Happy MLB Opening Day! Plus, who actually has a shot to win the Masters?

Happy Thursday morning, Opening Day and first day of the Masters, everyone! Wow, we have a lot to get to.

Let’s get right to it.

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Good morning to everyone but especially to…

MLB FANS EVERYWHERE…

The grass is green, the slate is clean and the possibilities are endless. It’s Opening Day!

Our experts have made their picks for every division, as well as their World Series champion. Here are their picks to win it all:

Meanwhile, our MLB expert Dayn Perry has ranked his top 100 players for the 2022 season, and I wholeheartedly agree with his top choice:

• Perry: “As a 19-year-old rookie in 2018, Juan Soto batted .292/.406/.517. In terms of rate-based production, that stands as his worst season to date. Four seasons into his career, Soto is looking like this generation’s answer to Ted Williams.“

Soto is awesome. Unfortunately, his team is not. The Nationals are +15000 to win the World Series at Caesars Sportsbook, the sixth-longest odds of any team. On the other end, the Blue Jays have the second-shortest odds at +900, and they have Perry’s No. 2 player this season:

• Perry: “Last season, Vladimir Guerrero Jr. as a 22-year-old unlocked his power potential in a huge way, and he did so while also displaying an advanced command of the strike zone. A brilliant career lies ahead.“

Also be sure to check out Mike Axisa’s Opening Day pitching matchup rankings and Matt Snyder’s best bets to win all of the big awards.

… AND ALSO A GOOD MORNING TO GOLF FANS EVERYWHERE

And it’s the first day at the Masters, too? Oh boy! I hope you’ll join us at any one of the multiple viewing options throughout the day, because it’s going to be awesome.

All eyes — or at least lots and lots of eyes — will be on Tiger Woods‘ return to competitive golf. He’ll tee off at 10:34 a.m. with Louis Oosthuizen and Joaquin Niemann. The fact that Woods is playing at all after a lengthy recovery following a major car crash in early 2021 is incredible. Whether he truly contends or not won’t change that.

As for who is expected to contend, our golf expert Kyle Porter has narrowed the field down from 91 players total to nine who could slip on the green jacket on Sunday. We revealed Kyle’s pick to win in yesterday’s newsletter, and today we have even more picks, including that of Chip Patterson:

• Patterson: “If he stays true to form, Xander Schauffele will be at a minimum in the mix to win and if you’re consistently putting yourself within a handful of shots of the lead the odds favor the tournament breaking your way eventually. Schauffele’s last two starts at Augusta in April have been T2 and T3, coming up just short of Hideki Matsuyama last year thanks in part to splashing his tee shot on the par-3 16th. He can play this course well and I expect him to do so based on recent form.”

Here’s everything else you need to know about the Masters that we haven’t covered in this newsletter already this week:

And if you happened to miss anything from earlier in the week, you can find all of our golf coverage here.

Honorable mentions

Not so honorable mentions

Who to blame for the Lakers’ debacle? 👀

By now you surely know that the Los Angeles Lakers — a team expected to challenge for an NBA championship — won’t even make the playoffs. They were bad on offense, bad on defense and pretty much just disjointed all season long thanks to injuries, poor fits, bad depth and questionable coaching. If they were any other organization, we would write them off as just a bad team and be done with them.

But the Lakers, of course, are not just any other organization, because they have LeBron James, whose influence on and off the court remains second-to-none and who, for just the second time in the last 17 seasons, won’t exert that influence in the postseason. And it’s James who’s to blame for this season’s failure, writes our NBA columnist Bill Reiter.

• Reiter: “LeBron likes to refer to himself as King James. … It’s time for the NBA’s king to accept that in order to retain his throne he needs someone else to govern his kingdom: A GM — Rob Pelinka, maybe, or someone else — who is fully entrusted with decision-making aimed at giving LeBron James what he needs rather than what he wants. … The Lakers are a mess. But all of it — Westbrook, A.D.’s very-predictable fragility, the lack of depth and defense, the lack of shooting, the entire makeup of the team — was a LeBron James production.”

So, what is it that James and Los Angeles need, you ask? Well, as Reiter lays it out, it’s really two things: shooting and defense. Those are the two things the Lakers got rid of — at James’ suggestion (to put it lightly) — last offseason. In the Westbrook trade alone, Los Angeles lost…

• Kentavious Caldwell-Pope, a strong shooter and dogged perimeter defender, and a huge part of the 2020 championship team
• Kyle Kuzma, a young, versatile talent with a decent 3-point stroke and the ability to both score and defend
• Montrezl Harrell, a high-energy post player who didn’t need the ball much to make a big impact

Then, as Reiter explains, the Lakers opted for Talen Horton-Tucker — a client of Klutch Sports, an agency run by James’ friend Rich Paul — over Alex Caruso, another key part of the title team and one of the game’s premier perimeter defenders. Those moves, all orchestrated by or at least influenced by James, played huge roles in the Lakers’ downfall.

There’s a long list of things to be done this offseason, and who’s truly taking care of that list will go a long way toward determining if this season was an anomaly or a sign of things to come.

Champions League recap: Benzema carries Real Madrid past Chelsea, Villarreal defense shines against Bayern ⚽

Karim Benzema continued his excellent Champions League form with a hat-trick to give Real Madrid a 3-1 first-leg advantage in its quarterfinal draw against defending champions Chelsea. Benzema has stated his case — and it’s a very strong one — that he is the world’s best player, writes soccer reporter James Benge.

• Benge: “What separates the best from the merely great is their ability to repeat their brilliance. No one is as reliably consistent as Benzema on the biggest stage. There are plenty of strong contenders for the individual crowns that will come at the season’s end, but what they have to argue against is remarkable. Two hat tricks on the biggest stage that may have irrevocably turned the ties in Madrid’s favor. First against Paris Saint-Germain, the Harlem Globetrotters of the Champions League, and then the competition’s reigning champions Chelsea. No one is shining brighter amid the galaxy of talent.“

Benzema has now scored in seven straight matches (in all competitions) and has multiple goals in four straight. He’s tied for second in the Champions League with 11 goals, and he leads LaLiga with 24 goals this season. He just doesn’t stop.

Elsewhere, Villarreal took a 1-0 first-leg advantage over Bayern Munich thanks to an early goal from Arnaut Danjuma. The Villarreal defense was a tough nut to crack, and manager Unai Emery deserves high praise, writes our soccer expert Jonathan Johnson.

The Champions League resumes on Tuesday with the second-leg matches of all four quarterfinal ties. Here’s how things stand currently:

• Manchester City 1, Atlético Madrid 0
• Liverpool 3, Benfica 1
• Real Madrid 3, Chelsea 1
• Villarreal 1, Bayern Munich 0

What we’re watching Thursday 📺

⛳ Masters Tournament First Round, starting at 8:30 a.m. on Paramount+, CBSsports.com and more
🏀 Celtics at Bucks, 7:30 p.m. on ESPN
⚾ Reds at Braves, 8 p.m. on ESPN2
🏀 Lakers at Warriors, 10 p.m. on ESPN