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2008 MLB Thread (1 Viewer)

Mike Frezon

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"Opening Day" is about 12 hours away (in Japan!).

I suppose it's time to shift gears away from spring training and start looking at the season which is already upon us. As Yogi supposedly once said, "It gets late early out there." :D

Bring on the predictions!
 

Mike Frezon

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Division Winners:

AL: Boston, Detroit, Los Angeles, Cleveland(WC)

NL: New York, Chicago, Los Angeles, Philadephia (WC)

I'll take Boston over NY in the Series.
 

Scott_J

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The first "Opening Day" of the season. Sunday is Opening Night and Monday is, officially, Opening Day. You gotta love MLB's semantics.

Anyway...predictions. Hopefully these are better than last year's. ;)
AL: East - Boston; Central - Detroit; West - Anaheim; WC - Seattle
NL: East - Philly; Central - Chicago; West - Los Angeles; WC - Arizona
World Series: Detroit over Arizona (upsetting the executives at FOX)
 

Jason Seaver

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Getting up early tomorrow! It's going to be a fun couple days of being more or less useless at work :)

AL: Boston, Detroit, Anaheim, New York (WC)
NL: New York, Chicago, Colorado, San Diego (WC)
 

Zembonez

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Man... predictions already! I'm just glad the new season is upon us. It validates Springtime in my mind. WOO HOO!
 

Mike Frezon

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Well...I got up and watched the game this morning (6am start). I hate waking up early! :)

But...it is baseball.

Both teams were wearing advertising patches on their sleeves. :thumbsdown: A Pepsi patch for the Athletics and E=MC(2) for the Sox. AND..."Ricoh" stickers on both teams' batting helmets. :thumbsdown:

**Brandon Moss just tied the game with a HR in the top of the 9th inning! Woohoo!

In an in-game interview, Bud Selig said "it's great" that people are up early watching baseball on opening day. He's smokin' some bad stuff. It's bad enough that east coasters are up @ 6am and tuning in for baseball...but it's 3am on the west coast! It's stupid. He then went into some spiel about the internationalization of MLB. Apparently his master plan is based on an improvement in air travel. He's either been watching too much science fiction or I couldn't comprehend what was being said because it was too early in the morning! ;)

Selig also complained--at least TWICE--about being tired because of his traveling to Japan. I would think maybe that would give him some kind of clue as to why it might, then, be a bad idea to have the ballplayers make that trip at the beginning fo the season. :rolleyes:

**The game just went to extra innings! Woohoo! Bonus baseball in game #1!
 

Brian Perry

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It scares me to see the Cubs almost universally predicted to be division champs, especially when:

- Kerry Wood has a good chance of coming up lame, probably at the worst possible time.
- Derrek Lee seems to have lost all of his power.
- The starting rotation has not improved...I don't have much faith that moving Dempster (Dumpster) from closer to starter will change his results.
- Alfonso Soriano has lost his base stealing desire/capability.
- Brian Roberts appears to be the longest awaited non-trade in history.

If we could overcome these obstacles and win the WS in this centennial anniversary of our last title, it would be awesome.
 

Kirk Tsai

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I like the Cubs' chances in the NL Central. That's a pretty weak division; the Brewers are the only team that has a chance to compete with the Cubs, and the Cubs have a much better pitching staff. Even if Dempster and Wood turn out poorly, well, that's only complaing about a 4th or 5th starter and a closer (Marmol--lights out last year--could easily take over).

AL: Red Sox -- Tigers -- Angels, WC: Indians
MVP: David Ortiz
Cy Young: Erik Bedard

NL: Mets -- Cubs -- Diamondbacks, WC: Phillies
MVP: David Wright
Cy Young: Santana
 

Walter C

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And their trip to Japan is sponsored by the Travelocity roaming knomes. :D

My predictions....

NL - Mets, Brewers, Rockies, Phillies (WC)
AL - Red Sox, Tigers, Angels, Indians (WC)

Once again, it will be harder to make the playoffs in the AL than the NL.

And Brad Lidge has just been put on the 15-day DL. Another slow start for the Phillies.
 

Alex-C

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FWIW, the extra innings package is free on a lot of cable systems during the first week. YMMV. You have to have a cable box, but many don't realize it and its a great way to enjoy the first week of games....see them all !
 

Mike Frezon

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And I just love a good cross-thread reference! :D

Alex: Thanks for that reminder. It's about the third or fourth one I've had already this spring and I'll probably forget come the weekend! :angry:

==============================

And did I mention that the Red Sox are now on pace to win 162 games this year? And, Manny's on pace to drive in 648 RBIs! :laugh: I think that would be a new record. He's also on pace to pose for deep flyballs off the wall 161 more times this season. :angry: Amazingly, today, he still managed to end up at second base. :rolleyes
 

Scott_J

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At least it came from a Red Sox fan, if that softens the blow a little. I was going to post something about that AB if no one else had.

What was that E=MC^2 patch advertising, anyway?

And FYI that Extra Innings preview is March 31-April 6. I wish they had a similar preview for MLB.TV, but it doesn't look like they do. Apparently, EI also has a "half-season free preview" the week of 7/17, at least on the local Time Warner system (try remembering that one, Mike ;)).
 

Jason Seaver

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Juan Pierre shouldn't have much to worry about from the bench. :)

Also, I believe Wakefield is pitching that game, and he tends to be a fly ball pitcher.
 

gene c

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Well, now they're on pace for 81-81! Won't make the playoffs that way. Sorry, but I'm an A's fan. And what about this business of flying to Japan for two games against the Red Sox to start the official season, and then back to the Bay Area to finish off the pre-season this weekend with three games against the S.F. Giants? Is that crazy or what??
 

Mike Frezon

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:laugh: Oh, yeah?! Well the A's are on pace to go 81-81, too! :P

Don't get me started on the whole Japan nonsense...and then the exhibition games-after-Japan nonsense.

As noted above, the Sox are also flying into the West Coast for some games with the Dodgers before then flying on to Toronto to then play more "real" games. To me it smacks of similar nonsense such as interleague play. :D
 

Walter C

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The whole thing with playing regular season games overseas is messed up. Especially when it costs one team 2 home games while the other doesn't lose any. (I know why it happened, I just think it's a bit unfair)
 

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