Go outside and look around you. Nearly-frozen mud is everywhere. The highs are in the thirties. And everyone’s talking about the exciting Final Four matchups this weekend in Atlanta, the Wizards’ chances of making the NBA playoffs, and the Bobby Knight movie on ESPN, starring Brian Dennehy.
It can only mean that baseball’s about to begin. For that I say Thank God, and since they’ve obtained a court order to keep me from doing the MLBeat anymore, here’s a baseball preview column as a way of tuning out basketball for the first time since November.
Team Most Likely to Play the Yankees in the World Series: St. Louis Cardinals. You should thank your local deity that you can go down to Busch Stadium anytime from now ’til October and catch one of the best baseball teams in the world. Even if they’re a fairly bland team to watch, even if that eighth-inning Budweiser song annoys without subtlety, and even if their manager is racist like a bunch of black ex-players are claiming, the Cardinals have somehow been a good baseball team over recent years, which is worth ten times more than a great football team, or any kind of hockey team.
Key Players Most Likely to Go Down for the Year with Debilitating Injuries: Wow, who thinks of sick topics like that?
But since it was asked: Rick Ankiel, Roy Oswalt, Edgar Martinez, Reggie Sanders, Billy Koch, Rondell White, J.D. Drew, and in the most crippling blow of all, Wiki Gonzalez. Go ahead, don’t feel ashamed about pulling for the best player on your least favorite team-someone you’ve probably never met-to suffer a painful, career-ending injury. It’s fun!
Surprise team of the year: Not the San Diego Padres. Every sports publication with a decent head on its shoulders has the Padres pegged to be a surprise team, but doesn’t that disqualify them by definition?
Instead, I’ll go with the Toronto Blue Jays, who will demonstrate how quickly a change in the upper ranks will manifest itself on the field. Hmmm, I wonder if I could make some sort of comparison to Student Life here..
Rookies Most Likely to Have Great Seasons: Are you kidding me? If I had the first clue on how to predict this sort of thing then I wouldn’t still be in college. I’d be living in Vegas, raking in millions of dollars every season, and I wouldn’t be trying to decide whether to use my bachelor’s degree to become a valet or a bartender. And anyone else who claims to know who between Sean Burroughs, Hank Blalock, Juan Cruz and Nick Johnson will have the best season is either in Vegas and trying to scam you, or wishing they were.
Team Most Likely to Disappoint: New York Mets. The Mets will make enough use of their added personnel to have a strong season and reach the playoffs, which will disappoint me greatly.
Player Most Likely to Have a Great Season Because He Abused Steroids: Not sure yet, but you’ll have the answer whenever a sportswriter refers to him as this year’s Bret Boone.
Multiply that guy by a hundred and you’ll have a conservative estimate of major leaguers who put illegal stuff in their bodies so they can hit the ball out of the park. Multiply that number by zero and you’ll have the number of MLB officials who are doing something about it.
Fantasy Team Most Likely to Win Its League: Mine.
This is only here because I had to find a way to work fantasy baseball into the column. And I’ve already wasted so much time poring over mine that I just had to start talking shit to somebody. Seriously, I’ve probably spent more time at college staring blankly at fantasy rosters, slack-jawed, trying to think of feasible trades or waiver claims, than I’ve spent, say, being in class.
Team Most Likely to Commit Hara-Kiri in July: Cleveland Indians. The end of seven years of wonderful baseball in Cleveland will see a potentially captivating auction for, among other commodities, Jim Thome, Travis Fryman, Bob Wickman, Bartolo Colon, Matt Lawton, Ellis Burks, and the moviemaking rights for any more sequels to Major League, which will quickly come back into vogue.
Team Whose Home City Will Most Likely Rhyme with “Pronto”: Toronto Blue Jays.
Player Whose Story Will Be Run Into the Ground So Many Times That His Original Dumb Act Will Lose All Its Meaning (aka The John Rocker Award): Ruben Rivera, who lost a guaranteed $1 million contract in exchange for $2500 quick cash at the pawn shop (and a one-way ticket out of the Yankee clubhouse) by stealing teammate Derek Jeter’s glove.
Jeff Kent is a dark horse for this award if his wrist injury never really goes away.
Player on My Favorite Team Most Likely to Get on My Bad Side if He Has Another Shitty Season: Andruw Jones.
First Team to Have Its Spring Optimism Wear Off: Tampa Bay Devil Rays. It will happen approximately during the top of the second inning of their season opener, when their Opening Day starter walks the bases loaded.
Contact Taylor at [email protected]