With the 2010 NCAA basketball tournament being whittled down to the Final Four, Tiger Woods returning to professional golf and the NBA regular season coming to a close, there is a lot going on in the sports world. 

Lost behind all of these stories is the start of Major League Baseball’s spring training. Spring training has been fascinating enough to fill as many story lines as an MLB regular season.

America’s pastime has had to overcome the stains of the steroid era and has had a hard time doing it.

Each year the sport has been dealt tough blows as some of its greatest players admit to using performance-enhancing drugs.

The young talent poised to improve so many major league teams this season has renewed the interests of many fans.

The highly touted number-one pick in the 2009 draft, Stephen Strasburg, started the spring season with promise, only to be sent to the minor leagues. Strasburg was the Washington Nationals’ best pitcher in spring training, but manager Mike Rizzo sent the pitcher to their double-A affiliate anyway.

Strasburg is the future of the lowly Nationals. The manager and the front office don’t want to risk injuring him from improper mechanics or overworking him by playing him too soon.

Also in the American League, the Minnesota Twins signed hometown-hero Joe Mauer to a long-term deal.

Mauer, the American League’s Most Valuable Player of 2009, was signed to a seven-year, $184 million dollar extension, signing him with the team through the 2018 season.

This is the first time the stingy Twins have spent big money to keep a talented player on their roster. With the opening of their brand new, publicly funded stadium, the team had to keep Mauer.

The Seattle Mariners have spent the off-season accumulating both young and veteran talent, signing a variety of young players to major and minor league contracts. They also signed veteran infielder Chone Figgins. These signings have skyrocketed expectations for the Mariners in the AL West, and many writers have put them at the top of the list of teams to look out for in October.

The MLB season seems to be more wide open than in years past. Some of the same teams will remain at the top, but look for new contenders to make deep playoff runs.

MY PREDICTIONS AL West Seattle Mariners AL Central Minnesota Twins AL East New York Yankees AL Wildcard Chicago White Sox     NL West Los Angeles Dodgers NL Central St. Louis Cardinals NL East Philidelphia Phillies NL Wildcard San Francisco Giants     World Champion St. Louis Cardinals