Just look at these teams (also, game times released)

Over the next couple of days, you’re going to see a lot of discussion over which teams should’ve gotten into the tournament and which shouldn’t have.

But all of the teams that truly have a shot at the national championship are in the field. None of these teams being talked about as snubs — Arizona State, Virginia Tech, Mississippi etc., would have had a realistic shot of going all the way. You can’t say the same thing about the NCAA’s other big sport, college football. And all of these bubble teams had major flaws (losing 10+ games during the season) — had they lost fewer games, they would’ve been in. It’s that simple.

The game times have been released for Thursday and Friday. I got them from CBS Sports and figured I’d group them for easier reading: (all times PT)

Lackey out until May

John Lackey will miss at least the first six weeks of the season with strained triceps. This comes on top of Kelvim Escobar being out for a month too — meaning the Angels’ top two starters won’t be healthy to start the season.

This is bad news, but not devastating. While I’d prefer Lackey and Escobar be healthy, the Angels do have a lot of pitching depth and still have a decent rotation.

Likely opening day rotation:

1. Jered Weaver
2. Jon Garland
3. Ervin Santana
4. Joe Saunders
5. Dustin Moseley/Nick Adenhart/?

Not great, but not terrible either. As Halos Heaven points out, the bright side to this is we get to see what the other pitchers at the end of the rotation are capable of. Can Ervin finally live up to his billing? Can Saunders repeat the success he had last season? Is Nick Adenhart ready for the majors? (If not, Moseley will be a decent 5th starter like he was when necessary last year.)

That Orlando Cabrera for Jon Garland trade looks even better now. This rotation would be much shakier without him.

As long as Lackey and Escobar aren’t out longer than has been reported, the Angels should be fine. Though it will be weird seeing the Angels throw Jered Weaver as their opening day starter.

14 days ’til Opening Day: Ernie Banks

There are 14 days left until that best day of the year, MLB’s Opening Day.

14 is also the number worn by Ernie Banks, since retired by the Chicago Cubs. Banks was an amazing player and among the game’s all-time greats, hitting 512 career home runs as a shortstop.

He played on the Cubs for his whole career (1953-71) and never got to play in the postseason. 13 of his 19 years as a Cub were spent on teams with losing records, and five of the other six were barely over .500. Typing those last two sentences just made me realize again why it must be painful to be a Cubs fan.

Banks is famous for saying “Let’s play two!”, and I’ll settle for teams playing one a day two weeks from now. Baseball season is almost here.