Giants "108 ERA"

At least Zito seems primed for a huge comeback this year. Awesome outing today.

Let's try to be positive for a change- if we get 25 shutouts a piece from Lincecum, Zito, and Cain we will be right in the heart of the wild card race.

There's really no reason to think the A's will finish last. They could, but Texas is pretty bad.

Texas has significantly more upside than the A's, who will probably end up trading Blanton at some point.

Check out Bill James' projections for Josh Hamilton... if healthy he could be a top-10 player in the AL. Add to that small bounce-backs from Young and Blalock, plus 450 AB's of ~.800 OPS production out of Bradley and this offense could be pretty decent... especially since they also project to get above-average offense out of both second base and catcher.

The Giants have to be the worst team in baseball. I mean look at that lineup: Roberts, Winn, Rowand, Name that Molina, Aurilia, Fransden... Crede? Ugh. Better hope Zito improves...

(2) So now we see what happens when Zito is comfortable in his own skin.

Texas has significantly more upside than the A's, who will probably end up trading Blanton at some point.

Texas has NO pitching. They have a lot of minor league talent, but still.

Oakland, barring any more major league talent dumps, is going to win about 80 games. They are not terrible. They are just mediocre. One big test will be to see if Justin Duchscherer is a capable major league starting pitcher. If so, they should have an adequate rotation and bullpen. However, offensively, they will struggle. They won't be like the Giants, but they won't be good at bat, either.

I don't think they will be bad either. But I the think the offense will be at least average - they have pretty decent hitters everywhere.

Things were so bad for the Giants today that MIKE SWEENEY stole a base! That has to have been some bizarre play where Sweeney just stole it by accident, right?

The scary thing is that the Giants could be the worst team in baseball and lose 100 games IN SPITE OF HAVING CAIN AND LINCECUM.

Before anyone calls me on it, let me revise my appraisal of the A's slightly: much depends on the health of Eric Chavez, Bobby Crosby and Rich Harden. If all three stay off the DL all year -- which seems unlikely -- the A's could win more than half their games, though I doubt they will challenge for the division or the wild card. If all three of those guys play as little as they did last year, the A's will lose 90 or more games. My guess is that they are somewhere in between (in terms of games played, innings pitched) and thus I think the A's will be in the 75-82 win range.

That seems pretty reasonable, Rich. But I'm not sure that Crosby is an asset at this point, with OPS+ of 68 and 67 over the last two years. ZiPS has him pegged for a .240 .305 .353 line. Even with good defense, that's pretty poor.

I've got my bet placed on the Giants coming in under 71.5 wins. It's always been fun to root against them, but never this much.

Also, Cubs and D'backs over 87.5. Braves under 85.5. White Sox under 77.5. Reds under 78.5. Those are all -115. Then we have the Yankees at +125 to beat the Red Sox in their season series, and the Padres +120 to beat the Dodgers in their season series.

While we are talking about bets, I've got the Mariners under 88 at -110, the Rockies under 86 at -110 and the Yankees to win the AL East at +140. Gotta like British bookies.

Has Diamond Mind or ZIPS runs their projections yet? I'd like to know what they prognosticate.

I feel like the Giants will win around 65-70 games, but wouldn't be shocked if they only won 60. The quality of their division will make them appear even worse than they are. But for the unbalanced schedule, this division could produce three 90-wiun clubs. Here is my back-of-the-envelope guess as to what the NL West will look like at season's end:

ARI 91-71
COL 90-72
LAD 88-74
SDP 85-77*
SFG 65-97

Whoever finishes in 4th place in the NL West (presuming it's not the Giants), that will probably be the best 4th place team in baseball since the wild card was instituted.

* SD could be hurt by its more difficult interleague schedule. They play 3 games with the Yankees, 3 with the Tigers, 3 with the Indians and 3 with the Twins, plus 6 games with the Mariners. By contrast, the Rockies don't have those games with the Yankees, Mariners or Twins, but do play 3 games with Royals and 3 with the White Sox.

I know interleague haters point to examples like this as to why interleague play is a bad idea. I am a fan of interleague play, but agree that it can hurt one club and benefit another, based on the quality of opponents. My argument is simply that over 162 games, 3 of the 4 best teams in each league are going to make the playoffs every year. However, the 4th team that makes the playoffs may actually be the 5th or even 6th best team some years, having benefitted from its schedule and division.

Also, Cubs and D'backs over 87.5.

Not a big fan of the old Plexiglass Principle, eh?

Cubs I'm not so sure about, but I'm drinking the Emeigh Kool-Aid on the D'backs.