MLB Fanhouse Previews

On Thursday, our staff of MLB experts unveiled their picks for the major postseason awards. Now we're down to the really good stuff.

Who will make the playoffs and win the ultimate prize in October? Our 13 brightest baseball minds (including yours truly) tried to answer those questions, and the results are after the jump. But first a few notes:

-- As a group we are most confident in three things: that the Cubs will win the NL Central (12 out of 13 panelists), that the Angels will win the AL West (10 of 13) and that two teams from the AL East will make the playoffs (a perfect 13 for 13).

We still have more than seven months before the Baseball Writers' Association of America hands out its hardware, but why wait? MLB FanHouse's staff is ready to name the award winners today.

But don't hold us to it.

These predictions are nothing more than having some fun. Think about it; there's two ways to predict who wins the MVP or Cy Young Award: take the obvious guy who's been at the top of his game (Johan Santana, Albert Pujols) or go with a hunch and make a stab at some so far unrewarded talent (Grady Sizemore, David Wright).

FanHouse completes its 2009 MLB Preview with a look at the New York Yankees.

When they signed A.J. Burnett, CC Sabathia and Mark Teixeira for a combined $423.5 million in December, the Yankees opened the door to criticism that they were just trying to use their revenue advantage to bludgeon the opposition. The team did use a heavy hand, but they aren't deserving of criticism.

FanHouse continues its 2009 MLB Preview with a look at the Boston Red Sox.

In a little more than half of a decade, the fortunes of the Boston Red Sox have done a 180-degree turn. Once a franchise of managerial incompetence, front office ineptitude and fatally flawed teams, the Sox have become a well-oiled winning machine -- smarter than the Yankees, but with similar financial might.

FanHouse continues its 2009 MLB Preview with a look at the Tampa Bay Rays.

Although they ended up falling short at the end, 2008 was the year of the Rays. After being the butt of jokes for the first 10 years of its existence, Tampa Bay turned an impressive collection of baseball talent into an impressive team, finally assembling a competent bullpen, and utilizing some position shifts to put a much improved defense on the field. With the pieces in place, everything came together, and the Rays increased their win total by 31 games on their way to winning both the AL East and AL pennant.

FanHouse continues its 2009 MLB Preview with a look at the Toronto Blue Jays.

There's no team in baseball in a worse spot than the Blue Jays. They've had to contend with the megapowers in New York and Boston for years, watching their competitive payroll and over-.500 seasons amount to nothing more than third-place finish after-third place finish. No matter how much they have spent and how much they have won, it has never been enough to catch the Red Sox or the Yankees.

FanHouse continues its 2009 MLB Preview with a look at the Baltimore Orioles.

The Charm City hasn't had much to feel good about when it comes to its baseball team lately. In this case, lately means more than a decade. The last time the Orioles ended the season with a winning record "Honey" by Mariah Carey was the No. 1 song in America and Bill Clinton was in the first year of his second term as president. The year was 1997.

FanHouse continues its 2009 MLB Preview with a look at the Chicago Cubs.

A magical regular season that yielded the most victories for the Cubs franchise since 1935 sent them to the postseason for the fourth time in a 11-season span. Unfortunately, 2008 ended the same way 1998, 2003 and 2007 did -- in disappointment. The Cubs head into 2009 hoping to wipe the slate clean and get over any fake curses they are allegedly saddled with.

FanHouse continues it 2009 MLB Preview with a look at the Milwaukee Brewers.

The Brewers are a really interesting team. Last March, everyone expected them to make a run at the playoffs, and they expected them to do so without any knowledge of the CC Sabathia trade and with the assumption that Ben Sheets would spend some time on the disabled list. In the end, they did make the playoffs, but they did it with half of a season of Sabathia and almost 200 innings from Sheets. Now those two are gone, and everyone expects the Brewers to take a step back this year.

FanHouse continues its 2009 MLB Preview with a look at the Pittsburgh Pirates.

For the better part of the last decade, the Pittsburgh Pirates aimlessly wandered through the wilderness of baseball with Kevin McClatchy and Dave Littlefield at the helm. Finally, they lost their jobs and Frank Coonelly and Neal Huntington took over. For more than a year, the new front office has been working on digging out of the hole dug by Littlefield during his reign of terror. There's only one real problem: The hole dug by Littlefield was so deep that it's going to take more than a year to dig out of it.