Pssst - Pre-Season Baseball Is Under Way!

With the exception of Munch’s long running SDMB Fantasy Baseball thread, not one mention of MLB in the forums today?

Pitchers & Catchers reported weeks ago.
All the A-Rod furor has quieted down.
The 1st televised game is tomorrow night on ESPN.
What steroids?

Even if you despise the sport, Spring can’t be too far away!

Yes, you read it correctly: The Pre-season has begun.

Go ahead, bash the Yankees if you must. The fact that opening day is a mere 768+/- hours from now means nothing you can say will bother me.

Feel free to predict, reminisce, complain, cheer, opine, bitch, moan, lament or regret.

Yankees? Yankees?
pshaw.

Go Cubbies

You can’t argue with Wood, Prior, Maddox, Zambrano. Yankees let their best talent go. Who they got, Brown, Lieber and… Mussina?

Hey you can score 5 runs a game, but when the staff ERA is 10, well…

Prediction: Cubs v Red Sox in the series, world to end soon after.

Javier Vazquez is arguably one of the top 3 pitchers in the AL, behind Halladay and Shilling.

ESPN has been running a game every afternoon since Wednesday…today (Friday 5 March) it’s the Yankees v Phillies…

If you have satellite, NESN is always very good about showing Red Sox matches from early on; last night they not only played Minnesota, but also Jerry Remy’s mike wasn’t working right away…I like Jerry Remy. :slight_smile:

I will be in London when ESPN has opening day from Baltimore – mmmm…so I can see my favourite city in the States on the tele and be able to see through my window my favourite city in the world, whilst listening to Jon Miller? I’ll be lucky if I’m not bodily assumed into heaven…especially if Arsenal have not only made it to, but also win, the FA Cup semi final on the same day…

Actually, I hope not to be assumed quite at that moment, cos Baltimore are playing Boston, and my English friends have never seen anything quite like Nomar Garciaparra’s batting box routines…I’ve been asked questions about strike zones and queried about pitchers’ wind-ups, but I think that ritual will boggle some minds at the British Museum…

:smiley:

Yay!

Ms Boods, your favorite city in the States is Baltimore? Are you sure about that? Are you from there? :slight_smile:

I think if Nomar went up against Trachsel, the world would just gring to a halt out of boredom.

I would like to take this opportunity to bitch at ESPN for a moment. Ahem.

ESPN, it’s great that you’re airing spring training games. I really appreciate it. Heck, you’ve even got my Angels in the mix. However, you have decided to only air the afternoon games. On weekdays. Can you not see the problem with this? No one can watch them!!! I’m at work, you dolts!

Take today for instance. In about two hours, ESPN will broadcast the Yanks - Philly game. Wonderful. But how about the Cards and Mets instead? They’re on at 7. Now, I know you have basketball on the main station, but you’re showing boxing on the deuce. Boxing sucks. Pre-empt it.

Saturday I’ll give you a break on since you’ve got all those worthless conference tourneys for teams that won’t make it out of the first round of the Big Dance. But what about Sunday? You’re showing bowling instead of the Yanks-Sox series, for Pete’s sake! What’s wrong with you? Bowling? Gah!.

OK, I’m done.

My preseason picks:

AL West:
Anaheim
Oakland
Seattle
Texas

AL Central:
Does it really matter? All I know is Minnesota will win the division and Detroit will be in last.

AL East:
Boston
New York
Toronto
Baltimore
Tampa

NL West:
San Francisco
San Diego
Arizona
Los Angeles
Colorado

NL Central:
Houston
Chicago
St. Louis
Cincinnati
Pittsburgh

NL East:
Philadelphia
Florida
Atlanta
New York
Montreal

Wild Card berths go to Yanks and Cubs. Take it to the bank.

[QUOTE]
AL Central:
Does it really matter? All I know is Minnesota will win the division and Detroit will be in last.QUOTE]
Hey now, us Royals fans have to hang onto something! Beltran, a healthy Sweeney, Berroa, Santiago and Juan-Gone! What? Pitching? Who needs pitching?!?

Neurotik - what, Milwaukee’s going to finish so badly that they don’t even show up in the standings?

(I’m a Pirates fan and I like to make sure there’s at least one team predicted to finish behind them in the NL Central.)

Awwww…Munch, Royals fans have a lot to look forward to. KC may win 85 games this year. When was the last time that happened?

And JerH, I forgot about Milwaukee when I was making the predictions, but really now, I can’t see anyone caring. :slight_smile:

My dad were born there, and his side of the family goes back to Thomas Norris, who came over with the Calverts…and family on his mum’s side used to sponsor the Old Orioles (according to family legend), and I’ve got family in the same cemetary as John McGraw (called Bonnie Brae by the older people, but I believe the real name is New Hope or New Cathedral Cemetary)…

I absolutely adore coming up I-95 south to go through Charm City; was just there last week…

At present, the Orioles are in some dark times, what with the Angelos regime…my favourite player ever ever is Doug DeCinces. I also have a brick from Memorial Stadium on my mantle piece, and a wee jar of earth from the infield…

I can’t stand to listen to the games on satellite cos I loathe Michael Reghi (and my apologies to anyone who likes him, honestly)…but one hopes that will pass, too, and someday Mel Proctor and John Lowenstein will return…

:slight_smile:

Bosox win, Yankees lose, and my cousin sponsored the Guinness pints.

Yesterday was a good day.

My Picks:

AL East: New York
AL Central: Detroit (this team is MUCH improved)
AL West: Anaheim
AL Wild: Boston

NL East: Philadelphia
NL Central: Chicago
NL West: San Francisco
NL Wild: Houston

The Braves’ long string of postseason play finally snaps this year.

You’re kidding right?

How are they much improved?

Impossible. MUCH improved from their performance is almost a guarantee. Still puts them in the bottom 5 of the entire MLB.

Two weeks from today (Friday) I leave the snowy clime of Denver for a week in sunny Peoria, Arizona to watch my beloved Mariners begin the quest yet again to overcome the dreaded “September Swoon” tm.
The Boys of Summer are back, and life is good.

I’ve heard plenty of times where a bet like this has been done, but only just witnessed it for the 1st time today.

Turt, one of the guys who works here, is a big Jet fan.
His friend, Joe, is a Giants fan.

Back in August, they had a bet on who’d have the best 2003 season record.

The wager: A 4x4 inch color tattoo of the cross town rival’s logo permanently inked on the losers body.

The Jets went 6-10 last season, the Giants 4-12, Joey lost and had to get a big, green J E T S logo tattoo.

He stopped in this morning, took off his shirt & showed Turt he finall ‘paid’ the bet he lost on. It was definititely real & he opted to have it put on the small of his back. He said even though he’s lost larger bets, having to fork over $200 to a tattoo artist for a logo of a team he hates truly taught him the perils of gambling.

In my case, I’d never make a bet like that for any sport. Except maybe the ChiSox, whose logo still looks like the word Sex to me.

My predictions

AL East
The Yankees and Red Sox sports announcers will all blow their vocal cords out yelling at each other over which team is the best. There will be a Master Card commercial showing ARod and Jeter as best of friends making fun of all the fuss about their egos, with both making big $$$.

Both teams will be neck and neck at the end, but both Toronto and Devil Rays will give a good showing up until August and thendo a swam dive.

But Boston will prevail where there will then be rioting in the streets.

AL Cent

weak, weak, weak. Any of 3 teams could win it. Detroit probably won’t cause Ivan Rodriguiz can only do so much. Kansas City will limp to the finish line, clinching less than a week before the end of the season. Minnesota will look just ok for the season, just enough to give the fan a faint light of hope. Chicago will tease their fans that they will do good and then start losing in August and Sept, their players won’t hold up for the whole season.

AL West

Anaheim all the way. End of story. The oppositing pitchers will have to face Anderson, Vlad, Glsus, Guillen, Salmon all in a row. They start the season with 7 decent starters and the top bullpin in the majors. I don’t even know why the other teams are even bothering to play the season.

NL East

Phillies is the only team contending in this division. The rest are just not putting a good product on the field. Could someone please buy the Expos and get them out of the hands of the evil Commish? Mets need to develop a minor league system rather than trying to emulate the Yankees and guy a pennate, it ain’t workin. Florida won’t repeat from last year, not that they were a fluke, just that they lost some key players.

NL Cent.

Cubs will take this division cause of pitching. Houston will be on their tail though right up to the end, and I could see them winning the wild card. St Louis will look good, but not good enough cause they don’t have enough pitching. Pirates need to spend money on more than their new ballpark–they need some good players. Brewers are a disgrace to the game and should be sold to someone who is not associated the the Commish.

NL West

I like the Padres. They have upgraded their offense and have added some experienced arms to go with those young uns they brought up last year. Arizona looks like the only other team to give them a run. Giants lost too many good players and Barry will be distracts by the controversy of if he did or didn’t do the juice. Dodgers, can you say 2006 at the earliest to even look good.

Anaheim Angels 2004 World Series Champions.

It is gonna be a fun year.

Psst. Neurotik Angels are on ESPN on Monday @11am. I may have to get sick that morn and get to work really late. :slight_smile:

I like that ESPN is showing some spring training games as I am not able to get to spring training this year. However, I can’t believe that mlb.com is now CHARGING for spring training games online.

Yeah, I’ve already got it Tivoed. Except it’s on at 2 pm on this side of the country.

Growing up, there was the yearly pain of watching the Indians lose.

Then, for a brief time in the 90s, they stopped losing. Strangely, masochistically, my interest waned somewhat.

Now, they’re bad and I’m glad. If only I were a Detroit fan… :cool:

Julie