MLB 2008 Season Thread
 

Not gonna do my crazy ass predictions like I did last year, but here goes:

AL East
1) New York Yankees
2) Boston Red Sox *
3) Tampa Bay Devil Rays
4) Toronto Blue Jays
5) Baltimore Orioles

Call me a homer but I think the Yankees have a good shot this year. A lot of projections agree with me, as well. Sox will take the Wild Card, and it's going to be really close between the Yankees and Sox again. D-Rays in 3rd is my bold prediction, I guess. They have a solid 1-2-3 in the rotation and the makings of a bullpen, and we all know they can hit. Their defense is also much improved with Upton moving to CF, Iwamura to 3rd and Longoria at 3rd. The Jays aren't bad but not much improved at all, and their players are fragile and inconsistent. They have potentially one of the best starting rotations, however, though I don't think they can compete this year. Baltimore might be the worst team in baseball.

AL Central
1) Detroit Tigers
2) Cleveland Indians
3) Minnesota Twins
4) Chicago White Sox
5) Kansas City Royals

Pretty much the same as last year, except Detroit and Cleveland flip flop. Detroit might have the best record in MLB this year with all of their offseason additions, though I'm a little nervous about their bullpen. Cleveland will win 90 but miss the playoffs. After that, the rest of this division is incredibly mediocre to bad.

AL West
1) Los Angeles Angels
2) Seattle Mariners
3) Texas Rangers
4) Oakland Athletics

There's just no touching the Angels in the west. Seattle adds Bedard but they played over their heads last year, so I'm expecting a similar 85-88 win season out of them. The Rangers and A's are both terrible. I pick Oakland to finish last because they're doing a complete rebuild.

NL East
1) New York Mets
2) Philadelphia Phillies *
3) Atlanta Braves
4) Washington Nationals
5) Florida Marlins

Mets won't fade this year, and adding Santana instantly makes them the favorites in the NL East and the NL. The Phillies are right behind them and will win the WC. They have possibly the best IF in baseball. Atlanta will have another solid season as they move on from the Andruw Jones era. The Nats aren't good but they're better than the Marlins who will probably be decent in like 3 or 4 years again.

NL Central
1) Chicago Cubs
2) Milwaukee Brewers
3) Cincinnati Reds
4) Houston Astros
5) St. Louis Cardinals
6) Pittsburgh Pirates

Cubs will win it with or without Brian Roberts. I love the Brewers and wouldn't be shocked if they took it this year... I don't think they'll top the Cubs though. I picked them to win the division last year and looked like a genius at midseason. The Reds have some young guys coming up that will fire them up and their pitching will be better this year. Houston is a team on the decline full of drama. St. Louis hasn't done dick since they won the World Series and will continue to fall. Pittsburgh... yeah.

NL West
1) Los Angeles Dodgers
2) Colorado Rockies
3) Arizona Diamondbacks
4) San Diego Padres
5) San Francisco Giants

Once again, all of these teams (except the Giants) will be competitive, 80+ win teams. I like the Dodgers this year with Torre, Andruw Jones, Kurodka and the young guys to take the division. Rockies pitching staff isn't as good as the Dodgers staff which is what is holding them back. D-Backs are good but don't score enough runs, 90 wins last year was a fluke, though they could win 85. The Padres are solid but unspectacular. The Giants rival Baltimore as the worst team in MLB.

AL MVP: Alex Rodriguez
AL Cy Young: Justin Verlander
AL ROY: Jacoby Ellsbury
AL MOY: Joe Maddon
AL Comeback Player: Manny Ramirez

A-Rod is unstoppable. Tigers will have the best record and Verlander will win 20 and strike out close to or over 200. Ellsbury will solidify himself as the Sox leadoff man and win ROY though he'll have stiff competition. Maddon wins MOY for bringing the D-Rays to respectability. Manny I guess for comeback if he qualifies... couldn't think of anyone else.

NL MVP: David Wright
NL Cy Young: Johan Santana
NL ROY: Joey Votto
NL MOY: Willie Randolph
NL Comeback Player: Andruw Jones

The Mets will sweep the NL by winning it... David Wright will go 30/30 and could go 40/40 and hit .310 for the NL Champs. Johan will annihilate the NL, and Willie will win MOY. Andruw Jones, Met killer, will be the comeback player of the year with a 30 HR, .260 type season and a GG in LA.

ALDS:
NYY def. LAA (finally)
DET def. BOS

NLDS:
NYM def. LAD
PHI def. CHC

ALCS:
DET def. NYY

NLCS:
NYM def. PHI

WS:
DET def. NYM

Kuroda**

;)

Whatev

Also, superstick this OH!

Gotta say I love it, just switch the victor in the WS and I'm 150% behind these predictions.:cool:

Jays will be the surprise team in the AL east, yet still miss the playoffs.

Red Sox win the Al East, Yankees finish in 3rd. Cleveland gets the wildcard. Tigers and Angels win their divisions.

Mets, Cubs, Dodgers all win the divisions and the Wildcard goes to Philly.

Red Sox for the World Series win

Ellsbury with the ROY..when is the last time a team had back to back Rookie of the Year winners?

Yankees will win 109 reg season games

Only if Pettite is on that HGH son

The Dodgers will choke

the Rockies will make the playoffs

SuperJones that OH

Rockies can definitely win the NL West, but I think LA and Arizona will give them a run for their money.

Danny Haren will win the NL Cy Young

I'm not drinking the Blue Jays Kool-Aid...I don't think they are gonna be that good

Billy Crystal just struck out

What, I thought the game was at 7

nope, they said he'd be up twice but Damon replaced him.

He made contact, fouled off one pitch, more than I could probably do

<font color=goldenrod>Crystal was the DH? I coulda swore they said he'd be playing the field for like an inning.</font>

Would have been great if they beaned him

why is he playing? what was the pitch he fouled off?

http://assets.espn.go.com/photo/2008...rystal_600.jpg
Gotta give him some credit for the Jordan gloves anyway

What's next, Matt Damon gearing up for the next Sox game? How about Stephen King?

Thats not him.


...is it?

<font color=goldenrod>Melky Cabrera, Shelley Duncan suspended 3 games. Jonny Gomes suspended 2 games. Joe Girardi, Kevin Long, and Bobby Meachem fined.</font>

Apparently they caught Melky punching Evan Longoria or something. LOL, I dunno but I find it hilarious that Melky was fighting. Nobody got hurt so its not a big deal or anything its just crazy because Melky is the last one I'd suspect of doing it. Kinda surprised Gomes only got 2 games. I mean he did run in from right field and try to plow into a guy from behind.

I guess the Yankees will be sporting Damon in CF and Matsui in LF for the first couple games of the season.

Three games or three spring training games

Pretty sure the suspensions automatically go to the regular season.

regular season games

any idea if Bonds has been snatched up for the season yet

cant seem to find jack all anywhere

no he's still unsigned. Clemens to believe it or not!

I'm gunna say Cubs vs Tigers in the World Series and i'm taking the Cubbies.

Bold Predictions

Either the Yankees or the Red Sox will miss the playoffs this year.

I got the White Sox in the wild-card.

A-Rod will be BETTER then last year

But still suck nutsacks in the playoffs.

Bonds will get picked up by the Rockies.

Ken Griffey Jr. has an injury free season

Ichiro will bat .400 this year

Brandon Moss ties it up in the 9th!!!!!!

well, it wasn't smooth but a win is a win.

Fuck I missed Opening Day

See why I don't trust Huston Street Vito? :roll:

<font color=goldenrod>Fuck I'm already 0-for-1 in this MLB.com "Beat the Streak" fantasy game. Basically you pick a player each day to get a base hit (you can re-use players and the game lasts all season even if you have an 0-for) with the idea being to pick someone to get a base hit that day for 57 straight gamedays. Was debating between Papi and Manny for today and went with Papi.</font> :mad:

rofl Manny thought he hit a homer and just stood there, but it was really a long ass double off the wall

Whatever though, drove in the winning runs

Looks pretty photoshopped I guess, also doesn't that come out to about $2.79

Its from CBS Sports, I'm sure they photoshopped that tho

It comes out to a little over 8000 thousand American dollars btw

Kaz Matsui is having surgery for anal fissure

An anal fissure is an unnatural crack or tear in the anus skin. As a fissure, these tiny tears may show as bright red rectal bleeding and cause severe periodic pain after defecation.[1] The tear usually extends from the anal opening and located posteriorly in the midline. This location is probably because of the relatively unsupported nature of the anal wall in that location.

lolololol

lol

Manny with a bomb today, about the only positive from the game. If he stays healthy Manny is gonna have a huge year, he has 5 RBIs in the first 2 games already. Dude wants to Get Paid like Asante Samuel

cant beleive i missed game 2 in tokyo. the first was good, what i saw of it anyway, seeing that it was played at midnight ovefr here. Now, Monday 1pm im waiting, the next match, forget whos playing though, but im excited that its baseball season again

Mets put Gotay on waivers and Oliver Perez had a scare today :y: :y: :y:

So the Giants did some stadium cleaning and removed EVERY image of Barry Bonds throughout the park.

I guess it's a sign of things to come.

Thats what you get for leaving the Rockies

WOOOOOOOOOOOOOO GOING 2 NATS HOME OPENER TONIGHT

It was awesome seeing the game tonight being played in the L.A. Colisseium. Or however you spell it. Over 100,000 watched it, biggest crowd in MLB history.

Left field wall was 201 feet, lol. Center and Right were like 470 or some shit.

Going to the Sox/Dodgers game tomorrow. WOOOOOOOOOOO

I always get envious of you guys that can easily go to games. I want that privilege. :(

The REAL opening day is HERE. O how I have missed the baseball season! Should be a crazy ride.

They should've put home plate in the end zone and had the dimensions be like they had at the Polo Grounds since they're doing the whole New York to LA commemoration. I know the Dodgers didn't play there but it could've been a nice touch.

Also the old attendance record for a baseball game was for a game in Melbourne, Australia? That's kinda weird. I thought most Aussies hated baseball.

clever

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lol

gonna have to see that commercial every baseball game I watch though

Going to the Rockies game on the 7th

suck on that YOUR Hero

Tell Holliday I love him.

<font color=goldenrod>I can't wait for tomorrow.</font> :love:

Jays haven't lost a game yet this season. :cool:

they'll fade

O's cut loose Jay Gibbons.

Wouldn't be surprised if the Jays picked him up. He could be a good bat off the bench for his daddy.

Crazy way to start the season. Walk-off HR for the Nationals.

Ryan Zimmerman is one of my picks for a breakout this season. Good start so far.

on pace for 162 HRs

Walk-off homerun!!

Nationals stadium review:

Parking is absolutely ridiculous, there is a little parking garage next to the stadium for $20 but I don't know what the deal is with it, I dunno if regular people are allowed to park there even. They installed zones around the area where you have to pay to park, on gameday its $2 for the first 2 hours before a game, and then during the game it's $18 per hour :| but we have a friend who lives near the stadium who let us park in front of his house with his visitor pass so whatever. At the stadium there were 2 gates to go through which resulted in a 10,000 people line which stretched around half of the stadium. It was gonna take 3 hours to wait in the whole thing and as we were standing in it there were thousands of people walking by because the whole thing had no structure at all and people could just cut in the front so even though we wanted to be good people and stay in line we just walked up to the gate and got in with a zillion people and waited 10 minutes to get checked by security (3 metal detectors for everyone going in the gate) which was freaking ridiculous cause Bush was there. 40,000 people funneled into 2 gates = a mess. The stadium was reallllllllllllllly nice however, really wide concourse areas and food everywhere, a million times better than RFK. While we were walking around at first there was this TV showing the end of the Davidson/Kansas game so there were like a hundred people there and we watched that.

There is a freaking gigantic scoreboard in the stadium but they showed like 2 replays the whole game and of course only when the Nationals did something good. They really need to get the kinks out of that cause sometimes they didn't show pitch speed among other things, but I dunno. I can't even remember a bunch of stuff right now. But Zimmerman's home run was incredible, first walk-off homerun I've ever seen live.

I can tell Brad Hawpe something if you want

sitting like right next to him

I liked Atlanta's new all navy alternate jerseys last night. Usually I don't like the jersey and the logo/numbers to be the same color but it looked good with their gray pants. Way better than their red alternates.

Fucking stop raining

Sup homefries?

Rockin my Robinson Cano jersey right now

can't wait.

Gonna get some food and some beers and fuckinnnnnnnnn watch the game

robinson kano

<font color=goldenrod>lol as if it wasn't already obvious that LaTroy Hawkins would be booed, apparently Ensberg decided he couldn't continue wearing the #21....so Hawkins grabbed it up.</font>

<font color=goldenrod>lol Yankees Opening Day postponed. I know so many people who skipped class and work today.</font> :o

lol Yankees.

Got tickets to see the Sox play the Mariners on June 9th...standing room only though lol

I agree with Supreme too, the Braves jerseys last night where pretty sick

METS BASEBALL IS BACK BABY! LETS GO CYTANA!

I hope he tears his rotator cuff.

Fair enough

I cant believe that the royals are beating the Tigers, this sucks. :nono:

Lol Chien Ming Wang musta been so psyched having the final opening day start, poor guy:(

Anyone been able to get on MLB.TV at all

How much does mlbtv cost these days?

$90 a year for regular but you want premium because the quality of regular went down this year :|

Dodgers up 4-0 :)

I am among them.

FZA you're a damn fool son

Gagne being Gagne

Solid debut for Fukudome. 3-3 with a 2B, game tying HR in the 9th and 3 RBI's

Eric "HGH" Gagne gave up the game tying HR :lol:

sad the Reds lost but pumped that Wood and Gagne both sucked REALLY bad

Santana looked sharpe, granted its the Marlins, still looked very good

lol wow 3 ER for Gagne....27.00 ERA :y: