MLB Predictions, 2016

With MLB’s Opening Night only a few days away, I thought it would be a good time to post some predictions for this upcoming season. Baseball is, predictably, a very hard sport to predict, if that makes sense. With the exception of the Cubs never winning the World Series again, you just never know which teams or player will have a good year or bad year. Therefore, if any of my predictions come true, I declare myself Supreme Prognosticator and should be given the Presidency by default.

I will try to make a prediction for every MLB team, but please also see my AL Central Storylines to watch in 2016 for a more in-depth analysis of what to expect for the Royals' division rivals. Here we go:

• The Blue Jays’ Jose Baustista injures his hamstring when attempting to make the most epic bat flip of all time. Frustrated with his injury, Blue Jays fans pelt him with beer cans and poutine (as only Canadians can do) and jeer as he limps like a cretin back to the dugout. 

• Yoenis Cespedes has all of his fancy cars stolen outside of Citi Field, and is forced to ride his horse to games, earning a $1,000 fine and citation from the City of New York for each dump his horse takes on city streets. 

• Madison Bumgarner’s horse challenges Cespedes’ horse to a race and wins. Cespedes decides to retire from baseball and pursue a career raising Thoroughbreds. 

• Pablo Sandoval, who starts the season on the bench after losing his starting job to someone named Travis Shaw, eats away his feelings until he is unrecognizably huge. He has to be removed from Fenway Park by crane.   

• Joe Maddon, the Biggest Hippie in Baseball, gets high after the Cubs Opening Day win and decides to turn Wrigley Field into a season-long music festival called “Wrigleystock.” The result is that thousands of millennials living in Chicago overtake the stadium and tragically burn it down in a haze of marijuana smoke. Needless to say, Wrigleystock destroys the Cubs chances of winning the World Series in 2016 and the Cubs remain cursed. 

•  Brett Lawrie, now playing in the AL Central, gets pelted with so many fastballs that he develops CTE. Roger Goodell and the NFL immediately release a statement that there is no evidence that playing football caused this or any other chronic brain disease. 

• The Cardinals’ Yadier Molina adds another neck tattoo to his MLB-leading 13 (how many tattoos can one neck hold?!?). Tragically, the tattoo is not the phrase “No Ragrets.”

• Nori Aoki sets the Major League Baseball record for Most Career Times Hit in the Nutsack by a Live Baseball. He is given the following trophy to commemorate this achievement:

• The Diamondback's Zack Greinke, disgusted with the outrageous prices of guacamole at Chipotle, declares his new favorite burrito place is Rudy's Burritos, although he hates having to drive all the way to Mesa for 65 cent guac. 
• Cy Young winner Dallas Keuchel of the Astros decides to shave his notorious beard for charity. He becomes unrecognizable and is not allowed in the stadium. As a result, the team fails to make the playoffs. 
  
• Wil Myers hurts his wrist on Opening Day playing ping pong in the Padres dugout and misses the entire season. 
• The Angel's Mike Trout hits for the cycle and every single anchor at ESPN has their head explode.
• Jealous of Trout, Bryce Harper hits for the cycle TWICE IN ONE GAME, and every single sportswriter in America has their head explode. America suffers from a shortage of sportswriters, and is forced to read blogs like this one instead. 
• Not to be outdone, Giancarlo Stanton of the Marlins attempts to hit for the cycle THREE times in one game, but is found injecting steroids directly into his buttocks in the middle of a game. He is not punished however, because the Marlins are terrible and need all the help they can get.
• The Atlanta Braves, who are playing their last season at Turner Field before moving into their new stadium outside city limits, give every Opening Day fan a coupon for Buy One Hot Dog Get One Free at the new stadium, not redeemable at Turner Field. The city suffers through horrendous riots the rest of the season.
• Speaking of riots, the City of Milwaukee holds violent protests when it is revealed that the original Hank T. Dog died in 2015 after players fed it Old Milwaukee and cheese curds, and the team has been cycling through imposters ever since. 
  
• Adam LaRoche is arrested after he is found guilty of kidnapping his doppelganger Charlie Blackmon of the Rockies. At his trial, LaRoche said he was just trying to get his son Drake a chance to play for a AA baseball team, which is the current level the Rockies play at.
• A report by Al Jazeera accuses Alex Rodriguez, who has announced he will retire after the 2017 season, of sending packages of Human Growth Hormone to Peyton Manning's wife. He explains that the report is "outrageous and wrong, and that the HGH is totally not for helping me pass Barry Bonds for the most home runs in MLB history."
• The Pirates' Andrew McCutchen is given an Indecent Exposure citation in Pittsburgh when crazed fans, expecting him to hand out his batting gloves after a game, rip his entire uniform off. 
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