Worthless MLB Predictions, Part 1

I love baseball, but when I put up detailed baseball posts/previews, they don’t get a whole lot of response. Maybe it’s because this is a Purdue site and so you aren’t here to talk baseball. But I’m not about to start a baseball blog when I’ve got access to this site. One of you should start one and then invite me on to guest-author posts. And pay me. Lots.

Anyway, I still want to do my annual predictions so I’m going to rattle of the places with a statement about each team. It will be hard for me to limit myself to a line about each team but I know longer posts are hard for guys like B-dowd to make it all the way through.

Today, the National League.

NL West

LA Dodgers – A full season of Manny should be enough for this division.
Arizona – LA’s closest competition will have the horses but not quite enough wins.
Colorado – Yes, their World Series run in 2007 was unfortunately a fluke.
San Francisco – So they cut Bonds loose and they still suck? Interesting approach.
San Diego – Shouldn’t be a last place team, but for some reason are.

NL Central

Cubbies – Too talented not to win a lot of games in the regular season. Will, of course, flop again in the postseason.
Houston – Despite terrible play in the preseason, they had a great second half last year. If they fire Cecil Cooper soon enough, they have a chance at the Wild Card.
Cincinnati – Hard to remember them being good, but they have a LOT of talent on this team.
St. Louis – Even with that World Series win, they’ve been not much more than a mediocre .500 team for most of the past two decades.
Milwaukee – Huge step back for this team. They barely made it last year with Sheets and Sabathia pitching like mad.
Pittsburgh – I keep hearing they have to get good at some point. It won’t be this year, though. Consecutive losing season #17.

NL East

Philadelphia – Why do people keep picking the Mets? Granted, Philly would be nothing if the Mets could close anything out, but still.
NY Mets – Sure, they could win the division. With Daniel Murphy in LF and Ryan Church in RF. Would you be confident?
Atlanta – They always find a way to be in the mix.
Florida – Always scrappy enough to ruin other teams’ seasons in September.
Washington – It’s amazing how DC-based teams have sucked for years.

The BS MLB Preview -- Part 1

That's right, it's only part 1, bitches. But I know there are some baseball fans among you. There have to be. It's a long time from the end of college basketball to the beginning of college football so I know you pass the time somehow.

So today, I'll be putting up my ramblings on the National League. Below you'll find a blurb on each team, with them listed in the order I think they'll finish. Also, while I've labeled this the "BS MLB Preview," it's really just what I think. Tim usually disagrees with me about everything related to baseball and Boilerdowd likes to make fun of baseball while writing about exciting topics such as open-wheeled racing. I always knew he was a gay European.

Please feel free to correct my order of who wins what in the comments.

NL East

New York Mets – Santana fixes everything! Omar is a genius! Mets fans have short memories if they really think this erases last year’s epic meltdown, the fact that their first baseman (Delgado) and left fielder (Alou) are like a hundred and declining, their number 2 pitcher’s (Pedro) arm might fall off and they have a manager who will probably be canned if the Mets don’t make the Series this year. One Big Question: With Yankee Stadium across town taking all the press, will anyone notice this is the last year for the toilet the Mets play in?

Atlanta Braves – Could easily win division if the Mets choke. Glavine and Smoltz, together again, falling asleep on the bench next to Bobby Cox thanks to their age. They lost Andruw Jones but have Mark Teixeria now for a full season. Isn’t that kind of a wash? One Big Question: Will the Braves wear their fugly ‘70s jerseys at all this year?

Philadelphia Phillies – Jimmy Rollins, Chase Utley, Ryan Howard, Brett Myers… sounds like a good team. They are good but they’re not good enough, plus the Phillies always find a way to disappoint. They have the goods to win the division and I’d tempted to pick the Mets to stumble, but Philly never seems to come through in a big spot. In any sport. Here’s hoping Charlie Manuel actually fights a reporter this year. One Big Question: Will Charlie Manual talk about being “flusterated” again (50 seconds into clip)?

Florida Marlins – Surprisingly better than they’re ever expected to be, the Marlins will challenge everybody in the division and probably win more games than they should. But once again, in offloading Dontrelle Willis and Miguel Cabrera this offseason they took two dumps – a salary one and one on their fans hearts. If they have any fans left. One Big Question: Is there any doubt the Marlins are the most attractive team in the bigs?

Washington Nationals – When your hopes are pinned to Dmitri Young duplicating last year’s comeback player of the year routine, you know things are bleak. That said, Manager Manny Acta is at least thinking like a sane person. One Big Question: Once the new stadium chicness wears off, will the primary entertainment in DC be how ridiculous Young is capable of looking?

NL Central

Milwaukee Brewers – I keep thinking the Brew Crew will actually break through one of these years and since this division sucks so badly, I’ll again say they do this time. Ben Sheets, Ryan Braun, Fatty Prince Fielder, Eric Gagne… this team looks like the plot to a movie about castoffs and fat dorks with glasses. Major League IV? One Big Question: Will Prince Fielder’s clever ballet-move approaches to sliding be successful?

Houston Astros – Tejada and Clemens on the same team? That would be awesome, and not just because I live in Houston now. Tejada, if he isn’t distracted by all the ‘roid talk, could easily hit 50 HRs playing in the little league field I can see out my office window. Sure, their pitching after Oswalt is weak, but they’re going to score 8 runs a game so who cares? One Big Question: Will Luke Scott continue to insist that his penis be involved in all home plate celebrations?

Chicago Cubs – No, they’re not going to win the World Series. They’re the Cubs, for crying out loud. And they eeked out a division title last year because nobody else wanted it and then they got obliterated in the playoffs by a marginal team. One Big Question: Will Sweet Lou ever win a singing contest with the umps?

St. Louis Cardinals – Tony LaRussa is officially overstaying his welcome. The Cards are not very good, Chris Carpenter isn’t going to be a savior and poor Albert Pujols won’t be on another winner for a while. One Big Question: Will Albert finally get fed up with people talking about his “poo holes”?

Cincinnati Reds – Dusty Baker is kind of an idiot, who has been noted for talking about “clogging up the bases” on many occasions. The man actually thinks on-base percentage is overrated. Have fun watching him destroy your team, Cinci fans. One Big Question: Will Dusty Baker ever realize that on-base percentage and scoring runs are not mutually exclusive things and actually do have a direct relationship?

Pittsburgh Pirates – I didn’t even know Pittsburgh still had a team. I don’t think most of Pittsburgh knows this, either. They’ll continue to suck. For years. One Big Question: Should they just sign Bonds for the attendance/press bump?

NL West

Los Angeles Dodgers – Why not? I really want to see Joe Torre do well, partly because I really like him and partly to shut up the morons who claim Joe was only a winner in NY because of the team around him. That’s about at stupid a sentiment as it gets. One Big Question: Will Joe Torre ever successfully teach Dodgers ownership the foxtrot?

San Diego Padres – Pads got ripped off in the one-game playoff last year (Holliday was out) and they’ll continue to be a good team that could easily win this division. We’ll see. One Big Question: Will yarmulke giveaway night be a hit?

Colorado Rockies – Remember, last year they were a fourth-place team as late at September 17. Then they went on that ridonkulous run where they went 14-1 to end the season, won a play-in game, then swept their way to the World Series… and then got walloped. I would love to see them do well for a full season but I don’t think it’s in the cards. One Big Question: Will Todd Helton and the Rockies simply assume crash positions and go down in flames right after getting their fans’ hopes up?

Arizona Diamondbacks – The D-backs made the playoffs last year as the division winner but they were the very definition of a statistical anomaly. They were outscored for the season by twenty runs, which usually means you’re going to be a lousy team. But they got a lot of breaks and one-run wins and it all held together in a cruddy division. It won’t happen this year. One Big Question: Is it too much to ask for some rich jackass to get plunked on the head by a ball while lounging in that ridiculous pool in the outfield? (Yeah, just what most of us want… to put on a swimsuit in front of thousands of people.)

San Francisco Giants – I have them in last place but they might surprise people. No, they’re not good, but they got rid of the albatross that is Barry Bonds. Barry Zito still sucks and will continue to be an anchor, dragging them to the bottom of the bay. But this team might look happy for the first time in a while. One Big Question: Why would a helmet need to wear work boots?

October is Different

I feel like I bring this up every year when I talk about postseason baseball but no matter where I look, I'm not able to find it. A number of years ago, MLB launched an ad campaign for the playoffs where they had several calm, mild-mannered people at what appeared to be a kid's birthday party or something, and they were wearing shirts that said "September," "August," etc. Then suddenly a guy comes in screaming, all intense, and jumping around getting loud and wild. His shirt is bright red and says "October," and then the tag line comes up and it says, "October is different." I think it might have been my favorite MLB-related ad campaign. Certainly a lot better that senile Tommy Lasorda telling weirdo people to go to the couch to watch the playoffs or Dane Cook enunciating at us that "There's only one October."

Anyway, before we get too ramped up into our Boilers matchup this coming weekend against the Buckeyes of Ohio State, I wanted to do some MLB playoff prognosticating since this is, after all, a sports site and I'm the resident seamhead. Oh, sure, the other two guys like baseball just fine but boilerdowd complains about how long the games are more than my wife and Tim is too busy antiquing to write about his beloved Indians. (Oh, by the way, Tim is a lifelong Indians fan and I'm a lifelong Yanks fan.)

Today I'll talk about the two National League series that we have on tap and tomorrow I'll ramble about the AL.

Chicago Cubs versus Arizona Diamondbacks

The Cubs started the season terribly and Lou Pinella looked like he was going to melt down in the season's first month. Apparently, this fired up his troops. Or maybe the NL Central was just that awful (again). When the Milwaukee Brewers completely melted down in the second half of the season (and make no mistake, if their season happened in New York, it'd be just as big a deal as the Mets collapse), the Cubs were there waiting, happy to take the division off their hands. As bad as the Central is, it's produced the past three NL representatives to the World Series (Cards in '04 and '06, Astros in '05). Could this be four straight? It's actually not so far-fetched.

The Diamondbacks, by all accounts, are freaks of nature. They've been outscored on the season by twenty runs and that almost always means you're in for a sub-.500 season. (To give you examples, the Cubs outscored their opposition by 62 runs, the Rockies outscored opponents by 102 runs and the Red Sox outscored opponents by 210 runs.) Yet their pitching kept them in it and they won an awful lot of close games. Call it heart, grit, stick-to-itive-ness or whatever, but understand that they're not nearly as good as their 90 wins suggests.

The Cubs have the dominant #1 starter in Carlos Zambrano and they have a potent offense led by Alfonso Soriano. They also have Wrigley Field, which is absolutely zany in October. As much as I don't think the Cubs are all that good, I really think they'll handle the Diamondbacks in the NLDS.

Cubs in four.

Colorado Rockies versus Philadelphia Phillies

Well, you all know how the Rockies stormed into the playoffs and how the Phillies occupied first place for two days after April (and one of those was yesterday). These two teams are both red-hot and I do mean red-hot. The Rockies have gone 14-1 in their last 15 and the Phillies have gone 13-4 in their last 17. Both teams were pretty much left for dead in mid-September and found a way to plow their way into the playoffs by simply willing their way to play good baseball. It didn't seem to matter who was getting in their pathes -- they were going to run them over. And that's pretty cool.

The Phillies probably have a slightly better team, although that's a tough call. While the Rockies have some slugs you've never heard of for good reason, they also have some fantastic up-and-coming players that you should have heard of, such as Troy Tulowitzki, Matt Holliday and Brad Hawpe. The Phils are stocked with mashers like Ryan Howard, Pat Burrell and Jimmy Rollins. One thing is for sure -- this series will not lack for offense, especially with two of the games at Coors Field in Denver.

I'll admit I'm biased in this one. I don't like Philadelphia, although that's got more to do with their fans than the team. But they've been knocking on the NL East door for a few years now so I'm not as excited about them getting this opportunity as I am for the Rockies. The Rox have been putting up marginal baseball for more than a decade since the only other time they ever slipped into the playoffs (in '95). I was so happy to see the fans in Denver have some good baseball to watch and they seemed to appreciative. Plus the Rockies are just fun to watch.

So regardless of what logic says, I think the Rockies will win this series and then be, improbably, just four wins away from the World Series. And if there's baseball in Denver in late October, it damn well could snow. That alone is worth rooting for.

Rockies in five.