Preview/Prediction

The Twins are coming off a very successful 2009 campaign in which they finished in a first-place tie with the Detroit Tigers (86-76), and then won a one-game playoff to move into the postseason.

This year they will open their new, open-air stadium, Target Field (pictured), which is reportedly a hitter-friendly ballpark… that fact may cause havoc with the club’s hope of repeating as division champs.

The Detroit Tigers finished last year with a record of 86-76, tied for first place in the AL Central… but they failed to make the post-season when they lost Game No. 163 to the Minnesota Twins and sat home while the post-season got underway.

At the conclusion of the season, Tigers' GM Dave Dombrowski began the process of rebuilding his team from top to bottom. In a seven-player, three-team trade with the Diamondbacks and Yankees, Trader Dave sent CF Curtis Granderson to the Yankees and SP Edwin Jackson to the Diamondbacks.

Once again, there’s not a heckuva lot to like about what is going on in Kansas City.

The Royals' front office appears to be completely lacking in terms of a consistent philosophy on how it wants to build the ball club.

GM Dayton Moore acquired a couple of decent young players in the deal that sent Mark Teahan to Chicago—but otherwise, his moves appear to be ill-conceived and devoid of direction.

The Cleveland Indians finished last season with a 65-97 record, good for fourth place in the American League Central. While I expect marginal improvement this season, there are too many questions to suggest anything better than a last place finish for The Tribe in 2010.

As recently as 2008, the NL West was actually the laughing stock of major league baseball, chock full of mediocre (at best) teams.

What a difference a few years makes.

While the only thing anyone remembers is that they lost to the Phillies again, the Dodgers actually had the National League's best record last year.

They got off to a red-hot start, before cooling down a little down the stretch.

The 2010 baseball rookie class is very deep filled with future All-Stars, and a few players that could one day be enshrined in Cooperstown.

There will be players that have great rookie campaigns, only to see a drop off in production in the next few years.

Opening Day 2010 is less than 72 hours away, which means most fantasy drafts have been completed. Judging by average draft positions on Mock Draft Central , fantasy owners are allowing certain sleeper candidates to go undrafted. One of those guys is Drew Stubbs , who has a current average draft position of 311.40.

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If you’re a die-hard fantasy geek, then you’ll know that more often than not, leagues are won by the sleeper picks and late draft selections that pan out.

In particular, those mid-to-late round picks often feature potential comeback of the year candidates. Here’s a top ten list of predictions for fantasy players that either struggled last year or dealt with injuries – and could easily have a bounceback year in a big way.

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During the entire offseason, the Braves rotation has been touted as one of the most solid in baseball. In the past couple of weeks, though, they have been excluded from many top lists.

MLB.com picked the Phillies to have the top rotation in the NL East. The Boston Globe's Tony Massarotti picked the Cardinals, Phillies, and Giants over the Braves in the NL. These are just a couple of examples.

It has perplexed me how the Braves' impressive pitching could be ranked so low. How does a team with few problems over spring training go from tops to glossed over?