The Braves' First Quarter: Even better than last year! (Technically.)

Indeed, Braves fans (and any other reader). This year's team is a full game better than the start they got off to last year. So certainly this means they should at least be able to force a deciding fifth game in the Division Series this year—once those Marlins cool off, of course.

While it's hard for me to read too much into how the season has started for some clubs (The Indians are 11 games over .500? Tampa Bay is leading the American League East?), the standings in the National League East look pretty much like what most people expected. There were some who felt the Braves could be surprise contenders for the division this year, and while Atlanta isn't out of the race by any means, the season so far has seen the team hovering around .500 most of the year.

However, the Braves began May by winning the first six games they played to start the month and there's plenty of reason to believe the Fredi Gonzalez era can begin can go into October.

NHL Stanley Cup Playoff Conference Finals Predictions: Obviously not my year

After one round, we were without my hometown defending champs. And now one round later, we're without either of the two clubs I'd had originally picked to be playing for the Cup this year. What we're left with is four teams, not one of which I can find a real rooting interest for. But at least only one can win, so I suppose that whatever silly objections I might have I will still be able to take some comfort in that three will end up being eliminated.

At the rate I'm going, you can probably assume this year's Finals will be the exact opposite of whatever I predict here.

Final Thoughts on 2010-11 Chicago Blackhawks: Rest in peace, Jimmy

Not that it hasn't been pointed out thousands of times or makes the excuse feel as though it would serve any real purpose, but it's hard to repeat after winning the Stanley Cup. Marian Hossa was coming off three straight years in which he played for teams with seasons that lasted all the way into June, so I can forgive him for missing some time during those regular seasons.

But looking back at this year, it was a struggle all season long just to compete. And while the team went out with an unbelievable bang that was oh-so-close to being an an accomplishment of historic proportions, there won't be any Blackhawks hockey this summer.

I suppose that gives me more time to figure out how I'm going to get the team's radio broadcasts when I'm living in Austin and the puck next drops for the team, but this year was a slowly painful realization that his year's squad just quite simply was nowhere near as good as what we had last year.

I knew this year's run wouldn't be the same when the guy I watched most of last year's playoffs with, Jimmy, passed away from lung cancer on April 20.

Round Two NBA Playoffs Predictions: At least there's one must-see series

There were no perfect scores among any of the "experts" I tracked for the first round of predictions in the NBA playoffs—even though one person did, in fact, have Memphis knocking off the top-seeded Spurs. But nobody had Atlanta beating Orlando either, and that's of course because everybody's picks largely look the same in these early rounds of basketball postseason.

Now technically into the conference semifinals of the tournament, consensus once again sort of rules in three of the four series—the only exception being this round's obvious headliner matchup between the Celtics and the Heat. The opinion among my group tilts about 3:2 in favor of Miami, but it's probably by and large the series most every fan most wants to see as much of as they can.

No offense to the six other cities with teams also playing this round (including my hometown's nearby Bulls), but as the story everybody's most interested in typically involves The Nazgûl.

Round Two NHL Stanley Cup Playoff Predictions: As long as we're talking about jinxes

I knew in the back of my mind while creating my first round NHL playoffs predictions that mentioning my record from the past two seasons would probably come back to haunt me, and sure enough, I tanked on my predictions bad enough to ensure that I even if I get every other remaining series correct I'll still finish at least one game worse than the record in each of the previous two years. Nice.

This second round begins in stark contrast to last year for other reasons, and while I'll get to the end of the beloved Blackhawks' season in a separate post very soon, this year's Washington Capitals team is in a much better place than where they were last year when I was making picks for this round. With both the pesky Canadiens and Penguins eliminated (despite my having picked both to be alive), the Caps indeed seem to me to be flying a little more under the radar in the East after so many pundits declared the Bruins the presumptive favorite to emerge from the conference. So, at this stage in the game, I'm still effectively standing by my pre-season prediction of a Detroit-Washington Stanley Cup Final—although we'll see if both those teams are still alive next round.

As for who I'm rooting for, that's very much up in the air. I'll still be following, for sure, but right now I'm entirely certain that any of the eight teams remaining is going to be able to generate even half the enthusiasm I displayed during Chicago's one series.

Still, the playoffs go on.

Hooray: Another fantasy championship

I'm forgoing the usual "nobody cares" graphic that's typically gone along with these sorts of posts, but I don't plan on requiring a fold for this summary either. If you've actually been following the only fantasy team I've been running ever since football ended, you might recall that I was also responsible for running my girlfriend's basketball team this year too.

I was optimistic about her chances against the top-seeded ex-boyfriend of another friend who, like the four other teams in the league, stopped paying attention shortly after the season began.

Unfortunately, Steve Nash sat out a game and there were a few other unfortunate missed games from some of her players and the lady's team ultimately had to settle for easily taking a third place game.

While I didn't get the championship match with ™'s team that I'd been hoping for, it was pretty satisfying to essentially thump the only other guy who'd been signing in and, during most weeks, dominating the league every week. He resoundingly beat me the first two times we played during the year, although I took the third meeting and we both finished 18-3 on the year. I had far and away the most transactions in the league with 55 moves (my girlfriend's team had 38, and this year's runner-up had 20), with a huge amount coming in the final few days. While I ran out to an early lead in the championship and led by 1000+ points at the end of the week, the numbers kept going until the season ended on Wednesday. With no player on my team scheduled to play that Tuesday and four of his guys (including Kobe Bryant and the same Luol Deng I had dropped so early in an otherwise fabulous year for him), I scooped up seven guys for Tuesday and then replaced most of them for Wednesday.

The result is that I've now won fantasy titles in three of the four major sports, with only football (which admittedly is the only one that would be worth mentioning ever again ... maybe) eluding me.

Despite what I'd say is an otherwise respectable fantasy résumé,  I'd like to point out that my girlfriend is given the higher rating on overall performance:

Whatevs. Maybe they'll correct it when they put my latest trophy in the case.

Round One NBA Playoffs Predictions: A genuine rooting interest

I sort of swore off the idea of using YouTube videos above the fold on posts, but this one's a pretty good at whetting one's playoff appetite. And just as this post's title indicates, this year's particularly special now that the beloved Bulls are among the favorites to end up with the Larry O'Brien trophy.

Before I get to everybody's picks though, let me glance back at what I had back at the beginning of the year and size up how I did: with 17 of the 30 teams in the correct spots, that's better than how I've done at the other three sports in recent attempts; seven of my eight Eastern Conference teams did end up making the playoffs, although I only had five of the Western Conference representatives correct this year; I had only three of the predicted seeds correct and my third straight Lakers-Celtics NBA Finals indeed remains a possibility.

Will I stick to that in the end though? We'll find out later, but for now, here's how it looks like the first round might shake out:

The Bulls' Fourth Quarter: THE BEST RECORD IN THE LEAGUE (!!!)

What more can really be said about how much this team has defied expectations this year? Not only did they win their division and finish atop the Eastern Conference, in the end, this year's Bulls team won more games than any other team in the entire NBA. No matter what round the playoffs might be in, Game One—and a Game Seven, should it be necessary—will be at the United Center for the Bulls.

(Psst: They only lost five times there all year.)

This particular past quarter was an even more unbelievably dominant finish to close out the year. The team quietly went about surpassing the 60-win mark, something that any time the franchise has done in the past (all five times coming in the 1990s), they went on to win the NBA Championship each time.

I don't know how exactly to prepare myself for this playoff run coming, but make no mistake: I fully expect this Bulls campaign to still be going after I move in about a month now. The concern isn't so much about viewing concerns (every game will be nationally televised by that point), but the thought that I wouldn't be able to attend another championship parade.

Round One NHL Stanley Cup Playoffs Predictions: The start of summer, playoff hockey and ice cream

The key to finishing atop the leaderboard at the end of NHL postseason prognosticating can typically rely on sniffing out the inevitable opening round upsets. I've finished a more than respectable 12-3 each of the last two years I've done this—one game worse than the best in 2009 and and one game better than the runner-up last year—often more attributed to going against the majority on one series or another in the first round. This year seems to have more underdog appeal than usual—and not just because the beloved Blackhawks are the absolute lowest seed in the West. (That certainly helps though.)

Before I get to everybody else's picks as well as my own, it's also somewhat custom to quickly look back at how the actual playoff bracket looks compared to what I had predicted at the beginning of the season. This year, I improved to correctly calling almost half the league's final standings in each division with 14 out of 30 spots nailed. While I only have two of the actual seeds correct, I had once again had seven of the eight Eastern Conference playoff teams right and improved to six out of eight in the West. And technically, both my Conference and Stanley Cup Finals are both still possible—dare I say likely?

Well, let's get to how this first round might go first: 

The Blackhawks' Fourth Quarter: Backing in is better than backing out

It was a rather peculiar finish to the season, what with having been in the middle of an eight-game winning streak during the last update and still having the possibility of postseason life not be determined until the very last game of the year—a couple hours after it, actually. But as crazy as yesterday was for the Blackhawks, the team's going back to the playoffs and they'll have to defend the Cup the hard way: being the eight-seeded team in the Western Conference and conceding home ice advantage in any series they play (unless one of those three teams in the Eastern Conference that didn't earn 100+ points this year somehow makes it to the Finals).

I look back on how yesterday unfolded and see the Vancouver Canucks on the schedule next now, thinking that how else would I really want things to have ended up? Would having moved up to a fifth seed and getting Anaheim in the first round really have been preferable? I realize that just as the many bandwagon evacuees have reminded me, the Blackhawks got rid of many of those lovable role players that played their pivotal roles to perfection last postseason. And without those guys, how in the world are you going to mess with the collective heads of the Canucks again this year?

But I'm getting ahead of myself here. For the moment, let me reflect on the last 20 games and then finally get these fucking taxes filed: