According to those who participated in the 2013 MillersTime Baseball Contests, the Tigers will win it all this year.
It’ll probably be the Nats they defeat in the World Series, tho some of you think the Nats will lose out in the NLCS to either the Giants or Dodgers, who then in turn will lose to the Tigers.
Got all that?
Tigers win World Series (Contest #6).
(Note: Last year you thought the Angels would beat the Phillies in the WS, and we know how far off that prediction turned out to be. For those whose memories are a bit challenged, neither the Angels nor the Phillies made the playoffs, and the Giants beat the Tigers in four games to win the WS.)
Further, it seems the American League will win the All-Star Game (thus breaking a three-year losing streak), if we are to believe MillersTime contestants, tho the voting was quite close (Contest #3).
For those picking the AL to win, most think Mike Trout will be the MVP, tho a few die hard you-know-who fans chose Robinson Cano. Those picking the NL to win believe Bryce Harper will be the MVP (probably because the contestants have a number of Nats’ fans).
And in another close ‘race’, the Sox are predicted to edge out the Yunkees in a majority of the 19 games they play against each other (Contest #5). That could well be because there are more Sox than Yankee fans participating these contests. It was easy to distinguish the Yankee fans: they brashly predicted the Yanks would overwhelm the Sox, defeating them in at least 12 of the 19 games.
(Note: The Sox won two out the first three games against the ‘Bumbers’ already this season. Also, as of this posting, 4/18/13, the Sox are 10-4 and a game and a half in first, ahead of the Yanks who are 8-5. Sox Magic Number is 144 with only 148 games left to play!)
Anyway, you seem to feel Cano and Ellsbury (or perhaps Pedroia or Middlebrooks) will be the heroes, and A-Rod and Ortiz will be the duds. Youk gets an equal amount of votes for being the hero and the dud.
Almost all of you believe the Nats will make the playoffs (Contest #5), tho there’s disagreement about whether they will then lose in the NLCSor in the WS.
(Personally, I thnk the Nats will have difficulty winning as many games as they did last year, 98, and if the revived Braves and Phillies show some life, as the Braves are doing so far, the Nats could have trouble making the playoffs. Just saying…)
* * * *
The other two contests (#1 – make a prediction about this year and #2 – make a prediction about your favorite team) have too many individual picks to list them all here. Once the season ends, however, I’ll list the predictions that came true, and let everyone decide which were the best predictions in those two categories.
But there are some good ones (e.g., Jeter – PED, O’s edge out Yankees for last place, Teddy wins 26 presidential races and Taft doesn’t win any).
Finally, it’s been a pleasure to read your predictions this year, except for the diatribes from my so-called friend David P who wrote the following in response to how well the Nats would do this year:
The Nationals are an enigma. They are a team with very little talent, an unpredictable manager who is long past his sell-buy date (did he really deserve the title ‘NL Man of the Year’ also – for what?), short-sighted & ill-qualified fans and an annoyance for winning games that they simply should not win. It is true that they did ‘well’ to make it to their first ever playoffs – it would be unfair to compare this team to the past life as the Montreal Expo’s but some who wear the Walgreens W do, but they just did ‘ok’ and only got to a first round elimination pinnacle which they were lucky to aspire to. Despite the fans hysteria, they will remain below par again. I have heard in some areas that the Nats are a ‘team for the next decade’ and one laughable comment saying that this is now a ‘Nationals Nation’ (really) but my question would be why? honestly – why? Is someone watching a different team to the one I saw last season? Is playing ugly & cheap baseball whilst beating opponents who are either off their normal game or having ‘one of those seasons’ a recipe for being future world-beaters? Surely in normal circumstances an average Phillies/Mets/Dodgers team would be able to field their 2nd line-up & still beat the Washington die-hards convincingly. In this life, every dog has its day. The Nats day has come and gone and they should prepare themselves for a 65-96 season. They will not be close to the playoffs. Bryce Harper is one dumb-a_s of a human being (even Forest Gump looks Harvard bound in comparison) and would profit from realizing that he isn’t actually as good as he thinks he is. Strasburg can play a little bit but lacks moral-fibre and has a heat allergy.
On a final note – I feel really sorry for Rafael Soriano as a player of his ability should not be wasting his time with a team like Washington.
I won’t give you Dave P’s email or snail mail address, but if you have something to communicate to him, please consider doing so in the Comment section below (keep it clean) or send it to me in an email (if you can’t control yourself). I’ll be sure he sees your considered responses.
Tim Malieckal said:
I agree with David P, on almost all counts.
First: DC is a Redskins town. Period. Yes, even after the Ravens took the Lombardi trophy. Even when the Skins sucked, even during the very saddest, abjectly painful years where Snyder was figuring out how not to be a spoilt brat owner, DC is all Burgundy & Gold, all the time.. and now with the arrival and ascendance of RGIII, fuggedaboudit.
Remember the Ovetchkin craze? Then newly-minted Caps fans realized one stud Russky does not a playoff series win, and that dalliance wilted. This is typical of the ‘on late, off early’ nature of the District’s bandwagon.
That’s not to say that the Nats have nothing. They have a ton of talent. But from this Mets fan’s vantage point, nobody is ‘scared’ of the Nats. They just feel like Fatheads on the wall: outsized and poised to be admired, but two dimensional and made of flimsy plastic, easily removed from the wall with nary a mark of evidence that fandom was e’re there.
I well remember when Strasburg came up – every single guy I root for the Redskins with on Sundays came out of the woodwork for that start. It was a helluva show, the ace has the goods. But does he have them upstairs, too?
Didn’t look that way last night, when he threw wild pitch after sixty foot dirt bomb after gofer ball, gofer ball, gofer ball, gofer ball, and triple when he met another stud in the making in #33 Matt Harvey. The guy who’s 4-0 with a .93 ERA and toting both Strasburg & Halladay’s scalp on his belt. Seems like when Strasbourg isn’t the favorite, he spits the bit. He certainly did when I watched him face RA Dickey a couple seasons ago in DC.
Which brings us to the fan experience. At that game, my friends and I were stunned to see that nobody challenged us AT ALL. Ten men in orange and blue kit, field seats for $40 (that this price point doesn’t ensure every game sells out is telling) standing in unison and cheering “Oh RA you’re so fine, you’re so fine you blow my mind Hey Dickey! [Clap Clap/ Clap] Hey Dickey!”. People stared at us in wonder, as they gorged and watched the game listlessly. What was going on here? Even the Marlins fans in the new park in Miami seemed more into the game of baseball. Then again, that could have been the Cuban cheerleaders being hoisted into the air.
Lastly, *what is the deal with the GM*? Innings limit is OK, I guess, though either it means they are worried about Strasburg’s mechanics or they are overly cautious. But how on earth do you sit your ace for the playoffs?! This guy should have had #FAIL tattooed on his forehead. You wanna limit innings, you have four options: take him out after 6 every start, skip him every three starts, give him month of April off, or shut him down. The last, obviously, is reserved only for the most short-sighted and moronic GMs. Is there anyone who thinks that kind of mistake doesn’t poison a clubhouse? Simply put, that would get you fired in New York or Boston, full stop.
How about selling Bryce ‘Pete Rose 2.0’ Harper’s record-setting, Opening Day jersey, pissing off the team’s great white hope for the future? That’s the kind of rookie mistake that gets your player signed with the Yankees (God Forbid). How about paying Jason Werth like he’s a 5-tool player, and not a guy who profited from playing in a bandbox with Utley and Howard being pitched around? Even if he didn’t look like a pizza delivery guy, that’s dumb. Now Zimmerman has the yips? Maybe the GM should put him on an innings limit.
Look, I’m a Mets fan, so I know dysfunction when I see it. This is a team that is still paying Bobby Bonilla, that tried to teach Jose Reyes how to run differently, that moved him to second in favor of Kaz Matsui at short, that let him walk to a division rival. A team owned by Ponzi scheme criminals, to boot. But the only team this Keystone Kops franchise is NOT afraid of is the Nats. Philly is always gritty, and won a championship. Miami is its own pyramid scheme, but they’ve won twice! As for the Nats, well, they played steadily for Davey during a year when all three other teams sucked. It will be the same this year, I expect.
I don’t hate the Gnats. I wish them well! But that’s kinda sad, really.