White Hot Baseball Predictions I Got Wrong, Right

So good and underrated. – US PRESSWIRE

The baseball season is coming to an end and I, for one, am unhappy about it. The end of the baseball season means the start of the baseball off-season, an off-season full of trade speculation, free agent signings/analysis, hirings, firings. It’s all moderately interesting but it’s not real baseball and real baseball is superior to all tangential happenings of said. This very moment, I am watching college football. College football! I ate chicken wings for dinner. Chicken wings! The times and seasons, they are a changing. We can’t stop it but that doesn’t mean we have to like it.

During upsetting moments such as these, I turn to the past for comfort. Some many months ago, I made a few predictions about the upcoming baseball season. Some of them were real predictions, others, exercises in whimsical nonsense (an [unpopular] favorite of mine). Total hubris, nonetheless. Please forgive me. Why don’t we examine my little flights of fancy and judge harshly? That seems completely reasonable and also a very convenient subject for a blog post.

Jay Bruce will lead the National League in home runs, but he will not win the Most Valuable Player Award.

He’s currently tied for second. Ryan Braun is the clear front runner. I don’t want to be too easy on myself, but without looking down the list or doing any real preparation whatsoever, I have to imagine there is going to be a much worse prediction.

Justin Upton will.

Like this one.

Hanley Ramirez and Jose Reyes start an upscale, glittery, designer T-shirt company together.

We don’t have any hard proof of this actually happening, and now Hanley is in LA (sidenote: lol Dodgers). Were the Marlins a successful baseball team this season, glittery T-shirts seem like a total lock. Alas.

Chris Carpenter will come back from his vague neck/shoulder injury to say a whole bunch of salty and surly things. Probably about the Reds.

Half right, I suppose. He has made a miraculous recovery from a number of ailments. Salty and surly comments are currently wanting.

Felix Hernandez will not be traded to the New York Yankees.

Perfect game? Yes. Trade to the Yankees? No. We are all winners, here. All of us.

Chase Headley will flirt with a 5-win season but no one will notice because he’s on the Padres.

Boy Wonder is currently at 6.9 fWAR and is one of the best players in all of baseball. Please allow me to bask in the glory of this prediction, for I am very proud of myself and I have no shame.

The exact same thing except swap “Chase Headley” for “Cory Luebke.”

Yeah ok, nevermind. But his ERA was pretty low when he got hurt, right? Right?

Alex Avila will not hit well at all.

The Tigers catcher is hitting .284/.357/.396. Not too hot. However, he is a catcher, and he has battled a number of injuries this season. I’m perfectly fine with calling this one a wash if you are. It’s your call. Don’t let the power go to your head.

The Nationals will stay in contention long enough to make it super awkward when Stephen Strasburg hits his 160 innings limit. And no matter how they handle it, some A-hole in the media will write an ill-informed and knee-jerk indictment of their decision.

This is more right than I ever could have imagined. But also, it was a super obvious and easy prediction to make. Calm down, Kyle, you’re not that smart.

Bud Selig will reveal himself to be a malevolent alien being, having infiltrated Major League Baseball as part of an evil plot to erode the United States from the inside out.

Not yet, but there’s still time.

Billy Butler will hit 30 home runs.

Country Breakfast of Bacon, Eggs, Hash Browns and White Toast With Coffee hit a home run yesterday to bring his season total to 28. The number 28 is decidedly not the number 30, but there are a few games yet to be played and really, holy shit, I don’t even know why I predicted this but it was a pretty awesome move on my part. That may sound pompous, and it is, but I have to take happiness where I can get it because my life is cold and empty and devoid of meaning.

Michael Bourn will steal 70 bases.

It probably wasn’t wise to include a player that I drafted on both of my fantasy teams.

Zack Greinke will soon grow tired of his newly hired high-profile baseball agent Casey Close. He’ll come to realize that the slick talking, designer suit wearing, 500 dollar haircut paying type just isn’t his speed, and Greinke will long for the personal attention and commitment found in a smaller time, lesser known representative. He will go searching for the kind of intimate knowledge and dry sense of humor commonly found in certain circles of online baseball blogging. He’ll do a quick internet search for persons who have written extensively about his career to date, and he’ll make a bold, rash, and innovative decision to hire said person to be his voice in negotiations, regardless of any applicable prior work experience that person may have. The two will form an unlikely bond, and become close friends. They’ll make a lot of money for each other. They’ll spend weekends together during the offseason, taking in popular cinema and barbequing in backyards. They’ll help each other build deck additions and smoke fine meats in wood sheds. They’ll stay up together late into the night, drinking fine whiskey and discussing the existential grind of mortality—the sick-sweetness of being and the untold mysteries of the universe.

No comment.

Albert Pujols will make the American League All-Star team.

It’s kind of amazing how when I originally wrote this post, that this final prediction was meant to be a total joke, what with it’s obviousness very apparent and undeniable. It turns out baseball is the weirdest sport ever. The best player in baseball is only such until he’s not.

Kyle writes baseball nonsense at The Trance of Waiting. You can follow him on Twitter @AgainstKyle.