2013-14 NHL Predictions: Lamest predictions ever

There was of course immediate fear that Sports Illustrated jinxed the Blackhawks season that begins tomorrow night when they put Patrick Kane on the cover and proclaimed Chicago would repeat as Stanley Cup Champions. The 'Hawks will hear over and over again how no team has repeated since the 1997-98 Detroit Red Wings, although much like last year's defending champion Los Angeles Kings, there's good reason for optimism in the Windy City since (unlike the start to the 2010-11 season) many of the key players from last year's Cup run are still on the team. Oh, and as I recall it, the last time I posted a pre-season magazine issue with the Blackhawks on the cover, that was the previous year they won the Stanley Cup. 

After winning the Cup in late June, the off-season certainly felt quite short. On top of that, this is also another year in which the regular season will have an asinine three week-or-so interruption because of the Olympics. Of course, the last time there was an Olympics interlude, that was also the season the Blackhawks won the Cup in 2010. 

So there's certainly some encouraging signs on that front, but there's also a whole slew of other factors to consider—none of which I can say I'm adequately prepared for. While I actually paid attention to the NHL Draft this off-season, I've been fairly oblivious to other major moves and then there's the entire reshuffling and reorganizing of divisions that also affects the playoffs in ways that I'm not totally certain I completely understand yet. 

Still, the puck drops on another NHL season tomorrow and I'll throw my half-assed picks out there, not that I think I'll be taking any tremendous risks. 

Game No. 163 Prediction: This could have (should have?) worked out a lot differently

I don't know when I'll get time to reflect on my predictions from the beginning of this baseball season, but needless to say, very few of them seemed to be accurate. As it turns out this year, the regular season concluded with two teams left tied for the final Wild Card spot in the American League. Ironically, these same two teams were also involved in a fairly controversial game way back on April 8 in which home plate umpire Marty Foster called out Tampa batter Ben Zobrist on a Joe Nathan pitch that sure looked to be way low pretty outside. At the time, you could dismiss it as being just one game, but sure enough, here we are with those same to teams tied for the final postseason berth.

Oddly enough, the Cleveland Indians avoided a possible three-way tie for these final two spots by winning one more game this year. Of course, Cleveland was perhaps the recipient of an even more dubious call the following month when famed abomination of an umpire Angel Hernandez actually reviewed a home run call and opted not to make the correct ruling in an Indians game against the Oakland Athletics. Fortunately for the A's, they won the West by a comfortable margin and the game proved to be inconsequential. Still, had the right calls been made (GIFs available here and here), it could very likely be a different playoff scenario—one without a 163rd regular season game, perhaps.

Nonetheless, here we are. And of two teams that I had both making the playoffs this year, only one of the teams playing Monday night is going to live to fight another day.

2013 NFL Predictions: There's gotta be surprises somewhere

A whole variety of new faces in new places this season in the NFL, but what difference will that really make? Some of last season's strongest teams appear to have gotten even better and most of the initial picks I've seen thus far seem to have either the Broncos or the Patriots as the pretty clear favorites in the AFC. Over in the NFC, the opinion is a little more mixed, as the conference has a number of teams that could be contenders, but the Packers and the 49ers seem to be popular choices. 

This is now my fifth year of making NFL predictions, and my track record really isn't that great. Ever since the first year of making picks in 2009, the only season I had more than half the teams in their correct final spots, I've had a fairly lousy track record at doing this. Nonetheless, making predictions is more or less what this blog has become entirely dedicated to and I'm anxious to see how this NFL season plays out.

I'll attempt to take a few risks this year so this doesn't look like another version of the average of everybody else's predicted finishes, but ultimately I think that it's probably smarter to go with the consensus in the AFC and relegate the surprises to the NFC. That almost certainly means the opposite was true.