The voice of the turtle is heard in our land

For, lo, the winter is past,
The rain is over and gone;
The flowers appear on the earth;
The time of the singing of birds is come,
And the voice of the turtle is heard in our land

Ernie Harwell's great tradition of starting the first broadcast of the new year with this excerpt from the bible (Song of Solomon 2:11-12) says spring like nothing else for many Detroit Tigers baseball fans. And although spring training is only a few days old, the excitement of the upcoming season is unlike anything I can remember. Not even during the middle 1980's was there this much excitement leading into camp. While there was plenty of optimism last year after the World Series appearance in 2006, there were still a number of people that didn't really expect a repeat performance last year and weren't really surprised when they missed the playoffs.

Expectations are almost universally sky-high now and 2008 sure looks like it might be different, especially on offense. The addition of Edgar Renteria and Miguel Cabrera to a lineup that already featured Magglio Ordonez, Gary Sheffield, Placido Polanco, Curtis Granderson, Carlos Guillen and Pudge Rodriguez certainly should result in the Tigs being able to score a bunch of runs this year. There will probably be no shortage of games that last about four hours with numerous pitching changes and scores of 8-5.

As with every team, the big questions for '08 with the Tigers will come down to if they can pitch or not -- or maybe will the hitting overcome the certain bumps in the road from the pitching. Justin Verlander will be looked at to be the 'A' guy, but almost of equal importance will be how Jeremy Bonderman does, especially in the first inning of his games. Nate Robertson, Kenny Rogers, and Dontrelle Willis will all have to be solid and if one of them can break out and win about 16 games, that part of the game should be fine.

Relief pitching is still going to be an adventure. Can Todd Jones still do it consistently? Will Joel Zumaya come back healthy enough to have an impact-- and more importantly will he be the same pitcher or have to learn how to pitch in spots instead of with power? I'm still not a huge fan of Jason Grilli's pitching, and Fernando Rodney can either be scary good or very bad. Hopefully the Bobby Seays, Tim Byrdaks, Zach Miners et al can just do enough. They don't need to be All-Stars, but being solid sure would be a big help.

One of the more interesting things to watch this spring will be how the bench players are picked. Backup catcher is still up in the air with Vance Wilson being less than a certainty and Brandon Inge wanting to play every day.

All in all though, the season will probably come down to how well the Tigers play against Cleveland who they will be fighting with for the Central Division. Although it's way too early, I'm going to mark down 101 wins this year for the Tigers, just two more than the Indians will end up with.

The road back to the World Series will probably be through Boston, a tall order for anyone.

I'm looking forward to catching a lot of baseball this summer, either on TV (all but one game is scheduled for TV) or the radio. As for getting tickets though.... that will be a difficult it seems with the prediction that most of the games this year will be sold out. While it'll be a lot of fun to be a Tiger and Tigers fan this year, there will also be a lot more pressure to win than ever before. This is going to be either the toughest or easiest season Jim Leyland will ever have. Hope for a fast start, Jim.