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There might not be a better time for high school sports than the spring. Really, it's a thing of beauty. On Saturday I covered girls lacrosse in 60 degree, cloudless weather. The spring also brings my favorite sport: baseball.

Speaking of baseball, we're less than two weeks away from Major League teams opening up play. Of course, the Red Sox and Yankees will be the favorites to win the World Series, but don't count out the Cleveland Indians. They have good pitching, a young and talented roster and the best player you probably haven't heard of in Grady Sizemore. They're my sleeper pick. In the end though, Yankees over the Phillies in six games.

My favorite team, the Colorado Rockies, will win 74 games, tease me until June with thoughts of the playoffs and then put me through three more months of general manager Dan O'Dowd reiterating that the Rockies are rebuilding. Unfortunately his five year plan to rebuild the Rockies is currently in year seven.

In case you missed it, Saturday night, the Nuggets beat the Suns, 131-107. Just when I start giving up on the Nuggets, they make an effort and pull me back in. Currently, they're the sixth seed in the West. Iverson and Anthony look like they're starting to get it and George Karl's starting to get the team to put a little effort forward on the defensive end. Still you can chalk up a Nuggets loss in the first round of the playoffs. I think.

Onto the biggest and best sporting event - March Madness. Some of my favorite things from the first two rounds.

Duke getting beat by VCU and Eric Maynor. Maynor gets the early award for the coolest cat in the tournament. With the game tied and 10 seconds left in the game, Maynor got the ball waved everybody off, slowly walked the ball up - leading to me screaming at the television to hurry the ball up - then silenced me and every Duke fan with a 15-footer in Greg Paulus' grill.

Currently, I'm on my way to winning every pool I entered. I have 11 of the Sweet 16 teams and all of my Final Four picks are still alive. Of course, the tournament is a marathon and not a sprint.

This time next week, I could easily have no Final Four teams left and a big dent in my ego.

- To reach Luke Graham, call 871-4229 or

e-mail lgraham@steamboatpilot.com