Spring Is Here. I picked up The Sporting News Fantasy Baseball Owners Manual 2004 on my way to work. And while I have no interest in fantasy baseball, this is the first pre-season magazine I've seen; forget groundhogs or robins or whatever else, this is the first sign of spring.

Here are TSN's projections for the Boston and New York rotations. TSN doesn't really explain how they arrive at these projections, but as more magazines come out, I'll post more projections, so maybe a consensus will emerge:

           GS   W  L  ERA   IP    AVG  WHIP
Martinez   30  18  5  2.35  188  .215  1.03
Schilling  35  21  7  3.11  252  .225  1.05
Lowe       32  16  6  3.74  208  .258  1.31
Wakefield  32  13 10  4.02  199  .249  1.31
Kim        25  12  8  3.55  167  .232  1.14

           GS   W  L  ERA   IP    AVG  WHIP
Mussina    21  15 11  3.97  221  .253  1.23
Brown      29  13  9  2.81  202  .228  1.18
Vazquez    34  18  9  3.33  222  .224  1.10
Contreras  25  10  6  3.68  166  .238  1.23
Leiber     Missed 2002; no projection given

Gratuitous Jeter Bashing: TSN projects him to slip across the board to .299/.366/.413. In the 12-member TSN Mock Draft, Jeter was chosen in the 6th round, #63 overall, and was the 7th shortstop chosen. Pffft.