1/26th Of The Season Report Card

By Rich Funk

As anyone that follows baseball knows, the first week means everything. The way teams perform in the first week of the season is absolutely 100% how you can expect them to perform the rest of the way. With that said, here's the 1/26th of the season SFWH awards. We call them the Finleys.

Best Batting Average: Howie Kendrick, Angels- Look out Ted Williams. Howie is going to blow by Mr. Popcicle and post the highest batting average of the modern era with a cool .444 average for the year. But don't let Mr. Williams off that easily. Teammate Chone Figgins (.407) and the Dodgers' Rafael Furcal (.435) will also be joining Howie in the .400 club. So Ted Williams is only known for 2 things: hitting .400 and being frozen. After this year, he won't be the only modern member of the .400 club and Walt Disney did the whole 'frozen' thing a lot better, so all Ted will be known for now is one of his lesser-known talents: merkin model.

Move Over, Maris: Mike Napoli, Angels - Mike Napoli will be your Home Run King in 2008. He's currently on pace to hit 64 home runs on the season. Teammate Torii Hunter is right behind him on pace for a 46 homer campaign. Napoli and Hunter are a catcher and outfielder, respectively. These positions are known to have some power. But what does it say when second baseman Mark Ellis, Jose Lopez and Jose Vidro are all on pace for 54 home runs each? Might they be dipping into the Brady Anderson Kool-Aid? I thought baseball was clean! That's what Mr. Selig told me! Loud noises!

Mr. Babyback Ribbies: Jose Lopez, Mariners - We may be looking at a season for the ages from Mr. Lopez in 2008. Jose is on pace for 189 RBI's on the season and there's no reason at all to believe he won't keep up the pace he's set in the last 7 days. Going along with a .318 batting average, 54 home runs and 27 steals, we can pretty much name Jose Lopez the MVP of the 2008 season and possibly the greatest player of all time.

Other Projections You Can Set In Stone:

• Jake Peavy is on pace to win 23 games...against the Dodgers. The other 23 wins will come against the Astros, giving Peavy an incredible record of 46-0 with an ERA of 0.56 and 278 strikeouts in 370 innings pitched.
• Francisco Rodriguez will nail down 69 saves this year without giving up a single run.
• Despite having a .176 batting average, Jeff Kent will still hit 27 home runs.
• The batting averages of Oakland's Jeff Fiorentino (1.000) and Ryan Sweeney (.455) will not factor into the batting title race, as neither of them will get enough at-bats to qualify.