I admit, some of these picks are a little chalk. But come on, whose aren't these days?

AL MVP:

Adrian Gonzalez, Boston Red Sox

Gonzalez is of course the new acquisition of the Red Sox, the team favored by everyone and their mothers to win the AL East. Although the Padres were certainly competitive last year, and came very close to a playoff spot, they still got a fraction of the media coverage the Red Sox will receive. Gonzalez is in the prime of his career and has had back to back outstanding years, finishing fourth and second in the NL in 2009 and 2010 respectively in baseball reference WAR, and his counting statistics should improve dramatically with a much more offensively potent lineup and a much more offensively potent ballpark. I would place Adrian Gonzalez as the co-favorite in the MVP race along with Miguel Cabrera, with Robinson Cano, Evan Longoria and other new Red Sox acquistion Carl Crawford not that far behind.

AL Cy Young:

Felix Hernandez, Seattle Mariners

Yes, this is the first of two back-to-back Cy Young award winners I'll be predicting this year, though I think the AL pick is going out far more on a limb than the NL pick. The one aspect of this pick I do like a lot is that by giving Felix the Cy last year with so few wins, if he wins just one or two more and otherwise puts up similar statistics, it would be hard not to award it to him again. He has more or less gotten better year-to-year each of the past five years (Fangraphs' WAR has him better in '09 than '10, but he had a better FIP, xFIP, and tERA last year and pitched more innings, so I'm not exactly sure why), and he's shown no injury history up to now, at least. No reason not to expect a near duplicate of last season. The other key contenders here I would have to think would be Justin Verlander, CC Sabathia and Jon Lester, with me nearly arbitrarily putting them in reverse order or likelihood of victory.

AL Rookie of the Year

Jeremy Hellickson, Tampa Bay Rays

He's a top three prospect in the majors according to just about everyone (and top prospect to be in the majors to begin the season and not on the DL). Hellickson will get a chance to get lots of innings and lots of wins. As I talk about in the NL ROY section, it's all about playing time. Hellickson, though not supposed to be an eventual ace, is mature and has very good stuff, or so I read. Other horses in the race would be Mariners starter Michael Pineda and Toronto Blue Jays starter Kyle Drabek.

NL MVP:

Albert Pujols, St. Louis Cardinals

The #1 overall seed of award picks, I kind of hate myself for picking Pujols (though of course, based on this year's NCAA Tourney, a #1 overall pick wouldn't be such a great bet). Here's the problem. We know as much as we can possibly know about anyone that Pujols is going to be fantastic. He's getting older, but he's still more or less in his prime years, albeit towards the end of those for a normal player, and the man has led the NL in baseball reference WAR for the past six years. I'd love to take a chance, I really would, but the other players I want to pick are super dark horses, and I just don't have the balls to actually pick them, but rather to mention them one sentence from now and give myself credit in case they crazily go on and win it even though I didn't pick them. After Pujols, the most likely I think are Joey Votto, Ryan Braun, Troy Tulowitzki and maybe Prince Fielder (at this point there are about eight names that I think have about even chance - including Hanley Ramirez and even Jason Heyward and Buster Posey - why not?). My super aforementioned dark horses, for the record I'll refer back to if they come out of nowhere, are Rickie Weeks and Matt Kemp.

NL Cy Young:

Roy Halladay, Philadelphia Phillies

Easiest pick I made all day - more than Pujols even, I think, even though there are a score of great pitchers in the NL. Roy Halladay is basically the best pitcher on planet Earth right now, and even though he's older, he has been extremely durable, is on a contending team and has both the old-school finishing games mentality gut-voters love, and the wonderful strikeout to walk ratios that stats-voters love. Maybe his biggest obstacle (besides every pitcher's number one obstacle - getting hurt) is Cliff Lee or Cole Hamels also having an amazing year, and somehow splitting the vote. Amongst the other outstanding NL pitchers I'd pick in order of likelihood to win would be Chris Carpenter, Cliff Lee, Tim Lincecum, Ubaldo Jimenez and Clayton Kershaw as my up and comer.

NL Rookie of the Year:

Freddie Freeman, Atlanta Braves

Rookie of the Year is first and foremost about opportunity (well, that at playing at least okay with that opportunity). Rookie of the Year, from year to year, is like the Tony awards - some years have extraordinary talent, like last year with Jason Heyward and Buster Posey, but other years have Bob Hamelin (or the musical Titanic) and just about anyone can sneak in there. When predicting it's always a smart bet to guess someone you know will get at bats, and the two best bets in that regard would be Freeman and Giants first baseman Brandon Belt.