Important Dates

2017 Champion: Patently Nuts (71.5 points)
2018 Season: March 29 - September 30

Monday, March 31, 2014

I sat down to write bold predictions, and you won't believe what happened next!!!

Like Caleb, I also haven't had a lot of time to come up with great bold predictions but wanted to at least throw something together before the AL games get going. Last year I was 0 for 5. Either I'm too bold or just stupid. Anyway, here goes...

1) Mike Trout ties or beats his 2013 performance in at least FOUR out of five roto categories. Last year I predicted he would beat his 2012 performance in at least 2 categories and he came up short, only surpassing his 2012 RBI total. Well, this year obviously the targets are lower, and I want to be bold, so I'm going with four. For the record, that's 109 runs, 27 HRs, 97 RBIs, 33 SB, and a .3226 average.

2) My team bats above .280. I think this is bold enough, as if I remember correctly usually we only have 1, sometimes 0 teams that end up batting better than .280. I targeted high average batters because I was intent on making Jonathan Villar my shortstop, and was scared of the possibility that he bats .220. Thanks to Caleb, I don't really own anybody that I think is capable of torpedoing my average. I'm going to give myself a caveat here though, and say that I will count this prediction as true if EITHER my team's final average is >.280, or if my opening day starting lineup ends the season with a combined average >.280 (that's Gomes, Davis, Kendrick, Bogaerts, Jeter, EE, Trout, Martin, Markakis, Brantley, and Ortiz). Just giving myself that out because I could easily end up trading average for power or pitching at some point.

3) I'm going to re-try one of my 2013 picks and say R.A. Dickey wins 20 games.

4) David Freese gets at least 100 RBIs. Batting 4th or 5th behind Calhoun, Trout, Pujols, and sometimes Hamilton, I'm expecting him to get a lot of opportunities. I think last year was a bad luck aberration. Freese's batted ball distance held up last year. Also, as much as Angels Stadium is not a hitter's park, it does play better than Busch for righties.

5) Bogaerts, Kendrick, Brantley, and Castellanos combine for at least 100 HR+SB.

6 comments:

Caleb said...

It'll be hilarious when Dickey rehashes his 2012 season (2.73 ERA, 1.05 WHIP, 230 K) but only gets 19 wins.

Luke Murphy said...

After today's start, I'll be pretty surprised to see Dickey any of those numbers.

MIKE TROUT, on the other hand, is lookin' good.

Spencer said...

I may or not may be working on a RA Dickey bio pic...

Luke Murphy said...

For real? I will totally go see that.

Andrew said...

He's missing a ligament in his elbow! It's nuts. He has no UCL. Apparently it cost him a bunch of signing bonus money when the Rangers team doctor noticed his arm looked funny in Dickey's college photo.

Luke Murphy said...

The "Knuckleball" movie from a couple years ago is pretty good. I think it's on Netflix.