My wild guess

I think the Tribe will do very well this year. However, unlike most people, I'm not assuming they'll win more games than they did last year. If fact, I think they'll win fewer. I'm guessing 90. Here's why.

The Tribe is young. It's reasonable to expect most of their young players to do as well as last year or better. Sizemore is the exception. You have to worry about the dreaded sophomore jinx. Don't worry. It's not gonna happen. Sure, Grady will have a few droughts, but at the end of the year, I suspect his numbers in '06 will be better than his terrific '05 numbers.

The starters are solid. Byrd and Johnson should give what the Tribe's deep thinkers thought when they acquired 'em. The two should post in excess of 400 innings and should combine for 25 wins. I'll take that. Westbrook should be fine. Closer to his '04 numbers than '05. That means he'll show slight improvement over last year.

You want a pennant? Look to the two lefties, Carsten "Crooked Hat" Charles Sabathia and Cliff Lee for that. For me to be wrong, these two really have to be the reason. Unfortunately, I think they'll both be very good and that CC will be maddeningly inconsistent. He will look utterly dominant and then forget how to pitch. I probably should invoke a comparison to Bartolo Colon's days with the Tribe here to make my point. OK. You get it.

The pen should be fine too. I really like Fernando Cabrera, and so do all the fantasy magazines. He could be really good some day as a closer. I just hope it isn't this year. If you guys read this with any regularity, you know I also like Andrew Brown...a lot. He didn't make the 25 man roster, but I'm pretty sure we'll see him before September.

The hitters will be as good as last year or better. Michaels will be a pleasant surprise to those who remain ignorant of the senior circuit. People won't miss Coco, even though he'll be a star in Boston. The Tribe's gonna score runs, lots of them. Victor Martinez should really emerge as a bona fide star. Peralta's probably going to see a drop in his numbers. His secondary numbers don't support a repeat, at this point, of his numbers from last year. He really needs to control the strike zone. Sizemore's fabulous and will get better. Belliard is the same guy he's been for the last two years. Sadly, Blake, Boone and Broussard are what they are too. Perez will give a nice right-handed bat in a platoon and off the bench. Nice acquisition.

Pronk is, of course, great when he's healthy. That's the problem and not just for Half Project/ Half Donkey. Look at the numbers from last year. The scary truth is that the Indians were amongst the healthiest teams in MLB. When's the last time you could say that about any Cleveland team. Unlike my writing partner, I'm not sitting here with metaphysical certitude knowing that the other shoe will soon drop. I'm just pointing out that that is one achievement that will be hard to duplicate. However, the one thing that bodes well for the Tribe in that regard is that most of the guys are young. They should be able to handle the grind.

If injuries do hit, the Indians have a shocking amount of depth. That also contributed to drop my win total to 90. Here's why. If, for example, Boone goes down, we luckily can plug Marte into the spot. He's great. He's a premium prospect. That means the front office will be patient with him and give him a real opportunity to contribute. It's hard for rookies to contribute in a pennant push, and even when he stumbles, Wedge will run him out again the next day. The same is true to varying degrees about Franklin Guitierrez, Brad Snyder and Ryan Garko. I'm not being critical, just realistic.

I think they could sneak into the play-offs. My number's conservative, but I'll stick to it.