Real Sports Talk With E-$

Last week's piece was about how the Los Angeles Angels were going to win the NL West, with the Texas Rangers contending for a wild-card position. This week, I will talk about the NL Central, in which the defending World Series champs, the St. Louis Cardinals are located. The Milwaukee Brewers actually won this division last year, while the Cards came in second to earn the wild card slot.  Midway through the year, the Pittsburgh Pirates were the feel good story of the year, as they were the division leaders after the All-Star break, while the Cincinnati Reds had a couple of key off-season acquisitions. The Chicago Cubs, still without a World Series for over a century, and Houston Astros round out this division.

1. Cincinnati Reds-The Reds added pitcher Matt Latos from the Padres, and look to build on an already strong pitching staff (Mike Leake led the team with 12 wins, Johnny Cueto had a 2.31 ERA).  Joey Votto and Jay Bruce will continue to add power at the plate (61 home runs, 200 RBIs combined) while Drew Stubbs looks to become one of the better centerfielders in the league
2. Milwaukee Brewers-Ryan Braun, who was the 2011 NL MVP, looks to become an even stronger force at the plate with Prince Fielder now in Detroit. Zach Greinke looks to produce a lower ERA compared to last year (which was at 3.83), while Yovani Gallardo is poised to show that last year was no fluke (17 wins, 207 strikeouts and a 3.52 ERA).
3. St. Louis Cardinals-Losing Albert Pujols to the Los Angeles Angels is going to greatly effect this team. Ryan Freese has to prove that he didn't get lucky in the playoffs (he was named World Series MVP), and the pitching staff has to have a good year for this team to even think about repeating (Adam Wainwright has a spectacular year in 2010 {was out all of 2011}, with a 20-11 record, a 2.42 ERA and 213 strikeouts).
4. Pittsburgh Pirates-Andrew McCutchen signed a deal this week that will keep him in Pittsburgh the next six years. McCutchen has quietly become one of the best centerfielders in the MLB, and could potentially have a 30-30 season (30 home runs and 30 stolen bases). A.J. Burnett comes over after a trade from the New York Yankees, and looks to rejuvenate his career after three shaky seasons in the big apple (two seasons with an above 5.00 ERA).
5. Chicago Cubs-It doesn't seem like it was that long ago that the Cubs were oh-so-close to going to the World Series (thanks Steve Bartman!). This team appears to be rebuilding for the future, as catcher Geovany Soto, leftfielder Alfonso Soriano and pitcher Matt Garza will be the biggest threats to the opposition this season.
6. Houston Astros-It must seem like it was such a long time ago that this team was in the World Series (2005). This team is coming off a season that consisted of the most amount of loses in Astros' history (106), and this team has nowhere to go but up (so I hope/think). Carlos Lee, Wandy Rodriguez and former Red Sox great Jed Lowrie look to make some noise this season.

On to the NFL. First thing is first, I was not surprised to hear that the New Orleans Saints had bounties for opposing players during their Super Bowl run. While I think that they weren't the only team to do this (and there will continue to be teams doing this), they will have to endure the punishments that commissioner Roger Goodell will hand down to them. The penalty handed out should nowhere near be as severe as the Patriots' punishments from the "Spygate" scandal ($750,000 in fines, first round draft pick lost), but the penalty should still be hard. The Pats blatantly cheated; the Saints tried to help their own cause by attempting to hurt the best players the opposition had. The other big story is that Peyton Manning was to be released on Wednesday. This opens the door to numerous teams around the league that need a quarterback (I am talking to you, Washington, Seattle, Arizona), while it is almost a guarantee that Stanford quarterback Andrew Luck will be the first overall pick in the NFL draft in April. With free agency starting up next week, a lot of rumors will start to circulate around the sport's world.

In other irrelevant (though I find interesting) sports news:

-Tuukka Rask being out for a handful of weeks won't hurt the Bruins greatly. He is, after all, the back up to Tim Thomas, who knows how to turn the swag on in the playoffs.

-The NHL has to pray that Sidney Crosby won't have any setbacks from his latest attempt at a comeback.

- Nice to see that Harvard will be in the NCAA men's basketball tournament since 1946.

-Rajon Rondo's triple-double against the New York Knicks on Sunday was awesome, but was the second best performance of the day. Deron Williams scored 57 points, and went 21-21 from the free-throw line.

-I think it is a smart move on the New Orleans Saints' part to not sign Drew Brees to a multi-year deal. Brees isn't exactly one of the youngest quarterbacks in the league.

-Speaking of the Saints, interesting to see that a workout that wide receiver Randy Moss did went well. Moss has always been a freak of nature athletically, but his attitude has to change in order for him to become successful……again.

-My pick to win the race in Las Vegas is Matt Kenseth.

Non-sports information of the week

Time to rant- So I live in Hall Hall, and I am getting sick of something. Throughout any given point of the day, it seems like there is an emergency vehicle (i.e. a police car/ambulance/etc.) that goes by the building with its siren and lights on just to blow past the cross-walks. My complaint? After going across the cross-walks, the sirens/lights are shut-off, meaning that they really don't have an emergency, and can't be bothered to wait like everyone else does. Is it really too hard to wait potentially an additional 20 seconds? C'mon man.

-For a minute, I thought the Pemi River was going to freeze on Tuesday night, but then I saw yesterday's forecast.

-Spring Break in a week- "Can't Wait!" (Bart Scott voice).

-I wonder when the Spring Fling performer will finally be announced.

-Ski season best last beyond Spring Break.