Evan Brunell’s 2010 MLB Predictions: Does Boston win it?

As the advent of spring training games are upon us, I thought I’d kick off everyone’s favorite little exercise by providing my own personal predictions as to how I think the season will shake out. Now, before I do so, a word of caution: predictions can change daily based on events. Heck, my predictions change multiple times a week. But I’ve gotta make predictions at some point, right? Point being, I might disagree with my own predictions a week from now. Most of the time, these kind of predictions are an exercise in fallacy, but it’s not going to stop me from trying.

I don’t know why I made things harder on myself, but I set out to present an exact record. This means I had to go into a spreadsheet and make sure all the wins and losses totaled the correct amount of games while also balancing out to a .500 record. Took me a while, but dadgum it, I did it. One thing I did not control for was the unbalanced schedule (in a total record sense), but I already strained my tenuous math skills, so I wasn’t about to complicate it further.

Click “read more” or the headline to find my predictions.

What about lineup protection?

It didn’t take long for David Ortiz to ask for a “power” bat to protect him in the lineup after Manny Ramirez was traded. This was oddly timed last year as the team was returning Jason Bay to the lineup and was expecting big things from him. Now with Bay gone Ortiz has stuck to his mantra asking who is supposed to “protect” him now.

This is a mental thing for David, but protection is a very misunderstood idea. The first thing I would hope is that Ortiz would take it upon himself to become the protection. To stop expecting it of others and say “I can hit 35 homers have a .400 OBP and carry this team”. Outside of that we need to understand what is known about protection.

Early studies looked at different numbers and found lineup protection to be largely a myth. Some were small size studies. Others said any effect they found was so small to be considered a myth. So we should just ignore Ortiz’s statement and move on? Not yet.

Red Sox need backup shortstop

With the signing of Adrian Beltre and impending acquisition of Bill Hall, it seems that the Sox only have one thing left to do: dump Mike Lowell to bring in a backup shortstop.

Lowell is perhaps even more redundant with the acquisition of Hall, who can play third and has done so primarily for a while now. There are now four third basemen on the roster (Kevin Youkilis included).

What the team lacks is a viable backup shortstop. While Hall can play every position but catcher competently, he hasn’t tried his hand at short in three years — and thus shouldn’t be considered an option there. He figures to serve as the fifth outfielder and primary third base backup and likely first base as well. He also can appear at second base but is his position of least experience (assuming you sum all his outfield games).

Assuming that the team dumps Mike Lowell (who deserves a better fate and I feel should have a nice season in 2010 but it is what it is, and I can’t argue with the team’s decision), who can they bring in?

All-Aughts Team of the Decade LF: Manny Ramirez

When Boston fans look back on the 2000s years from now, David Ortiz and Manny Ramirez will only have grown in stature. For the rest of all our natural lives, any dominating three-four duo in the lineup will be compared to Papi/ManRam to determine ‘the best ever.’ (Fire Brand archives: Breaking down the Manny and Papi duo, 2/9/07; 3-4, 8/5/06.)

Today, we recognize Manny Ramirez (and all his faults) as the All-Aughts left-fielder of the decade.

All told, Manny hit for an obscene .312/.411/.588 line, cranking 274 home runs and 868 RBI for the Sawx.

Guest Sunday: Looking back at the ‘04 Sox/Cards

Drew Silva, 22, contributes to Rotoworld.com, MLBTradeRumors.com and FanGraphs. Check him out on Twitter. Silva takes a look back at 2004, the season of salvation for the BoSox and revisits where the seminal players on the World Series teams are now…

Guest Sunday: Turn it around, Theo!

Alex Remington is a blogger for the Atlanta Braves at Chop-n-Change, and kicks off Guest Sundays, which will be a recurring feature in the offseason, where you hear from other bloggers on issues related to the Red Sox. This Sunday, Remington urges Boston to move on from their underperformers and strike hard this offseason.

Looking at the rest of the postseason field

Fire Brand has been very aggressive these past few days at completely breaking down the Angels from Boston’s perspective. We’ve brought to you a look at the hitters, pitchers, the running game, Angels’ official postseason roster, other breakdowns and of course… predictions.

Let’s take a (short) break and look at the other series which begins tonight.

Sunday Notes: Wake done, Farrell staying, etc.

Happy Sunday, everyone. It’s the last day of the 2009 regular season. Mixed emotions abound… a dark winter is foretold, but the most exciting time in baseball is well within our grasp.

Let’s check out what’s going on in Red Sox land…

Injuries Among the Contenders

There is nothing that can derail a team quicker than a slew of injuries in October. The Sox have seen their fair share of injuries lately, though the M.A.S.H. unit has had some success returning the boys to action.

But they are not the only team in the hunt, as the Yankees, Twins, Angels, and Tigers all have their own bumps, bruises, and breaks to deal with. And no, we are not including Texas anymore, as their playoff odds have now dropped below half of one percent. The only race left is between Detroit and Minnesota for the AL Central.

Here’s a rundown of the significant injuries on each team:

Tweets on the Red Sox’s 25-man roster

In a homage to Twitter, the new social media application that is changing how news is delivered (in the same vein how blogs changed everything) I bring to you a summary of each Red Sox player on the 25-man roster in 140 characters or less (the maximum number of characters you can enter on Twitter).

Have Twitter? Follow me. Tim’s on too. Oh, and Fire Brand has one as well. You’ll notice that had you followed Fire Brand, you would have gotten all these tweets last night.