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While the Bulls season tips off tonight, the regular season technically began last night. So again, my apologies for being a day late in posting these picks that are largely reprints of what I had last year.
The major exception this time around is that for the first time in some five years, I don't have the Miami Heat winning a division and coasting into the NBA Finals once again. While the loss of LeBron will certainly be devastating, the Heat should still be able to hang around in the one division in the East that has a little bit of doubt. But the debate in the East essentially boils down to which one of the two teams in the Central you like more: the Bulls or the Cavs.
The West remains an absolute freak show of talent, with some 10 teams having a realistic shot at making the playoffs. I had a hard time deciding which one of last year's teams I wouldn't pick to make it again this year.
It's still somewhat amazing for me to see the Spurs as such predominant favorites in most of the picks I've seen thus far, not because I don't think they're not talented and able to repeat but more because I've grown so used to them being dismissed as "too old" year in, year out. Still, I know we're bound to get (at least) one major injury that screws everyone's picks and possibly eliminates a very popular title favorite.
All of that said, I'll still take a stab at how I see every team finishing and which one will be hoisting the Larry O'Brien next June.
And please forgive me for the spacing and font size issues as I'm posting this while
I'm
on
my
lunch
break.
One right, one wrong in last round with neither series lasting as long as I had predicted. Since the Wild Card round concluded, the only consistency in my predictions has been that I've been right about the Giants, wrong about the Royals, and incorrect on the length of every series. I'm 2-6 for this October, so fans of either team going into this last round would be right to hope that I don't pick their club.
It's not as though the baseball postseason has been necessarily bad, as there have been a number of very close games decided very late. However, none of the series have approached the maximum length and I don't really sense that the pattern's about to change—no matter how much I personally might be hoping otherwise.
This year's Fall Classic gives us one team that is seeking its third title in the past six years (dynasty?), and a club that hasn't won anything since it last appeared in the playoffs the same year Ronald Reagan was beginning his second term as president and my beloved Bears began a Super Bowl season by winning their first dozen games. It should be clear who I (and probably most of America) are pulling for, although what's really the point in getting my hopes up now?
After another abysmal round for me, I am now one for six in picking winners this postseason. At this point, I would almost be better served just pasting the predictions I made before the season began even though most of those teams have been eliminated.
This will be a somewhat strange rooting interest for myself (and a lot of fans) as it relates to this pair of series. Over in the American League, we have two relatively likable squads from cities that are three decades (or more) removed from their last World Series appearances.
And in the National League, we have the same two teams that have alternated as pennant winners for the past four years.
So we're left with a feeling of "Finally!" for one series and "Again?" for the other. It's already pretty clear which league I will be pulling for when we're down to the last two teams, but there's certainly reason to believe that we'll at least get two competitive series over the next week or so.
And having said that, now watch us get two sweeps.
So I was unable to get these picks up before the puck dropped last night (Blackhawks season, after all, begins tonight). I don't think being a day late gives me any sort of profound advantage or additional insight that any of the experts out there didn't have for the months leading up to making their own predictions.
And as the graphic here indicates, my beloved Blackhawks are quite the popular pick this year. While at the bank yesterday, a segment on PTI simply asked Tony and Michael "Kings or Blackhawks?"
Such is the way of the NHL, where much like the NBA, the West is seen as the overwhelming favorite. And while Chicago and L.A. are understandable favorites, you really couldn't fault anybody for liking other clubs in the West that upgraded this off-season, such as, say, St. Louis or Anaheim.
While seeing the Blackhawks being the choice of so many admittedly bolsters my optimism about a prolonged first viewing of the NHL Playoffs with the newborn (who will be a year old by the time the Cup is awarded), I'm also left a little uneasy by the distinct likelihood that an overwhelming favorite probably won't pan out.
Nonetheless, with the Bears being such a disappointment thus far this season and my still being left with a fair bit of skepticism about how much hope to invest in the Bulls (and let us not even speak of the Braves), hockey arrives at just the right time. Oh, how I have been longing to hear the voice of John Wiedeman again.
Well, that didn't go so well. At least I specifically admitted that I wasn't "terribly optimistic" about how I'd do, and I'm no more optimistic this round than I was in those two Wild Card game.
Sure, there seems to be a couple favorites here, but strange things happen in the baseball postseason. I suppose that if nothing else, I should just sit back and take a moment to appreciate that we won't have to endure the possibility of another October featuring the New York Yankees or Boston Red Sox.
However, we've still got the Cardinals. And the Dodgers. But at least those two clubs are playing one another in this round, so one will be gone by the next time I'm posting picks. It's going to be hard to top the thrill of that extra-inning Kansas City victory, but I'll keep my fingers crossed.
Looking back on my predictions for this year way back when we were still months from having a baby, I did pretty well in the National League (nailed all five finishes in the NL East, got three in the West, and only two in the Central), correctly predicting all five of this year's playoff teams—including the Wild Card matchup we'll be getting on Wednesday night.
The American League? Well, that was nothing worth bragging about. While I did have three (CORRECTION: two) of the five playoff teams there right, I only got the three bottom finishers in the Central correct and everybody else wrong.
I'll just flat-out state that I'm not terribly optimistic about how I'll fare in postseason picks, as I could really see just about any of the 10 teams (mild exaggeration, but half-serious) in the playoffs winning it all.
Yeah, yeah, yeah. I know it's been a while, but yes, the baby's doing fine. And so is the wife. Fatherhood's a total joy, of course. Rest of the family? Well, that's another—
What's that? Football picks? Oh, right.
What with all the time I've dedicated to preparing for fantasy football over these past few months (i.e. mock drafts killing my cell phone battery), I've kind of forgotten how this whole "blogging" thing works. (Rest assured, there won't be any blogging about said fantasy football team this year ... or any fantasy team ... ever again, I assume.)
If I remember correctly, this is the time of year in which I submit my annual supposedly thoughtful stabs at where each team is going to finish and how the postseason will play out. Of course, I've admitted in recent years that I have no idea on occasion and just want to crank out some total guesses. However, I should point out that I did get six of the eight division winners right last year, in addition to correctly identifying the Super Bowl loser.
So, you know, hooray me.
I'm thinking this year will fall somewhere in between those two extremes. I'm guessing that once again, my AFC predictions will be very similar to what's already being commonly predicted, and then I'll take a chance or two in the NFC. Maybe. I don't know yet. I really am just winging it here.
I'm typing this on lunch breaks at work, so this will be anything but expanded thoughts. Probably no more than a couple sentences for each division and maybe one statement at the end for the ultimate predicted big winner (which I honestly have not yet decided).
I would spend more time on this if we had internet access at our current home in lovely Waller, Texas, but alas, we're still waiting for that sort of technology to be established. Trust me, I've brought the issue up multiple times, and the wife, to her credit has been even more vocal than I. The entire problem is, of course, entirely the fault of—oh, right.
I'll stick to the football.
I was surprised to look back and see that this here blog is nearly eight-and-a-half years old now. There have been numerous instances over By My Count's lifetime in which I've openly wondered what the hell I was doing here. For the most part, it has largely been about putting my predictions for various events in writing.
On October 14 of last year, the wife and I found out that we were about to become parents. I have mentioned this only briefly in some recent posts, but there's no getting around it now. The wife's water broke just as we were preparing to go to bed this past Tuesday night and our beautiful baby daughter arrived early Wednesday evening. The moment I heard the first cries of our child brought tears to my eyes as well as my wife's, and it immediately becomes the new favorite moment of my young marriage.
So is BMC now destined to become something entirely new? Tales about dirty diapers and baby burping? No, probably not. But I can say that I am anticipating that all of the posts that had become "annual" types (quarterly and final thoughts on the Four Bs, full predictions for each of the four major sports, etc.) will probably be abandoned. In all honesty, By My Count is probably the least successful of any social media endeavors of mine (I started a little Twitter account last month that already has more pageviews than this blogs had in its entire lifetime), but I never intended to make money off this account or break any new ground. For the most part, it became mostly just an excuse for recording my thoughts about my favorite sports teams (and the Oscars). If anybody else wanted to read them for some reason, that was cool.
If anything here is likely to survive, I would assume it would be the playoff predictions I've always enjoyed making. But I can't say for sure seeing as this is my first go-round with child-raising, and the baby's taking a bit of a priority over blogging. This is not so much a farewell as it is just a simple explanation why it could be a while before you hear from me again.
Blackhawks fans have been spoiled these past few years. The team had enjoyed considerable success in Games 5-7 of most any series they played in over the past four year, and it was the winning record in those games that probably led many of us (including yours truly) to assume that Chicago was on its way to a second straight Stanley Cup after the Hawks came back from a 3-1 series deficit to force a seventh game. But then reality happened.
Everything seemed to start well enough, and even when the Kings fought back to tie Game 7, the Blackhawks would retake the lead. As the series that had been so good even casual fans were raving about its quality saw the winner-take-all game go into overtime, we all wondered which Hawk would emerge as this year's hero. Toews had the game-winner on the breakaway in Game 5 in St. Louis and Kane had the series-clincher in Minnesota. This time though, the lucky bounce of the puck instead went in the other team's favor and fans all over Chicago were left speechless.
While it was certainly a heartbreaking conclusion to a hard-fought series, the end result is not cause for panic. There are questions that deserve to be asked, for sure. However, the Blackhawks were attempting to repeat after last season concluded later than usual, this season began earlier than usual, and the team was tied for the most skaters sent overseas for the Olympics. The fact that they made it as far as they did is a testament to how very good they are, and that they lost to a club that was arguably the best team in the league is nothing to be ashamed of.
Consider it a lesser of two evils. The final two teams remaining are from America's two largest cities, one from a television ratings wasteland on the West Coast and the other being largely absent from social media mentions for most of the year until recent weeks. With a baby on the way, I'll just say I won't be too torn up about missing any moments of this year's Final.
I say that now, but because it is the last hockey series of the year, I know I'll be tuning in when I can. As a Blackhawks fan, I'm still clearly reeling from being one period away from a possible repeat to now instead seeing the Kings about to claim their second Cup in three years—and earning discussion of their own dynasty. Make no mistake, Los Angeles is the heavy favorite here, coming off of a Western Conference Final victory that was considered by many to be "the real Stanley Cup."
There will be no shortage of attractive underdog narratives for various media outlets to play up with this New York team, a franchise that last hoisted Lord Stanley 20 years ago. Sure, maybe having the best goaltender in the playoffs could indeed steal a game or two. But a series? Um, I've got my doubts.
