Sport: MLBPick Selection: White Sox
At 8:05pm, our complimentary selection is the Chicago White Sox over the Cleveland Indians. The Sox are back to defend their World Series title of last fall and could very well be better than they were in 2005 while their biggest threat in the division, the Indians, would like to build on their surprising success of the last season. It will be a tall task for the Tribe as they may have taken a slight step backwards from 2005. They lost one of the best young outfielders in baseball, Coco Crisp, to the Red Sox, and the AL ERA leader, Kevin Millwood, to the Rangers. Still this is an exciting and mostly young team to be sure. Mark Buehrle, one of the most consistent pitchers in baseball the last 5 years takes the mound for the defending champs against CC Sabathia. Sabathia is a workhorse and had a very good campaign in 2005, winning 15 games, but since 2000 he has posted only one regular season (2003) with an ERA under 4 runs per game. He ended 2005 strong, winning 4 out of his last 5 starts, but those four wins came against the D-Rays, Tigers, and Royals (twice). Sabathia has been getting rocked this spring as well, with an ugly ERA of 8.35 going into this opening night matchup. Buehrle dominated Cleveland last year, garnering a 2.45 ERA against them while the Sox won 4 of his 5 starts vs their division rival. Their offense should get a big boost with the addition of a healthy Jim Thome, so look for the ChiSox to be even tougher to start the new year. Take Chicago. As always, good luck...Al McMordie.
|
Handicappers
