Friday, April 2, 2010

And building on the Stark article...

ESPN's "Experts" picked their division winners. Let's keep this to the NL Central (with World Series picks in parentheses), and reference it at the end of the year:

Jorge Arangure, Jr: Cardinals (Phillies)
Matthew Berry: Cardinals (Phillies)
Steve Berthiaume: Brewers (Phillies)
Aaron Boone: Reds (Phillies)
Jim Caple: Cardinals (Giants)
Tristan Cockcroft: Cardinals (Yankees)
Jerry Crasnick: Cardinals (Rockies)
Richard Durrett: Cardinals (Yankees)
Gordon Edes: Cardinals (Cardinals)
Pedro Gomez: Reds (Yankees)
Christopher Harris: Cardinals (Red Sox)
Orel Hershiser: Cardinals (Yankees)
Tony Jackson: Cardinals (Phillies)
Eric Karabell: Cardinals (Phillies)
Tim Kurkjian: Cardinals (Phillies)
A.J. Mass: Cardinals (Cardinals)
Joe McDonald: Cardinals (Red Sox)
Joe Morgan: Cardinals (Phillies)
Amy K. Nelson: Cardinals (Cardinals)
Rob Neyer: Cardinals (Red Sox)
Buster Olney: Cardinals (Rockies)
Peter Pascarelli: Cubs (Braves)
James Quintong: Cardinals (Yankees)
Karl Ravech: Cardinals (Red Sox)
J.P. Ricciardi: Brewers (Phillies)
Brendan Roberts: Cardinals (Yankees)
Mark Saxon: Brewers (Yankees)
Jon Sciambi: Cardinals (Red Sox)
Dan Shulman: Cardinals (Red Sox)
Mark Simon: Cardinals (Yankees)
Chris Singleton: Cardinals (Phillies)
Jayson Stark: Cardinals (Phillies)
Rick Sutcliffe: Cardinals (Rockies)
Jon Weisman: Reds (Red Sox) - though the Cardinals made it to the World Series
Gene Wojciechowski: Cardinals (Rays)

Of ESPN's 35 experts, 28 of them picked the Cardinals to win the NL Central. In no one's predictions did the Astros make an appearance as a Wild Card team.