2012 World Series Prediction: The record of a predicted loser

The predictions tag is certainly the one used most often here. And with the occasional exception, the team that I pick to win whatever sports championship at the beginning of the year very rarely goes on to do so in any of the four major sports.

Curiously, the outcome that has turned out to occur far more frequently is my originally predicted runner-up emerging instead. In fact, there have been at least five times in the six-year history of this blog: last season's Miami Heat, both the Pittsburgh Penguins and the Los Angeles Lakers of the 2008-09 seasons, and perhaps most lovingly hoped for, the 2009-10 Chicago Blackhawks. 

The fifth, final and furthest runner-up that instead won it all was the 2006 St. Louis Cardinals. Coincidentally, that was also the same year of the last World Series appearance for the Detroit Tigers, the same team that I not only have picked to lose throughout this postseason, but also picked at the beginning of this year to be on the losing end of this final series of the year.

So it should be relatively clear what I'm really expecting to happen at this point. One of these years, I'll remember that everything that happened in baseball's regular season goes completely out the window at the start of the playoffs.

I should confess that I will likely miss a majority of this year's World Series, seeing as I'll be on my honeymoon. I may attempt to DVR it, although I can't really imagine that I'd actually watch entire games when I get home. Needless to say, I've obviously got plenty of other things on my mind right now—I mean, Jesus ... did you see how many winners and losers I forgot to color in for those years past?—so let me just get on with the inevitable and hope that if I catch any of these games, they're actually good ones.

So like I said, this has been something of a disastrous year for making predictions in the MLB playoffs. I've gotten exactly two winners correct (one Wild Card game and one Divisional Series), but have been entirely off on all of that. Still, you read what I just wrote, so my last pick is:

Detroit Tigers over San Francisco Giants in five games

As usual, it seems like the Tigers will not only upend my prediction from the beginning of the year (thanks for the help with that Marlins thing, Ozzie; best of luck with the next gig), but be one of those teams I seemingly picked against all the way to the very end. Hey, I'm pretty sure that worked out for the Lakers, and nobody in L.A. complained about that. Point here is that. Unlike the Californians that make it so easy to loathe that basketball team, I think Detroit's suffered enough these days. And seeing as there might be absolutely no chance that the Red Wings (or any other hockey team, really) brings back a semiannual Stanley Cup, give the Motor City a quick and decisive win here. The comebacks that the Giants have achieved in the last two rounds have been impressive for sure, but just like that Braves team that also had to battle back from a 3-1 deficit to the Cardinals to get to the World Series in 1996, I think San Francisco will not be able to do it again.