Boston Red Sox: No Love from ESPN on 2012 MLB Predictions

ESPN came out with their annual MLB predictions for the 2012 season today, surveying 50 of their top writers, analysts and contributors to see who they think will come out on top at the end of the year. After many writers had the Boston Red Sox winning the World Series at the beginning of the 2011, many of them didn't even put them on their ballot to make the postseason whatsoever.

The first spot up for debate was the winner of the American League East, to which many of the voters had the New York Yankees or in fewer cases, the Tampa Bay Rays. The lone voter to select the Red Sox as the AL East Champions was Matthew Berry, known for his fantasy baseball expertise. 

With MLB announcing that each league will now have two wild-card teams, who will play each other in a one-game playoff to determine who moves onto the divisional round, each voter was allowed to select two teams. Of the 50 voters, 15 had the Red Sox making the playoffs by way of the wild card.

Now here is where things get interesting. Only one person, Baseball Tonight anchor Karl Ravech, was the only voter who had Boston winning the American League pennant. Ravech, who is close friends with new Boston manager Bobby Valentine, had Boston sneaking into the playoffs as a wild card, defeating the Texas Rangers and then taking out either the Yankees, Detroit Tigers or Los Angeles Angels of Anaheim in the ALCS; clearly a bold move.

Not only did Ravech choose Boston to make the playoffs as a wild card and win the entire American League, but he also said that Boston will defeat the Arizona Diamondbacks in the World Series. 

Ravech tweeted earlier:

"Delighted by massive response I'm getting to red sox-diamondbacks world series prediction..injuries, trades and time folks..let it breathe."

As Red Sox Nation, we can only hope that Karl Ravech is the smartest out of the 50 "experts" asked for their predictions, and that the Boston Red Sox can come out on top in 2012.