My 2011 MLB Predictions: In Review

I know we're way past the halfway point of the MLB season, but since many teams have played 100 games so far, it's time for me to look back on my predictions I made the day before the season started. So, let's look at how smart (stupid) I was...

My 6 divisions winners were: Philly, Milwaukee, San Francisco, Boston, the White Sox, and Rangers. Funny enough, I was smart here. 5 out of the 6 have a very good shot to win their divisions. The White Sox, well...  they aren't out of it, but Cleveland and Detroit are better teams right now. If Paul Konerko wasnt' half as good as he was, the Sox would be approaching Royals levels of bad. The rest of the teams are either in first or tied for first, so I'm smart! But, I'll take my hits next...

My 2 wild card teams were the Braves and Yankees, and once again, I prove to be smarter than I appear. But those teams weren't the hardest to pick, the hardest were the other contenders. The bigger contenders in the NL for me were Colorado, LAD, Cincinnati, Florida and St. Louis. Funny enough, only 2 of them are serious contenders right now in Cincy and St. Louis, and they are also competing with Pittsburgh (!). The rest of the teams are having bad years, and once again prove I'm not as smart as I look. My AL wildcard contenders were Oakland, Tampa Bay, Minnesota, and Detroit. One of those teams is atop their division, one is saddled with being in a tough division, and the other 2 are having pretty bad years. The preseason hype machine for Oakland was obviously unfounded, and once again prove those preseason preview magazines are also not helpful tools for getting an accurate outlook on the season.

My award winners are though, about to restore my dignity, possibly. Adrian Gonzalez was my AL MVP pick and thankfully he's living up to the hype. My NL MVP pick was Albert Pujols, and he's not the leading contender, as he has taken a backseat to Jose Reyes and Matt Kemp. The Cy Young picks were Cliff Lee and Jon Lester, and while one has lived up to the billing, the other has been too injured to be a serious contender. My Manager of the Year picks have been pretty decent, with Ron Roenicke leading his Brewers to the NL Central lead and Terry Francona leading the injured Red Sox to the best record in the AL. But they won't win those awards in my minds now because of the managers of the surprise Indians and Pirates likely taking the cake.

But where I really fall down is in my Rookie of the Year picks. They were Aroldis Chapman and Dustin Ackley. Oops. Craig Kimbrel is dominating the NL, and Justin Turner has been a nice pleasant surpise for the Mets. In the AL, another Mariner could win in Michael Pineda, and also Jeremy Hellickson and Zach Britton have been pretty decent. Even though this has been normally the hardest award to predict the winners of, I will admit failure.

So you've just seen my ego-deflating look back at my MLB pre-season predictions. Hopefully, someone has done worse than me, but no one will admit it. Oh well, next up... FOOTBALL!