Hi!

I almost forgot Home Run Derby is tonight. Rootin' for Chase Utley and TV's Evan Longoria.

Here's how I'm doing so far. My picks on the right, current standings are in bold on the left

National League
East

1. Phillies — Phillies
2. Mets — Mets (Wild Card pick)
   
3. Marlins — Braves
   
4. Braves — Nationals
5. Nationals — Marlins

I underestimated the Marlins and overestimated the Tigers, but I'm not complaining. I do live in Florida now. 8)

Central

1. Cubs — Cubs
2. Cardinals (Wild Card leader) — Brewers
3. Brewers — Cardinals
4. Reds — Astros
5. Pirates — Reds
6. Astros — Pirates

Haha the Astros magically stink now, and anybody who proves my Wild Card pick wrong is OK by me.

West

1. Diamondbacks — Dodgers
   
2. Dodgers — Diamondbacks
3. Giants — Rockies
   
4. Rockies — Padres
   
5. Padres — Giants (picked 12th behind Floyd "Money" Mayweather)

Now there's the Rockies I know and love. Why couldn't they have sucked in, oh I don't know, October?

American League
East

1. Red Sox — Red Sox
   
2. Rays (Wild Card leader) — Yankees
   
3. Yankees — Rays
   
4. Blue Jays — Blue Jays
   
5. Orioles — Orioles

I love how everybody was like "Rays in third are you nuts?" Up until last week they were the best in baseball.

I don't usually like to make changes to my baseball predictions mid-season, but I'm calling this now: If the Rays don't win the AL East, they are taking the Wild Card and at least going to the ALCS. And I really, really want to see a Rays-Phillies World Series.

Central

1. White Sox — Indians
2. Twins — Tigers (original Wild Card Pick)
   
3. Tigers — Twins
4. Royals — White Sox
   
5. Indians — Royals

oh boy now there can be a curse of the jacobs brothers~!

West

1. Angels — Angels
   
2. Athletics — Mariners
3. Rangers — Athletics
   
4. Mariners — Rangers
   

Nobody cares about the AL West.

Oh boy I can't wait for tomorrow when the AL wins another All-Star Game.

Fun fact: Last time the NL won was in Philly, and I was there.

You did not go to school at Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry.

Most of you aren't even British. Liar.

WII BEER PONG


RATED T FOR TEEN

hey wait a minute

Well, since I managed to scare a few less observant folks, the last post was to point out that I'm back on my old username.

Come on guys there was a zombie hand and everything.

So let's bring you up to speed:


1.  I moved to Florida in October.

I spent most of last year job hunting, and I'm now a full time Web editor for a local cable news station in Orlando. My "weekends" are in the middle of the week, but that's really one of the only things about that job that could be better.

I currently live literally down the street from SeaWorld. It's about a 10-minute drive to Disney property, and 15 minutes to Universal. When I tell people to come visit -- which reminds me, come visit -- I add "I live near a castle."

2.  I will not be living in Orlando for much longer. Karen and I are moving in together in July.

We've been together for a year now and we're both pretty happy. In the you would probably vomit sort of way. Yeah, we're awesome.

We had our year anniversary May 14. I got her a spot for us on a tour of the Magic Kingdom, and dinner at the California Grill on top of Disney's Contemporary Resort. Both were excellent.

She bought me Mario Kart. What can I say? The kid knows me.

Currently she lives in Winter Haven, about 45 minutes away -- without traffic, and that doesn't happen much. So we found an apartment at a pretty nice halfway point between our jobs. The "town" is called Champions Gate, and it's very "golfy," but we still will live near a castle.

We've decided our new place is going to be beach-themed. It's going to be awesome.

3.  On the Internetting front, I started playing with ExpressionEngine this week. It's a content management suite similar to Movable Type, only I had to pay for it so it looks like it'll be able to do backflips for me instead of me having to do backflips for shit like Wordpress. I can run multiple sites from it, so my plan is to run Progressive Boink, celebdeathtoll and my own portfolio.

I expect that to take a while for me to set up, especially since I'm moving in July, but once I do, it looks like it'll make things a lot easier on me. The problem with P-boi is that it has become largely dependent on me to keep it updated, and it wasn't always that way. I was my freshest, I believe, in 2005, when I still made things pretty, but that was usually a few times a year deal. It showed across my other accounts online -- LiveJournal, MySpace -- hell, even e-mailing people. I've been longing to get back to that, but I've had a hard as hell time trying to get back to that happy place online, so I can merge it with my happy place in real life.

4.  BASEBALL!

I'm still only halfway finished chronicling Mike Fireball's Fucking Insane Grapefruit League Tour, but right now my mind is currently busy being blown away by the fact that the best team in baseball as of this morning is the TAMPA BAY RAYS.

I moved down here expecting shitty baseball, and both Florida teams are currently at the top of their divisions.

I live closer to the Rays, so they're my new home team. They still don't feel like home like my Phillies still do and will continue to do for a very long time, but the fact that they are in first place in the same division as the Red Sox and Yankees is helping a lot.

It may take 20 years for me to ever root for the Marlins over the Phils. Maybe longer, since they're going to officially be the Miami Marlins in 2011, but it's still nice to have them around as bragging rights. Suckas.


That's it for today. Come visit. I live near a castle.

Here, real quickly, are my predictions for the 2008 MLB season. Provoke me to discuss in the comment thread.

NL East

1. Phillies
2. Mets (Wild card)
3. Braves
4. Nationals
5. Marlins

NL Central

1. Cubs
2. Brewers
3. Cardinals
4. Astros
5. Reds
6. Pirates

NL West

1. Dodgers
2. Diamondbacks
3. Rockies
4. Padres
5.  
6.  
7. Floyd "Money" Mayweather, Jr.
   
8.  
9.  
10.  
11.  
12. Giants

AL East

1. Red Sox
2. Yankees
3. RAYS
4. Blue Jays
5. Orioles

AL Central

1. Indians
2. Tigers (Wild card)
3. Twins
4. White Sox
5. Royals

AL West

1. Angels
2. Mariners
3. Athletics
4. Rangers

World Series

I want: Phillies over Indians in 7. Chase Utley completes the MVP Triple Crown.
More likely: Red Sox over Mets in 5.

Spring Training, Game 2: Phillies @ TigersJoker Marchant Stadium — Lakeland, Florida

http://forums.progressiveboink.com/phpbb3/viewtopic.php?f=3&t=3758&p=132442#p132442

Eventually I'll get around to changing my name back because I like having a unique name instead of sharing a given name with some other guys on Google like a rocket scientist and some baseball player and apparently the Michael Moore of Republicans (seriously, check it out), but for now:

Spring Training, Game 1: Astros @ Indians
Chain of Lakes Park — Winter Haven, Florida

I bought MikeWestfall.com and copied all my LiveJournal entries there.
It doesn't look pretty or anything yet, but content is king. Right?

And I've started with my Opening Day baseball predictions.

If you insist on following along on your LJ friends page, you can add the RSS feed mikewestfallcom