Let's Talk Of Several Sports

Starting with baseball. Since the last post, Jason Motte went on the DL, and so did David Freese. Carlos Beltran's trying to play through a broken toe, and Adam Wainwright got a nearly $100 million contract that starts next year.

He promptly went out and surrendered 4 runs on 11 hits in 6 innings on Opening Day. I know, only one start, and hey, he didn't walk anybody, while striking out 6. Still, the results are what ultimately matter, and those weren't so great.

That makes me sound more down than I really am. It's too early in the season for me to pay much attention, what with it being a six-month long haul. Besides that, I don't find myself with particularly high expectations for the Cardinals. Oh, I expect them to finish with a winning record, but I'm not sure they'll make the playoffs. There are quite a few teams that ought to be good in the NL this year. Cincy, the Nationals, Atlanta, probably San Francisco and Arizona, maybe the Dodgers. I've seen several people who are high on Milwaukee, though I'm not as sure. They might have better pitching than last year, but their offense is suspect. Especially considering MLB's pursuit of Ryan Braun is reaching vendetta levels at this point. I expect them to conjure up some trumped up charge they can suspend him for at some point. If so, I'd expect the Brewers' offense to tank completely, like the '07 Cards when Pujols would take a day off. Even so, there's also the Pirates. I don't know, maybe this year they manage to stay above .500 all season. They made it into July in 2011, and August last year, so they ought to at least be a winning team into September this year.

Anyway, there's a lot of competition for those 5 playoff spots, and I'm just not sure about the Cardinals. The middle infield looks poor, and I'm not totally sold on the pitching staff. But if guys like Shelby Miller and Trevor Rosenthal can get some solid innings under the belt, and perhaps Matt Adams (and eventually) Oscar Taveras and Kolten Wong can get some at-bats to prepare them for heavier loads next year, I'd feel pretty good about that. The Cards have been pretty consistently good for awhile now, I'm not going to panic if they slip a little this year.

Over in the NFL, Arizona traded for Carson Palmer. Yeesh. Sadly, he is an upgrade over Skelton or Lindley (Skelton's been cut loose), and also over Drew Stanton or Brian Hoyer. I'm not sure he's that much of an upgrade, but at least this hopefully keeps Arizona from wasting a high draft pick on one of the sorry QBs in this year's draft. Go for the offensive line! Or linebackers! But not Manti Teo!

Part of the reason I'm not much concerned with baseball is that I'm preoccupied with the NBA. The playoffs are about to start, which means this is the time of year I most regret not having TV around here. The Western Conference looks stacked, though the Nuggets took a hit with Gallinari having knee surgery. Still, they seem like a deep enough team to be the one best suited to surviving losing their #2 scorer. They spread the load around so much already, it just means everybody else needs to pick up a little slack, which they theoretically can do. The Spurs without Parker, or the Thunder without Westbrook would have a tougher challenge, I think (though it's not the same thing, since those guys perform different roles for their team than Gallinari does for Denver).

It looks like the Lakers might get the #8 seed, though Utah holds a tie-breaker. Even though I'm a big Nash fan, I would thoroughly enjoy Los Angeles missing the playoffs entirely.  This trainwreck of a season has been a joy to behold. Even if the constant dissecting of a team that spent most of the season below .500 has been tedious. I don't really care that Utah will likely be destroyed by OKC or San Antonio, just as the Spurs did to them last year. Does anyone really expect the Lakers, with their shoddy defense and lack of any consistent offensive strategy to do any better? So what if Utah (or the lakers, or the Mavs) gets obliterated? They're the 8 seed, that's what usually happens, occasional Golden State over Dallas, or 76ers over Derrick Rose-less Chicago notwithstanding. The Bucks are probably gonna be the 8 seed in the East. Is anyone going to be surprised if Miami curbstomps them 4 straight games and moves on? No, because Miami's a 1 seed, and the Bucks are an 8, and that means Miami's vastly better than Milwaukee. And if the Lakers are an 8 seed playing #1 San Antonio, it means the same thing.

As to Miami, I'm not sure there's anyone in the East who can beat them. The Bucks have no chance, and Atlanta's fallen apart over the course of the season. Boston (even if they had KG), Chicago, and Indiana all have top-notch defenses, but so does Miami. They might slow the Heat offense down, but the Heat will do the same to them, and they don't have nearly as much wiggle room there. I'd give the Knicks a chance if they could shoot 3s the way they did the first month and a half of the season. Otherwise, I don't think they can keep up. Which leaves the Nets. Brooklyn has some big men that are useful, which is still Miami's weakness, assuming you can keep the game slowed down enough. That was Indiana's problem last year, or OKC when Perkins was on the court. A lot of the time the Heat were too fast for the other team to bring their big men into play. If the Nets could slow it down, ugly it up a little, they might have a chance, but I wouldn't call it a good one. It'd be pretty cool to see Miami play in the Western Conference playoffs instead. Let them go at it with the Spurs, or the Thunder, maybe throw Memphis at them, or the Clippers. At least they'd get a challenge.