{"id":17917,"date":"2021-10-05T05:35:23","date_gmt":"2021-10-05T11:35:23","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/learningturkey.com\/blog\/?p=17917"},"modified":"2021-10-03T16:43:17","modified_gmt":"2021-10-03T22:43:17","slug":"2021-predictions-revisited","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/learningturkey.com\/blog\/2021\/10\/2021-predictions-revisited\/","title":{"rendered":"2021 Predictions Revisited"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"<\/a>What a difference six months makes.\u00a0 Back in March<\/a>, at the dawn of the 2021 baseball season, I made my annual predictions as to who would win what with little idea if the season would go off as planned. \u00a0Now that the regular season has come to an end, it is time revisit those predictions and see what, if anything, I got right.<\/p>\n

American League<\/h3>\n

East<\/strong>: Yankees<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Well, that’s one down.\u00a0 Despite losing two starting pitchers from last year’s staff, the Rays managed to repeat as champs of the AL East.<\/p>\n

Central<\/strong>: Twins<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

I was all set to go with the White Sox here, until a late injury to Eloy Jimenez in spring training left me feeling bad.\u00a0 The Twins fell off the face of the Earth, while the White Sox overcame injuries all season to cruise to their first division title since 2008.<\/p>\n

West<\/strong>: Astros<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Hey, here’s one I got right.\u00a0 The Astros return to the top of the division after a one year break.<\/p>\n

Wild Cards:<\/strong>\u00a0White Sox, Blue Jays<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Talk about coming down to the wire.\u00a0 With a potential 4-way tie for the two Wild Card spots heading in to the final day of the season, the Yankees and the Red Sox both took control of their destinies with victories on Sunday, leaving the Blue Jays and the Mariners on the outside looking in.<\/p>\n

AL Champion:<\/strong>\u00a0Yankees<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

The Rays do seem to be the class of the league.<\/p>\n

Cy Young:<\/b> Lucas Giolito<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

That seems very unlikely.\u00a0 Blue Jays ace Robbie Ray seems like a popular choice.<\/p>\n

MVP:<\/strong>\u00a0Aaron Judge<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

A fine choice, but who could have seen Shohei Ohtani coming?\u00a0 The two-way Angels star will run away and hide with this award.<\/p>\n

National\u00a0League<\/h3>\n

<\/p>\n

East<\/strong>: Braves<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

The Braves, despite losing Ronald Acuna Jr. to injury, picked up their third straight division title.<\/p>\n

Central<\/strong>: Cardinals<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

The Brewers pretty much ran away and hid with the division title.<\/p>\n

West<\/strong>: Dodgers<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

The Giants shock the world and win 107 games to deny the Dodgers their 9th straight division title.<\/p>\n

Wild Cards:<\/strong>\u00a0Padres, Mets<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

The Dodgers and their 106 wins become the best Wild Card team of all time.\u00a0 Meanwhile, the Cardinals ran off a 17-game winning streak, the longest in the National League since 1937, in September to overtake everyone for that second spot.<\/p>\n

NL Champion:<\/strong>\u00a0Dodgers<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Sure, why not.<\/p>\n

Cy Young:<\/strong> Walker Buehler<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

I think I actually have an outside shot here.<\/p>\n

MVP:<\/strong> Fernando Tatis Jr.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

And I think I may have a shot here as well, though time missed due to injuries may push people towards Bryce Harper, who had a monster second half.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

What a difference six months makes.\u00a0 Back in March, at the dawn of the 2021 baseball season, I made my annual predictions as to who would win what with little idea if the season would go off as planned. \u00a0Now that the regular season has come to an end, it is time revisit those predictions […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[34],"tags":[110,113,119,125,121,5914,57,116,9341,256,124,255,258,9803,8055,8049,118,8057,49,51],"class_list":["post-17917","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-baseball","tag-angels","tag-astros","tag-blue-jays","tag-braves","tag-brewers","tag-bryce-harper","tag-cardinals","tag-dodgers","tag-fernando-tatis-jr","tag-giants","tag-mariners","tag-rays","tag-red-sox","tag-robbie-ray","tag-ronald-acuna-jr","tag-shohei-ohtani","tag-twins","tag-walker-buehler","tag-white-sox","tag-yankees"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/learningturkey.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/17917","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/learningturkey.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/learningturkey.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/learningturkey.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/learningturkey.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=17917"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"http:\/\/learningturkey.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/17917\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":18126,"href":"http:\/\/learningturkey.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/17917\/revisions\/18126"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/learningturkey.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=17917"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/learningturkey.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=17917"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/learningturkey.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=17917"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}