teams starting 2-0, there is none more surprising than the National Press Club, which posted a startling 9-6 comeback victory against a seven-time defending division champion, The Gazette, while landing a thrilling 14-13 win over new entry City Paper.

“Things have changed,” exclaimed long-time Press Clubber Paul Basken as Big Blue started the season 2-0 for the first time since 1998, when, ironically, they last went to the playoffs (as a No. 2 seed).

The irony goes deeper. The Gazette's 0-2 start, including a 16-12 loss to AP, sent us to the league archives. It was Final Day 1998 that The Gazette was last swept in the division, and that was the last year the Green Machine failed to win their division or make the playoffs. For shock value, The Gazette had lost four--count 'em, four!--divisional games in the new century, going 34-4.

Now, with a brutal upper-tier schedule ahead and down 0-2 in their division, could this be the first test of the Green Machine's supremacy this decade?

Another big upset came at Aspen Hill, where Team Video, winners of four games last year and just one in the division, held off playoff entry Atlantic Video, 9-7. Otherwise, it was bad news for 2006 playoff team NBC News Channel and perennial threat Discovery Channel as each was swept.

Despite going 0-2, it was a solid debut for City Paper, which lost two exciting one-run games and then, in proper MMSL spirit, attacked the Stained Glass Pub and saluted their first Opening Day by hoisting beers. Reportedly, nary a drop was spilled.

Townhall.com took early command at the brutal Burning Tree Division but barely escaped an AOL squad that played five men, four women and still knocked off defending champ Post.com in eight innings. Likewise, the Bucketheads had a skeleton squad and you won't hear any complaining about a split. It appears once again the Burning Tree is going to be a filthy dog fight.

Outside of the Press Club's big day, the news leaguewide was all the dang offense. This was the third-highest day of scoring since the wood bat era began in 2005 and run production climbed a whopping 20 percent over Opening Day last year. There were nine slaughter-rule games. Still, 10 games Saturday were decided by four runs or less.

Unquestionably the new higher .47 COR softballs make a difference. Last year, after having made the decision to switch to wood bats too late to order livelier balls, the squash-like .44 COR ball we used (that was also used with superbats in years prior) crippled offenses. We saw immediate impact with the higher-COR ball.

CBS News's 23-17 victory against NBC News Channel was by far the highest combined score of the wood bat era, and was the highest-scoring game in the MMSL since USA Today beat the Washington Times, 22-18, June 21, 2001.

All of this, and it was only Opening Day.