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After a memorable 2008 season that saw the Milwaukee Brewers make the Playoffs for the first time since 1982, expectations for the 2009 season were mixed.

Many people thought the Brewers wouldn't have enough pitching to make a return trip, while others thought their bats would carry them to the promised land for a second straight year.

The Brewers are about to begin a nine-game home stand that will see them try and regain first place after being overtaken by the St. Louis Cardinals.

Looks like the apparent blunder of nixing a Washburn deal with the Minnesota Twins last year was not much of a mistake. 

When Ruben Amaro was appointed general manager of the Philadelphia Phillies shortly after the team’s 2008 World Series victory, he knew the only way his inaugural season would be considered a success was if the Phillies managed to make it back to the World Series. Not an enviable position to be in considering the difficulties involved in repeating, let alone making it back to the World Series two consecutive years in a row.

Growing up in Toronto during the heyday of the Blue Jays run to the back-to-back titles, I was blessed with being able to witness both the building of a championship team from scratch as well as the ability of a wealthy team and city paying big bucks to keep the team together.

While the Blue Jays payroll was at or near the top of the league in '92 and '93 when they won their titles, the differences from top to bottom were nothing like they are today.

In this past month, the New York Mets have turned into the New York Bets; people all around the world are betting on when the next Mets player will find himself with all the others on the bloated DL. Some even go a little bit farther and pick a player. 

Some of the biggest names on the Mets' disabled list are Jose Reyes, Carlos Delgado, JJ Putz, Oliver Perez, John Maine, and the newest player to join the club, Carlos Beltran. 

It's almost July. That means we have almost three months of MLB highlights, wins, losses, and data at our disposal. From this we can draw conclusions, project outcomes, and try to figure out the Rubik's Cube that is the 2009 baseball season.

Tuesday afternoon, Los Angeles Dodgers’ starting pitcher Clayton Kershaw was kind enough to take part in a live chat event at 1:00 pm Pacific Time on MLB.com.

For 39 minutes, the native of Dallas, Texas answered questions from fans that were logged into a chat room.

Clayton is in his second season with the Blue Crew. Drafted in 2006 by the Dodgers at only 21-years of age, Kershaw was the Gatorade National Baseball Player of the Year at Highland Park High School in Texas.

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The Tampa Rays are positioned to take the American League East. 

They’ve been through their injuries. The Rays have played without BJ Upton, Evan Longoria, Jason Bartlett, Akinori Iwamura, Shawn Riggans, Pat Burrell, Troy Percival, Scott Kazmir, Chad Bradford, Jason Isringhausen, and Brian Shouse. 

Tampa Bay lost its replacement center fielder before the season even started, and they are only six games back.

Yesterday, I spent a while sitting in the car while driving to the Mets game, and I listened to Mike Francesa talk about how the Mets’ season is effectively over. He said, “Rather than the Mets trying to tread water, they are just trying to tread.”

While this may be an accurate statement, I am not going to be so quick to just give up on the team. That won’t solve any of our problems.

Remember what Tug McGraw said, "Ya gotta believe!"

Being already the 23rd of June in the year 2009, the current MLB season is over 40 percent complete.

This year's San Francisco Giants stand at 37-32, a record that few predicted for the orange and black, but more amazingly, they are doing it despite poor general managing and poor coaching.

First off, let it be clear that this is not a pessimistic article. In reality, it is an piece filled with optimism if you read between the lines.

But let's get to the issue at hand, shall we?