Baseball Season Begins!

Actually, it kinda began a few days ago, but it feels like it began today. Let me put a few things out on the table now:

God/Ichiro will really take-off this year, batting .350 and staying strong through September.

Jamie Moyer will come close to 20 wins. Freddie Garcia will too.

Raul Ibanez will get some attention. Rich Aurilia won't.

Radical prediction: Both John Olerud and Edgar Martinez will bat around .300, hit around 25 home runs, and score around 100 runners. They've only been doing that every year since the dead ball era (aka the '80s).

Oh yeah, I guess there are some other teams too. Here's some more crazy guesses:

Some superstar-laden team will win the AL East, while some minor league team will win the AL Central.

There won't be a subway series. You know, between the Cubs and the White Sox. No one takes the red line between those two parks anyway. Why start now?

Pitchers won't even bother will Barry Bonds. 600 AB, 600 IBB. He'll end the season batting 1.000, or .000, depending on what your childhood was like. Ok, just saw him hit a game-tying home run. He'll get some of those too somehow.

Cubs, Cardinals, and Astros fans will all contend that their team is by far the best in the NL Central long into October, despite the fact that only one of those teams will still be playing.

The Braves will win the NL East again, all this Phillies nonsense notwithstanding. Atlanta just doesn't know how not to.

The Padres will feel much better about themselves now that they have new digs. They'll need it, since they're still a bad team. I guess Arizona will win the NL West. I don't really know. That's what the smart people say.

Ken Griffey Jr. will get hurt again. Oh wait, that's already happened!

(Real) radical prediction: The Mariners will win AL West. Anaheim will be a wild card (and thus the peace between my girlfiend and I will be kept until October). Tough luck, A's and Red Sox.

By the way, check out Espn Page 2's day by day predictions. I can't top that.

I end with a nice point Peter Gammons made (paraphrasing): with all this talk of money taking over baseball (like always), it's useful to remember where the crown has ended up the last three years: with the Diamondbacks, Angels, and Marlins.

What a great game.