With the Midsummer Classic in the books, there’s no better time to look ahead.  Here’s What we know, what I forsee, and what will happen (maybe)

SCOTT JACOBS

The All Star Game in Anaheim, Los Angeles United States of America, Planet Earth was a real clunker yesterday.  3-1 for an All Star Game?  That’s like going to a fourth of July fireworks show in New York City and seeing one minutes worth of fireworks.  Talk about adding more fuel to the fire that great pitching beats great hitting.  The NL essentially won on a bases clearing double.  That clutch hit aside, they were basically a one hit wonder.  Like Sisqo.

And so, with the NL ending their embarrassing 13 year All Star game drought, we can finally bring ourselves back to meaningful baseball.  This time it counts?  A Cub made the play of the game and a Diamondback corralled in the final out.

Now we can turn to more important things like –

(Interrupted)  Boycott Arizona 2011!  Boycott Arizona 2011 (pushes person away).

Good god, how’d that person get in here?  O well, back to baseball.  This has been a really tight race so far, with the biggest division lead being held by the surprising and bankrupt Texas Rangers. A lot of people expect the Rangers to dump Cliff Lee because they can’t afford to resign him (paging Mark Cuban), but I think a franchise that hasn’t made the playoffs since 1999 (remember the days of Pudge Rodriguez and Juan Gonzalez?) will think twice before selling their playoff chances short.  In the AL Central another great race is brewing between the white-hot Chi Sox and the Tigers (with the Twins hanging in there too after a fast start).  The Royals as usual are irrelevant.  In the AL East, as expected the Yanks, Rays, and Red Sox are running the gauntlet.  The Orioles are beyond awful.

In the National League it’s been a trifecta of surprise leaders: Atlanta, Cincy, and San Diego.  Atlanta was pretty good last year competing for the NL Wild Card well into the final month, but the Reds and Padres were afterthoughts.  The Reds had been named as a team to watch the last few years, and this year they’re finally putting it all together.  Still there’s a lot of baseball to be played.  In San Diego those in the know expected the Pads to sell off anything resembling talent to the highest bidder, but something crazy happened– San Diego started getting ridiculously good starting pitching and just like that they lead a very competitive West, with the Rocks and Dodgers hot on their tails.

That said, here’s what we know:

* The Pirates will miss the playoffs yet again– 18 years running.  To those who say continuity builds a winner, maybe Pittsburgh isn’t the best example.  WIth just 6 managers since 1993, the Pirates have become so irrelevant that if they were contracted, few outside of Pennsylvania would notice.

* The Orioles worst nightmare has come to fruition.  Not only is Baltimore really, really bad this year– an MLB worst 29-59, they’ve more disturbingly fallen behind the Nationals in terms of interest.  With Stephen Strasburg provoking more interest in the Nationals than ever before, the Orioles not only are really bad, they’re really dull.

*  The Marlins will forever be cheap, until they prove otherwise.  $20 says money and payroll were the two biggest factors why Bobby Valentine mysteriously fell out of the driver’s seat to be Florida’s new manager and why the team stuck with Edwin Jackson, the first Puerto Rican born manager (just happy for the chance) instead.  At this point, it’d be a revelation if the Marlins opened up their wallets even after they open up their new park– set to open in 2012.

*  Bobby Cox is one helluva manager.  Unlike the boys in the Bronx or other mega-markets the Braves don’t have unlimited funds at their disposal.  And with Cox set to check out of the Majors after this season– his 20th managing Atlanta, it’d be terrific to see him go out a winner.  Atlanta has a good team, but Cox has proven time in and time out that he is a great manager.

Here’s what I forsee:

*   Miguel Cabrera will come close to winning the Triple Crown, but will finish third in homeruns.  And the Marlins will look at the haul they got for him and Dontrelle and wonder, what the heck were we thinking?  O right, cheapskates.  Forgot.

*   The White Sox will fade after a sizzling stretch to finish third in the AL Central.

*   The Yankees will win 106 games.  Fueled by two tough losses (The Boss and the Voice of God), New York will be more motivated than ever to prove they can repeat and win another title in honor of two legendary figures in their franchise’s history.

*  Ubaldo Jimenez will win 24 games, with the Rockies bullpen blowing 2 late leads.

*  With the home-run era pretty much dead, and this being the year of the pitcher, two more pitchers (one big name guy, and a journeyman) will pitch a no hitter.  The league leader in home runs will have no more than 42.

*   Bud Selig considers moving All Star Game out of Phoenix, but at the last second decides to keep it in the desert.

Onto the predictions that have an 87.4% chance of being not even close (but if I’m right I want all the credit).

Division winners and Wild Cards

AL East:  Yankees (huge second half upcoming from uber-motivated group)
AL Central:  Tigers (no Mets double dip in 2010: Tigers get their act in gear and overcome pesky Twins, tough Sox)
AL West: Rangers (assuming Texas keeps its team intact, this is their year to finally return to October)
Wild Card: Rays (This could be their last hurrah, before big name players start leaving for bigger dollars)

NL East:  Braves (after winning 14 division titles in a row, Cox ends brilliant career with one more)
NL Central: Cardinals (Redbirds know what it’s like to handle pressure.  Reds are newcomers to it.  Experience wins out)
NL West: Rockies (Jimenez rolls, late season charge guts Padres out of 1st)
Wild Card: Padres (Great pitching sustains offensively anemic bunch to thrilling Wild Card berth)

The Playoffs

ALCS: Yankees OVER Rays in 7 (epic series swings in favor of Bronx Bombers with late come from behind win)
NLCS: Braves OVER Rockies in 6 (one last title run for Cox’s cinderella bunch takes them to World Series)

World Series: Braves OVER Yankees in 6 (too Disney you say?  how about fitting for a legendary manager, who happens to have a whale of a team this year.  forever underachievers, the 2010 Braves overachieve to a surprising World Series title)

W.S. MVP: Chipper Jones (why not?  i’ve already gone this far)

Photo: Getty

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