Today is Opening Day!  That means it’s time for my yearly baseball predictions (or as some might call them, the list of teams that won’t win the World Series).  This is going to sound a lot like last year.  In fact, I’ll even use some direct quotes from last year’s predictions: “Last year I made some baseball predictions and they didn’t turn out so well.”  I got 5 of the 8 playoff teams right, but neither of the World Series teams right; that’s a slight improvement over last year.  (For those keeping track, my NCAA basketball bracket stunk again this year.)  I only overestimated the capabilities of the Washington Nationals a little last year.

Well, I’m here to try it again.  First, let’s start with the Nationals.  I predicted 75 wins last year – I was off by 6 (a ten-game improvement from the year before).  Again from last year, “I’m going to look at it like I was just a year too early – I’m going to predict 75 wins for this year.”  With the starting pitching looking a little better stability-wise, the bullpen continuing its improvement, and key additions in the field (Werth, LaRoche, Ankiel, and Morse) making the defense better (with hopefully not too much of a drop-off offensively), a 6-game improvement seems possible.  We’ll see.  The future could be looking up over the next couple of years: win in the 70s and get a solid foundation of young players built this year, get Strasburg back and add a solid free agent or two to improve to the 80s win range in 2012, and add Harper and other key pieces to get into playoff contention in 2013.  Here’s hoping that happens! Let’s go, Nats!

And now for my season predictions:

AL East: Red Sox

AL Central: White Sox

AL West: Rangers

Wild Card: Yankees

Surprising team: Orioles

Team that just misses out: A’s

NL East: Phillies

NL Central: Reds

NL West: Rockies

Wild Card: Braves

Surprising team: Marlins

Team that just misses out: A toss-up between the Brewers and the Giants.

World Series: Red Sox over Phillies in a thriller! (I was just a year too early last year.)