MLB Preview: AL East

The weather we had in Chicagoland in the past week was insane, it felt like summer... yet baseball season hasn't officially started yet. That changes in a couple weeks. So, with the season nearing and all the previews coming out, I need to get going with my own thoughts on finishes in the upcoming season.

My goal, since this is probably my last "free" week, is to hammer out division-by-division previews one day at a time. I haven't looked too hard at much of this, but I have done a little homework on all 30 teams. I'm going to get the division I hate out of the way first.

AL East
I hate this division only because it's all the major pundits talk about. There's always so much focus on what the Red Sox and Yankees do. I'm a firm believer in the East Coast bias when it comes to sports in particular. I'm sure you could argue that me starting with this adds to the bias, but really, it was the first division I really read up on, plus I wanted it to be out of the way.

1. Tampa Bay Rays
I have to say, this is one AL East power I can actually tolerate, just because they're fresh to the scene of being a great team and they don't have the sickening Boston or New York ties. As for the team itself, they have arguably the best rotation in the American League (up there with the Angels and Rangers), and a solid lineup that returns Carlos Pena from his one year hiatus in Wrigleyville. He once again had a low average last year, but came up with some timely hits. His protection of Evan Longoria should give the Rays enough of a punch to battle with the ferocity of the Yankee and Red Sox attacks.

2. Boston Red Sox*
Truth be told, I had a moment of sadism back in September watching the final collapse of Boston's season, but this team will be back in the hunt again this year. I don't see that starting rotation having that bipolar of a season again, and I also feel pretty confident in saying that Carl Crawford can't possibly have as bad a year as he did last year. The thing keeping me from picking them #1 is the departure of Papelbon, though Andrew Bailey isn't a bad replacement. They'll grab one of the 2 wild card spots (hence the asterisk) in the American League.

3. New York Yankees
If you go by SI's projected batting order, that 2-5 scares me, even the 1-5 if you add Jeter at the top. No one feels comfortable having to face Granderson, Cano (who has over the last couple years developed into probably the most underrated offensive player in the game), A-Rod and Teixeira in succession. This team will score runs in bunches again. The question is, how many will they give up? They solidified the rotation with guys like Kuroda and even Michael Pineda, but I'm just not as sold on this rotation as I am Boston's or Tampa's. I don't know that I see Ivan Nova being as good as he was last season, though he's a legit #2 starter. These guys will be in the playoff race for sure though.

4. Toronto Blue Jays
The new Tampa in the division, these guys are going to surprise some folks. I can see Toronto being in the thick of the race in June and July before they start to fade away a little bit. If their starting rotation starts to get things figured out more, they'll be in the race into August and September. We know they're going to hit well. Brett Lawrie should be a fun kid to watch in his first full season, and that Bautista guy isn't too bad either I guess.

5. Baltimore Orioles
Poor Baltimore. They have some decent talent in guys like Adam Jones and Nick Markakis, but they don't have the firepower at the plate or on the hill to go toe-to-toe with the other teams in the East. Camden will have to settle for watching another year of not-so-great baseball (something I've been stuck doing for years). They're at least a few years away from contention.




One down, 5 to go. Tomorrow I will switch leagues and go to the NL East.

East to West: Peyton's Mountain Assault

I wasn't sure what to think last week when I heard reports of Peyton Manning meeting with Bronco big wigs last week. Really, he would be an improvement to any NFL team outside Massachusetts, Louisiana and Wisconsin (arguably inside too, but they're both good with the guys they have I'm sure).

Now that it's all but official that Manning is moving west to the mountains of Denver, you have to look at this team with a little more fear and respect than you did last year. I like Tim Tebow as a person and an athlete, though I admit that he has his flaws as an NFL-caliber QB. That's what makes this deal such a brilliant move.

Last year's Broncos were a team that went on a big run with Tebow's unpredictability early on and had some victories where there should have been defeats. But that team was built around a good defense that would keep them in the ball games to give the offense a chance to win at the end. Now? They can become a more complete team with the most cerebral field general the league has ever seen.

So what of Denver's golden boy? From what I've seen, Denver is looking to trade Tebow, presumably for a second round pick. Given that Tebow would be relegated to the bench, it makes sense to get something for him. But here's a radical proposal if the right deal doesn't come along: why not move him around the field?

Tebow made a name last year as something of a dual-threat quarterback, though he was usually better scrambling for positive yards than he was throwing the ball. Since he has that ability to take off, why not use it? Put him in the I-formation as a fullback a few times a game. Hand it off to him a few times, but you can also use that as a decoy to fool the defense. As we well know, Manning is an expert at that sort of thing. That's what makes this following idea even more ingenious.

Keep the White Horse in the Stable

I know... I'm infringing on Geoffy's territory. But he hasn't posted yet, and there's no rule that says we can't double up on the biggest game of the season so far.

I missed most of the 1st quarter last night, but caught the end of it on ESPN 1000, plus part of the 2nd quarter until I got home and watched the rest. This game was a phenomenal one (easy for me to say, given the result). We can't confirm anything about the seemingly inevitable playoff matchup between these teams from just this one game, but we did learn a few things about both teams.

I tried to make this a multiple point argument, but I keep coming back to one main point Bill Simmons brought up after the 2011 NBA Finals.

"You can't win with three guys. You need seven, at least, then you need a couple of random Brian Cardinal-type moments every game. That's why Rick Carlisle so pointedly kept mentioning "team basketball" in the postgame presser last night. You need eight or nine guys to come through to win a title. We learn this every spring. And then, we forget it every summer, fall, and winter. The 2010-11 Heat tried to buck the system. Didn't work." [Source]

That was what happened last night. LeBron and Wade combined for 71 of the Heat's 102 points. And yes, James Jones had 2 huge 3's near the end that made it more interesting than I wanted it to be. But Bosh was awful last night (3-15 shooting), and Jones' 2 triples were the only ones he took. As a whole, Miami's bench shot 4-14 (15 points). That's not going to get it done.

On the other hand, the entire Bulls team came ready to play. Deng struggled from the field, but the shots he hit were crucial ones. Watson played nice defense, coming up with a big layup off a steal to stem a Miami run. Noah played great defense, coming up with some key blocks.

But the biggest thing last night was the beloved Bench Mob. Korver brought the hot sauce. Gibson and Asik controlled the paint. Jimmy Butler continues to show promise. But of course, the biggest star last night was John Lucas III.

I wish they had the CSN Chicago feed up when I wrote this. Stacey King went nuts. ("I don't care who you are, LeBron James! You can't stop me! You can't even hope to contain me!") I tweeted that Derrick Rose must have bestowed his "Destroyer of Worlds" powers to John Lucas last night. Something happened where John Lucas just couldn't miss.

The other big numbers? The Bulls won the rebounding battle (50-34). The Bulls had 14 offensive boards leading to 21 2nd chance points. You won't win many games giving a team like the Bulls that many opportunities.

Let's put this game into perspective though. Would the presence of D-Rose have made this game a little more separated? I want to say yes... but I don't know. LeBron would have been on him the whole time and they would have trapped him everywhere. He wouldn't have gotten to attack the way Lucas did. The Bulls also shot 10-19 from deep last night (they were 9-13 at one point). They won't be that hot from deep every night unfortunately. At the same time, it took Dwayne Wade going off in the 4th quarter to get the game that close. I'll be honest. He scares me, but it's hard to go 8-9 from the field in a quarter, and 4-5 from outside the paint. One constant you can figure will still happen is that LeBron will still disappear in the 4th quarter.

Regardless, when these teams meet in the Eastern Conference Finals, we're going to be due for another bloodbath. The Bulls will have a great shot this year at getting over the hump and making the Finals behind the hero known as D-Rose, but he won't be going in alone. He'll have his supporting cast right beside him to help get to the Promised Land.

The Official Confessions of a Sportscaster NCAA Tournament Pick 'Em

I posted here last week about my intent to run a tournament pool as part of COAS. I've set up the pool, and with the bracket now official, it's time to join in! Some of you may have already seen it through my Facebook or Twitter, but you are definitely invited to join this pool.

In the interest of upping the stakes, I am also offering a chance to guest write a post for Confessions of a Sportscaster to whoever wins the pool. Of course, because of my radio background, even though this is for Internet purposes as opposed to broadcasting, I still feel obliged to put down all the rules for the contest here. Stupid federal rule disclosure laws.

1. Only one (1) bracket per person.
2. Scoring: There is a maximum possible score of 192 points for picking winners. Each first round game is worth 1 point, second round game worth 2, regional semifinal game worth 4, regional final worth 8, national semifinal worth 16, and the championship game is worth 32 points. The highest scoring bracket wins. In the event of a tie, the final score will be used as a tiebreaker. I don't know if wins comes before that or not (not sure on the official Yahoo! rules).
3. Prize: The winner will be allowed to guest write one (1) post for Confessions of a Sportscaster. Said post may be about any sports-related topic. It can be as local as a school or traveling team you are involved in, or as big as the leading topic on SportsCenter. There is no word limit on your post. Do not use obscene language or make discriminatory remarks based on race, gender, socioeconomic status, sexual orientation, religion, et cetera. By rule of the First Amendment, I will not decline a post that offers opposing views to my own, though I do reserve the right to edit your post for grammatical or rule-violating reasons. I will credit the author for writing the work at the beginning of the winning post, and will mention if any editions have been made on my part.
4. If you have any questions or for the winner to submit his or her post, you can email me here.

Once again, the pool can be found here. Good luck!

Game Notes: Elgin High School vs. Auburn High School (3/9/12)

 Final Score
Auburn 67, Elgin 56

Summary
In a fun 4A Sectional Championship game and the first game I've ever called for commercial radio, we were treated to something of a slow start, as neither team really got anything going offensively early on. After a couple minutes of jitters, the Auburn Knights (30-2) started to find their niche, going ahead 11-6 after 1 quarter. In the second they started to pull away a little more, as the Elgin Maroons (26-4) couldn't buy a basket. The Knights led 28-17 at the half. The 3rd quarter started about even, before the Maroons made a huge run towards the end of the quarter, pulling within 3 at 35-32, getting the crowd involved. But in the 4th, the Knights took over, slowly rebuilding their lead as Elgin didn't have enough in the tank to complete their comeback.

Key Stats

• Elgin: 18-52 FG, 17-27 FT. Elgin was just ice cold last night. They shot 1-10 in the opening quarter, and finished 4-18 in the first half. It's amazing to consider that they shot so poorly, but never trailed by more than about 11 points the entire game. But you look at the margin, and those missed free throws loom big over this game. As for the missed field goals, some were poor forced shots, some were great defense by Auburn, and the rest just weren't falling.
• Fred Van Vleet (AUB): 32 pts. All I can say about this kid is, "Wow." The future Wichita State point guard had to step up with Auburn's main big man Jaylin Marshall out with a knee injury. And boy, did he ever. He was able to attack the basket with authority and get to the line (where he was 13-16), and he also hit a couple key 3's in the 4th quarter to put Elgin away. And then for good measure, he assisted LaMark Foote for a beautiful alley-oop dunk with about 30 seconds left that put the exclamation point on the win.
• Kory Brown (ELG): 20 pts. Brown singlehandedly kept the Maroons in the game. He struggled a bit from the line early in the first half (6-9), but attacked the basket in the 2nd half and got some big layups. Amazingly, he played probably about 14 minutes with 4 fouls, somehow avoiding fouling out when there were a couple occasions he could have been called for his 5th, only to have the foul called on a teammate. You have to feel bad for the senior, but he played his heart out in his final high school game.

Final Thoughts
This was a great game in front of a packed house in Carpentersville, IL, someplace I had never been before (and honestly got lost a little bit on my way up... thank God for GPS devices). Both student sections came out in full force, but the A-Team (Auburn's student section) brought their A-game to help Auburn get over the hump. Interestingly enough, security and police had to get involved with fans a couple times and escort them out of the gym (I think one Elgin fan went to confront the A-Team during halftime and had to be forced out of the gym... c'mon, man.)


In what may very well have been my last radio broadcasted game for a while, I got a great game, and had a phenomenal team to work with. Many thanks to Dave Schmidt and Tom Warner, two radio veterans who were called upon with the main guys down in Peoria for being great broadcasters for a great game, and for being two of the nicest guys you will ever meet. I also have to thank WROK Program Director Scot Bertram for giving me the opportunity to put on a headset one more time.

Confession of a Bracketologist

Ah, Championship Week... one of the more fun weeks out of the year. It's a week that leads up to one of the biggest sports Sundays of the calendar year, all in preparation for by far the best 4 day stretch in all of sports: the opening rounds of the Big Dance.

This is the time when college basketball junkies and casual fans alike get involved and fill out brackets, one of the things I absolutely love to do. My dad ran an office pool for at least 10 years, and we'd get some sizable groups together for it. He has since quit running it, as the amount of time it took to put together really took its toll, even with me helping do data entry. I still fill out a bracket in some capacity.

And that's where this post comes into play today. I'm going to run a pool through Yahoo! for anyone who is interested (since it is free). It's an open pool, so feel free to invite anyone else you might be interested in.. You can sign up to join the pool here. To sweeten the pot, I will also offer the winner an opportunity to write a post for Confessions of a Sportscaster about any sports-related topic. At the same time, if you just want in for the fun, by all means, feel free to join in.

Feel the madness! Good luck!

Chippy's Super Sweet Sixteen

I mentioned back on Monday in previewing the Cardinals' prospects in the NCAA Tournament that there would be competitive, fun games, but that the Cardinals had a great shot at making the sectionals. And sure enough... they did!

With wins over Rose-Hulman and Washington University this weekend, the Cardinals made it to the Sweet 16 for the first time in school history. This is saying a lot for a 150 year old school, but when you look at the championship banners in Merner Fieldhouse, it's almost all for Track and Field and Cross Country (especially of late). This team has been an exciting one to get behind. I didn't get to catch any of the games the past couple days, but every account has been positive.

These last 2 games have proved that the Cardinals are one of those very tough teams. They play solid defense, and while not being able to pull away very much in either of these games, they have been able to close them out with solid defense. On the offensive end though, this team is scary. When you go through this roster, the Cardinals have 6 guys that can kill you. On Friday against the Engineers, it was Landon Gamble getting feeds down low and proceeding to score at will. Last night Kevin Gillespie put the team on his back again, but Gamble had a double-double, and Raridon and Tiknis were also in double figures. Vince Kmiec was ice cold last night, but had 5 assists. CJ Goldthree is somebody who can score both inside and out off the bench, and when Gamble is tired or in foul trouble, Charlie Rosenberg is more than a capable backup.

Looking at the bracket overall, there have been some big upsets already. On Friday, the teams D3hoops.com ranked #10 through #13, along with #17, #18, and #25 all lost. Such is what happens in the NCAA Tournament; anything can happen. Saturday, NCC beat Washington (#19th), and we also saw #14 fall... and the top team in the nation fell last night to... Illinois Wesleyan! I have to take back my doubts about them making the dance; they've proved they belong. Wheaton also won their way to the exclusive party, proving once again that the Gauntlet is one of the best conferences in all of D-III.

So like I did last week, I will go over the teams North Central will be on location with for next weekend's portion of the tournament. The NCAA announced this afternoon that The College of Wooster (Ohio) will host the sectional rounds at the Scot Center.

Wittenberg Tigers (23-6)
Defeated Birmingham Southern 63-56, defeated Carroll 87-70.
The Tigers made it as an at-large team out of the NCAC, led by senior forward Clayton Black (14.2, 6.8) and Josh McKee (10.6, 3.9). They're a very good defensive team, allowing just 61.4 points a game, while scoring 67.4. They have a pretty good interior presence with Black and Alex Brandt, who both shoot over 50 percent from the field. As a team, they shoot about 44%, but they're an average team from 3 (33.6%) and not the greatest from the line 68.8%). This is NCC's matchup on Friday, and should be a fun battle between Black and Gamble in the paint.

Wooster Fighting Scots (26-4)
Defeated Maryville 70-63, defeated Capital 92-79.
The NCAC Tournament champions might be the scariest team out of this sectional, especially playing at home. They have an insane +12.4 point differential (not sure where that ranks nationally, but wow.), scoring 75 a game while only giving up about 63. They are led by the 3-headed monster of Justin Hallowell (14, 6.8), Xavier Brown (13, 3.5) and Josh Claytor (11.1, 5.3, 61.7% FG). It's a perfect trio; Claytor is your killer down low, and Hallowell and Brown can get you both inside and out. What will happen against tough defenses of the CCIW is hard to say, but this team got this far for a reason.

Illinois Wesleyan Titans (21-7)
Defeated UW-Stevens Point 69-61, defeated Hope 108-101 (2OT)
You know this team is legit when they knock off the top ranked team in the nation... but also when they survived the Gauntlet. I saw these guys play Wheaton in the CCIW semis, and they played well, but lost largely because Wheaton was unconscious from the field in the first half of their matchup, and IWU didn't exactly light up the floor either, so the lead was just too much to overcome. You may know their resume if you follow CCIW hoops; unanimous All-CCIW 1st Team-er Jordan Zimmer (15.8) leads a well-rounded team, with guys like Victor Davis (10.6, 5) and John Koschnitzky (9.4, 3) backing him up. This is a good defensive team (66.8 ppga) that has almost as good a point differential as the Scots (77 ppg for a +10.2 differential). This is another game that will be fun. Just think, we have the possibility of conference rematches for the right to go to the Final Four!

I'm assuming once again that the FM89 crew will be making the trek out to call these games. This is the biggest weekend in men's basketball history for the school, and the biggest basketball moment since the women's team won the 1982-83 title. Go Cardinals!