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Junior left-hander Andrew Miller is widely expected to be the No. 1 overall pick of the Kansas City Royals in next week's baseball draft. (Cy Young himself couldn't save the woeful Royals, but that's a blog for another day.) Oddly enough, Miller will not be pitching the all-important first game of this weekend's NCAA Regional at Boshamer Stadium when the Heels face Maine today at 6 p.m.

Coach Mike Fox hasn't lost his mind. He offered pretty solid reasons for opening against the Black Bears with soft-tossing righty Robert Woodard and coming back with Miller against either Winthrop or UNC Wilmington on Saturday in the Tar Heels' first home regional since 1983.

For instance, Woodard has been a No. 1 starter before ('05), Maine has a lot of right-handed bats and Woodard is better on short rest than either Miller or Daniel Bard, another high first-round talent, meaning he could throw again Sunday or Monday if needed.

Then, there's this:

We just made the call and felt like Robert's going to get deep into the game. Not that Andrew won't, but the history with Robert is he throws so many strikes, he's going to get us into the sixth or seventh inning more than likely. The last thing you want to do is tax your bullpen the first game of regionals, so we'd rather not do that.

Let's see how it pans out. If they lose Game 1, the Heels would likely need to win four games in 48 hours to advance to the Super Regional.

I'll also be interested to see whether UNC's surprising two-and-out at last weekend's ACC Tournament in Jacksonville is a sign of trouble or maybe a blessing in disguise. We'll see how fresh and focused the Heels are in comparison to N.C. State, which made a strong tournament run and now might possibly have some tired arms when it plays a brutally tough regional in Austin, Texas.