The 2004 Major League Baseball season already is two games old with the Devil Rays and Yankees splitting a pair of games in Tokyo last week.
Based on those games, the Rays' Victor Zambrano is a Cy Young candidate, Tino Martinez is on pace for 81 homers and the MVP and Lou Piniella is the favorite for manager of the year.
Ah, but the rest of the league gets going today, so a few other names for the awards will be thrown into the helmet.
So here's our best guess at who will win this season's awards.
AL MVP: The chic pick would be Alex Rodriguez. The sentimental pick would be Nomar Garciaparra, considering Boston tried to deal him and all. But our pick is the guy who was going to stay at short in New York no matter what: Derek Jeter.
NL MVP: It will be interesting to watch Barry Bonds to see if his power numbers go down in that weak lineup. We're going to stick with the guy who put up monster numbers last season and will again: St. Louis' Albert Pujols.
AL CY YOUNG: Boston's Curt Schilling, by sheer unfamiliarity, will baffle hitters for half the season. His amazing stuff will baffle them the other half. Same with the Yankees' Kevin Brown, who already has a victory this season. Our pick: Brown.
NL CY YOUNG: The Cubs' Mark Prior might have the best stuff, but he's out indefinitely with a leg injury. His teammate, Kerry Wood, though, is healthy and based on his spring, ready to dominate. Our pick: Wood.
AL ROOKIE OF THE YEAR: When he was in high school, Twins catcher Joe Mauer was voted the player of the year in baseball and football. He'll get a third trophy to go with the other two. Keep an eye on A's shortstop Bobby Crosby, but our pick: Mauer.
NL ROOKIE OF THE YEAR: The NL has several promising candidates, including Padres shortstop Khalil Greene and Expos outfielder Terrmel Sledge. Last season, Yankees rookie Hideki Matsui did not win rookie-of-the-year honors. This year, another Matsui will. We're going with Mets shortstop Kazuo Matsui.
AL MANAGER OF THE YEAR: Our vote already goes to the Yankees' Joe Torre, who didn't get fired after losing the opener.
NL MANAGER OF THE YEAR: The Padres might not win the NL West, but they will stay in contention long enough to get Bruce Bochy the award.
THIRD IS NOT A CHARM: The Astros let Geoff Blum go to the Rays in the offseason to make room for Morgan Ensberg to play every day. The Astros named Ensberg the starting third baseman before spring.
That's good for Ensberg considering he was hitting .200 with no homers and one RBI for the spring coming into the weekend. He also had a team-high four errors after committing nine in 127 games last season.
WHAT JINX?: Will the Sports Illustrated Jinx strike again? As if the Cubs didn't have enough shaky luck, SI put Wood on the cover and predicted the Cubs would win the World Series. The headline: Hell Freezes Over.
Wood wasn't bothered: "It didn't jinx Michael Jordan, and he was on it quite a bit."
Meantime, manager Dusty Baker said, "I wouldn't mind if hell freezes over. That means I have a better chance to get into heaven."
SAVING HIS ARM: Over the past seasons, Atlanta closer John Smoltz mostly pitched in save situations or, at least, with the game on the line. That often meant going a week without pitching or, occasionally, pitching five or six times in a week.
Not anymore.
"I can't do what I did the last two years," Smoltz told the Atlanta Journal-Constitution. "I can't go eight days without throwing. There may be days off, where in the past two years I may have taken the ball. Just because I have to be smarter (after surgery)."
Look for Chris Reitsma, who was a setup man and closer last season with the Reds, to get some of Smoltz's leftover save opportunities.
LOU-IE, LOU-IE: Arizona manager Bob Brenly said he is going to take Tampa native and D'backs leftfielder Luis Gonzalez out at certain times in some games to save Gonzalez's right (throwing) arm. Gonzalez has a second-degree ligament tear, and the elbow isn't getting better.
"We know what it is, and we have to live with it," Brenly said. "There might be times this season in the eighth inning of a game when we have a one- or two-run lead and he has batted in the eighth inning, we may take him out for defense. It's not meant to embarrass him or show him up. It's just what we need to do as a team to put our best defensive ballclub on the field late in a ballgame. He understands that."
Gonzalez said the elbow sometimes aches, but, for the most part, he feels fine.
"I've just got to get to the balls and get them in," he said. "It was no secret before about my throwing out there."
EX-RAY: Former Rays pitcher Tanyon Sturtze is looking for work. The Dodgers released him early last week, then the Marlins did the same on Friday. Sturtze went 4-18 with the Rays in 2002.
"That's still coming up?" Sturtze told the Fort Lauderdale Sun-Sentinel. "2002 was a difficult year. It seemed like every time something would happen it would happen where I would end up taking the loss. I didn't throw the ball that bad the whole season. Things just kept piling up a little bit. Once they get into those higher numbers, people start talking about them."
SHORT HOPS: Former Armwood standout Sterling Hitchcock has been named the fifth starter in the Padres rotation. Because San Diego won't need a fifth starter until April 17, Hitchcock will go Triple-A Portland to start the season. ... More than 100 players from the Dominican Republic - including stars such as Sammy Sosa, Pedro Martinez and Vladimir Guerrero - will open the 2004 season on major-league rosters. That's the most of any country other than the United States. ... For the first time since 2001, Expos games will be shown on English television in Montreal. A cable sports network (The Score) will show 25-35 games. ... Rockies manager Clint Hurdle got tossed out of a recent spring game after only five pitches. What did he say to the home-plate umpire to get the boot? "If you can see the bottom of the ball it's too high."
- Information from other news organizations was used in this report.
