The beauty about writing a column is that you can talk about whatever it is that you want to, and seeing that I sometimes make outrageous claims such as that the NBA season will be canceled, I thought it would be interesting to catch up on all that I’ve said so far and track how I’ve been doing and make some more half-supported predictions to keep track of. So, let’s start from the top.
In the first issue, I said that the NBA season will be canceled and fans shouldn’t get their hopes up that their favorite team will be taking the court this year. So far, my prediction has held true. The NBA has canceled the entire preseason and a month’s worth of regular season games. While some progress is being made with negotiations, it still seems that both sides are still pretty far apart.
I also said that Texas A&M would be playing in the SEC starting in the 2012 season. A scary week or two after publication it looked like A&M might have to delay playing in the SEC for another year or two, and I’d have to prevent a retraction. Instead, A&M prevailed and half-substantiated prediction number two held up.
In issues two and three, I talked about the disappointing performances of Notre Dame and Arsenal, hinting that they were most likely going to have some pretty horrible seasons. Since those articles, Notre Dame has gone 4-1, improving to 4-3 on the season and beating ranked opponent Michigan State. While the fighting Irish would like to be 6-1 on the season or at least 5-2, 4-3 still isn’t too bad. I’ll go ahead and call strike one on this one. Arsenal, on the other hand, has continued a streak of mediocrity, climbing out of the doldrums of 13th place all the way up to seventh where they currently sit with a negative three goal differential and 12 points behind table leader Manchester City. Although Arsenal has improved from a horrendous team to a bad team since the start of the season, I’m still far from a believer in the North London club. I’ll give this one some more time before I pass judgment.
Predictions:
My prediction for the World Series was a 7-2 Rangers victory in the all-important “Game Seven.” The results proved to be on the other side as the Cardinals used their momentum from Game Six to win their 11th title in team history.
LSU will be this year’s college football national champions. Let’s be honest, the real title game will be when LSU plays Alabama. Anyways, LSU will win after beating Oklahoma State 38-24 because OSU’s star quarterback Brandon Weeden fractures the pinky on his throwing hand in the 1st quarter.
The NFL will issue a new award this year in honor of Michael Vick and the Philadelphia Eagles. Vick will earn the dubious title of MDP (most disappointing player) after a lackluster campaign that sees the Eagles finish 7-9 and miss the playoffs despite petitioning the commissioner for a move into the NFC West.
The Dolphins will finish first in the “Suck for Luck” campaign with a 1-15 overall record, and plan on taking Andrew Luck with the first overall pick. Upon hearing about the possibility of winding up with the Dolphins, Luck will pull an Eli Manning and demand that the Dolphins trade picks otherwise he won’t sign a contract and instead enter the workforce as one of the best architect’s in the business and the best flag football quarterback ever.
Finally, in honor of the looming college basketball season, Kentucky will take home the title this year after defending champion UCONN is declared ineligible, because UCONN’s players won’t achieve the newly required academic standards passed by the NCAA. These new standards scare high school recruits who are afraid they won’t reach post-season and traditional powerhouse universities, while Ivy League schools such as Harvard and Penn amazingly become more competitive.
There you have it. Here is a copious amount of predictions for you sports fans to keep in mind over the next few months. The scary thing is that I just might actually get one of these right. Happy Halloween!
It is what it is: Some will rise, some will fall
