E-Mail This Article to a Friend " Eye " of the storm: Hits and misses in 2004 BY CHRISTOPHER YOUNG

Every sportswriter often feels the need to make predictions or prognostications through his or her writing. I am no different. Thus far this year, I have been right on occasion, but boy, have I also been wrong. Here’s where the darts landed looking back on "Sporting Eye’s" view of the wide, wide world of sports this year.

1/30/04: I don’t see any way that the Patriots will lose Super Bowl XXXVIII, and I’ll even go so far as to say that this team could be the first to hold its opponent to single digits since the Raiders blew out the Redskins, 38-9 in 1984. I can see the Carolina running game becoming a non-factor, and I can see the Panthers struggling to move the ball. I foresee the Patriots having their own problems with the Carolina defense, but putting enough points on the board to make it comfortable.

... The closest thing to a Super Bowl goose egg we’ve ever seen was Super Bowl VI, when the Roger Staubach–led Cowboys swamped the Dolphins, 24-3. I think Sunday’s game will be a tad similar, with one difference.

Patriots 13, Panthers 0. (Actual final score: Patriots 32, Panthers 29.)

2/13/04: It is starting. Its presence is palpable in the air. And it will, without question, be lingering and gradually intensifying for the next eight and a half months.

Hope annually springs eternal in the Hub, and perhaps folks around here also realize that this upcoming [baseball] campaign could provide the last best chance for this team, as presently constituted, to break the 86-year title drought. Having [so many] guys under contract for this season is the best reason why Boston could actually do the unthinkable and reward New England fans with the region’s second championship of the calendar year — something that hasn’t happened since the Steelers and Pirates presented the Steel City’s faithful with a joyous 1979.

2/17/04: And if the Yankees win this year’s World Series, it would be appropriate if a nice little asterisk appeared right beside their name on the champions list — one that says, As well they should.

2/20/04: Therefore, they can no longer be rightfully called the "Pinstripers." They must now be referred to as the "Theybetterwinstripers." Because there is no longer any excuse for this team to falter — not with this potpourri of unmatched talent.

3/8/04: NHL playoffs: Right now the Bruins ... have their sights on a championship, and it’s not too far-fetched to think that 2004 could be a helluva year for parades on New England’s fabled streets. (Final first-round playoff result: Canadiens 4, Bruins 3.)

3/19/04: But here are this year’s dubious 14 [baseball teams] who can already book fall cruises because they’re unlikely to have any [playoff hopes] standing in the way: Tampa Bay, Baltimore, Cleveland, Detroit, Texas, New York Mets, Montreal , Pittsburgh, Cincinnati, Milwaukee, Los Angeles, Colorado, Arizona, San Diego.

Fourteen teams out, 16 teams left to battle for baseball supremacy. (All 14 of those teams did miss the playoffs, with the exception of the Dodgers, who won the NL West crown.)

3/22/04: [Red Sox] centerfielder Johnny Damon isn’t hurt at all, as far as we know, but we must question his mental health if the shaggy-haired speedster insists on entering the regular season looking like the long-lost son of Charles Manson and Courtney Love.

4/2/04: Baseball preview: NL East: Philadelphia; NL Central: Houston. It’s tough to pick against the sentimental favorites in Chicago, but I have just enough questions about their rotation to hand them the wild-card spot instead. St. Louis for the first time since who-knows-when will be just another face in the crowd, but at least the Redbirds have a smidgen of hope.... NL West: San Francisco. AL East: So who will take the division? [M]y gut feeling is that this will be a tight race throughout the season, with the [Sox and Yankees] perhaps never more than five games apart in the standings. Nonetheless, if forced to choose, I’d have to give the slightest of edges to New York. AL Central: Minnesota. AL West: Oakland. [I]f [Mark] Mulder cannot join fellow aces Barry Zito and Rich Harden on a full-time basis, that could open the door for the likes of Anaheim to sneak in and steal the division. Finally, Texas is also in this division. The last time a team lost A-Rod to greener pastures, it won 116 games. Worked for Seattle; won’t work here. No way, no how. Predicted pennant winners: Boston, Houston. (Actual post-season participants: NL division winners Atlanta, St. Louis, and LA; wild card: Houston; AL division winners NY, Minnesota, Anaheim; wild card: Boston. Pennant winners: Boston, St. Louis. And Texas remained in the divisional chase throughout the season and ultimately won 89 games.)

4/12/04: There are but two ways that this Red Sox season will end: euphoria or disappointment. Based on expectations around here, that’s just the way it is. Now if it’s euphoria, then each of the unsigned players will point to the fact that they helped break an 86-year title drought, and therefore these conquering heroes should be paid according to the team’s ultimate success.

6/28/04: The [Democratic National] convention and Big Dig will go on, as will the season of the Boston Red Sox, and while no one’s path is likely to be smooth on the road to fruition, this is what we’re stuck with, and we’d be smart to make the best of it because the ending just might be worth the aggravation endured.

7/2/04: After the Sox were swept three straight in the Bronx to fall eight-and-a-half games back in the East: For Sox fans, there are two thoughts: damn this team. And thank God for the wild card.

7/12/04: All-Star break notes: Also, don’t forget that the [baseball] trading deadline is just under three weeks hence, and some keen horse-trading could be the difference between a post-season berth and a cocktail on the veranda. . . .

Some random notes regarding the contenders: the Yanks have a 33-12 road record, but unless another top-flight pitcher is attained (or Kevin Brown returns from the DL unscathed), there’s no way this staff can win a World Series.

9/10/04: NFL preview: [W]hen the Pats visit Pittsburgh this season for the first time since the 2002 title game, they’ll find a shadow of that former squad. Luckily for the locals, the Big East’s Pitt Panthers should be decent and could win more games than their pro counterparts. (The Steelers are 6-1 and ended the Pats’ 21-game win streak last week.)

... I have a lot of friends in upstate New York who won’t like me putting the NY Giants in fourth [place in the NFC East]. . . . I see the team starting off 1-4 before making a mid-season run toward respectability. (The Giants are currently 5-2 after a 4-1 start.)

. . . Still, Carolina should coast in this division because of its weak division mates . . . (The Panthers are 1-6.)

9/20/04: Boston’s performance [in losing two of three in Yankee Stadium in mid-September] serves as a reminder that until it puts forth such efforts that stake its claim to be the American League’s best team, the New York Yankees retain the credentials and the evidence to submit that the pennant is theirs to lose.

9/27/04: If I’m the Yankees, I hope that things will work themselves out as they always seemed to in the glory years of 1996, ’98, ’99, and 2000. The cream, as they say, always rises to the top, and the Bronx Bombers’ roster has more of the whipped stuff than any other squad in baseball. But that’s about all I have to be cocky about.

... Because truly, while Mussina and El Duque have pitched pretty well as of late, Javier Vazquez, Brown, and to an extent Lieber have not, and that poses all kinds of questions for the post-season rotation. Add to that an overused "big three" in the pen and a slew of set-up guys who have shown little this season, and you’ve got even more questions — with answers hard to come by.

... So while Oakland has a penchant for choking, Minnesota apparently lacks the offensive firepower to contend for a pennant, and the Red Sox always seem to find a way to lose, things change. They always do. Eventually.

And if I’m the Yankees, I’m really not too sure about my team’s chances or its karma this year. I’m downright terrified that this could be the beginning of the end — of the swagger, of the championships, and of the Curse.

10/18/04: ALCS notes: So can the Yankees lose [four] games in a row and cough up the pennant? Seems unlikely, and it’s never been done in the sport’s long and illustrious history. Maybe a flawed team like Oakland could blow a 3-0 lead, but it seems a bit far-fetched to imagine an explosive line-up like the Yankees’ being shut down for three-straight nights after posting a 19-run outburst.

So it’s easy to close the book now on the 2004 Red Sox and say that they don’t have a chance to overcome this imposing deficit and capture even a bit of respectability en route. They had their chance, and the Yankees simply played and pitched better.

... And if Bronson Arroyo or Lowe or even Wakefield were starting game five at Fenway on Monday, then the funereal mood would likely shroud the Hub as it waited for the inevitable. But it’s Pedro Martinez — a man who could be pitching for a place in the history books and most likely even for his 2005 contract and beyond, so there’s a lot at stake for the Dominican ace. And should he win, then the Sox head back to the Bronx in the exact same position they were in last season (and this time with Curt Schilling, and not John Burkett on the hill for game six), and then all bets are wisely off.

10/22/04: World Series preview: Will it be anticlimactic [against St. Louis]? Perhaps, but I think I speak for many in Red Sox Nation when I say I was getting a little tired of seeing Jeter, A-Rod, Jorge Posada, and the waggly bat of Sheffield in my living room nightly.

. . . The Yankees are gone, the Sox are not, the Cardinals await, and eight playoff teams have been whittled down to just two.

Four wins from post-season glory. In Boston? Could happen. Why not them?

Sporting Eye runs Mondays and Fridays at BostonPhoenix.com, and Christopher Young can be reached at cyoung[a]phx.com