The 2011 season begins for the Dodgers on March 31st at home in a game against the defending champions the San Francisco Giants. The starters for the game have already been announced. The Giants will start their long haired hippy, Tim Lincecum - while the Dodgers will counter with their clean cut and wholesome ace Clayton Kershaw, in what will be a classic matchup of Evil vs Good. I have gone ahead and simulated this game, making a guess at the starting lineups 100K times. Below are the lineups used and the results.
| Player | Pos | | Player | Pos |
| Giants | | | Dodgers | |
| Andres Torres | CF | | Rafael Furcal | SS |
| Freddy Sanchez | 2B | | Andre Ethier | RF |
| Aubrey Huff | 1B | | Matt Kemp | CF |
| Buster Posey | C | | James Loney | 1B |
| Pat Burrell | LF | | Juan Uribe | 2B |
| Miguel Tejada | SS | | Jay Gibbons | LF |
| Cody Ross | RF | | Casey Blake | 3B |
| Pablo Sandoval | 3B | | Rod Barajas | C |
| Tim Lincecum | SP | | Clayton Kershaw | SP |
... And now the results
| Away | Home | | | Favorite | Win Prob | Over/Under |
| SF | LAN | Tim Lincecum | Clayton Kershaw | LAN | 53.972 | 5.81217 |
So we see that the Dodgers will likely be a slight favorite to win on opening day, but a win probability of just under 54% is pretty much a toss up game.
Here is the hitters boxscore
| Name | AB | Hits | H1 | H2 | H3 | HR | RBI | BB | SO | wOBA | BABIP |
| Andres Torres | 4.27 | 1.006 | 0.576 | 0.317 | 0.025 | 0.088 | 0.282 | 0.337 | 1.287 | 0.296 | 0.317 |
| Freddy Sanchez | 4.218 | 1.16 | 0.772 | 0.309 | 0.01 | 0.069 | 0.301 | 0.281 | 1.002 | 0.318 | 0.347 |
| Aubrey Huff | 4.065 | 1.028 | 0.696 | 0.2 | 0.012 | 0.12 | 0.377 | 0.378 | 0.957 | 0.315 | 0.304 |
| Buster Posey | 4.054 | 0.997 | 0.694 | 0.236 | 0.004 | 0.063 | 0.344 | 0.304 | 1.043 | 0.29 | 0.317 |
| Pat Burrell | 3.824 | 0.881 | 0.525 | 0.226 | 0.002 | 0.128 | 0.427 | 0.433 | 1.29 | 0.309 | 0.313 |
| Miguel Tejada | 3.941 | 1.025 | 0.713 | 0.241 | 0.006 | 0.066 | 0.348 | 0.197 | 0.705 | 0.295 | 0.303 |
| Cody Ross | 3.738 | 0.862 | 0.557 | 0.206 | 0.005 | 0.095 | 0.346 | 0.288 | 1.165 | 0.287 | 0.31 |
| Pablo Sandoval | 3.467 | 0.718 | 0.465 | 0.18 | 0.006 | 0.067 | 0.289 | 0.422 | 1.375 | 0.279 | 0.321 |
| Tim Lincecum | 3.657 | 0.335 | 0.265 | 0.059 | 0.001 | 0.009 | 0.1 | 0.147 | 2.201 | 0.115 | 0.225 |
| | | | | | | | | | | | |
| Rafael Furcal | 4.043 | 1.025 | 0.652 | 0.264 | 0.037 | 0.072 | 0.24 | 0.347 | 0.867 | 0.31 | 0.307 |
| Andre Ethier | 3.87 | 0.971 | 0.568 | 0.249 | 0.011 | 0.144 | 0.376 | 0.448 | 1.021 | 0.333 | 0.306 |
| Matt Kemp | 3.95 | 0.947 | 0.605 | 0.202 | 0.03 | 0.11 | 0.37 | 0.272 | 1.205 | 0.297 | 0.318 |
| James Loney | 3.784 | 0.969 | 0.6 | 0.27 | 0.015 | 0.083 | 0.381 | 0.395 | 0.78 | 0.322 | 0.303 |
| Juan Uribe | 3.771 | 0.892 | 0.544 | 0.212 | 0.019 | 0.117 | 0.421 | 0.249 | 0.862 | 0.296 | 0.278 |
| Jay Gibbons | 3.578 | 0.816 | 0.473 | 0.2 | 0.007 | 0.137 | 0.4 | 0.363 | 0.838 | 0.308 | 0.261 |
| Casey Blake | 3.508 | 0.808 | 0.504 | 0.206 | 0.009 | 0.089 | 0.325 | 0.257 | 1.031 | 0.287 | 0.301 |
| Rod Barajas | 3.419 | 0.745 | 0.478 | 0.176 | 0.005 | 0.086 | 0.307 | 0.224 | 0.811 | 0.271 | 0.261 |
| Clayton Kershaw | 3.424 | 0.346 | 0.279 | 0.055 | 0.002 | 0.01 | 0.091 | 0.125 | 1.857 | 0.122 | 0.216 |
Pitchers Boxscore
| Name | IP | SO | BB | Hits | HR | PC | FIP |
| Tim Lincecum | 6.488 | 7.057 | 1.889 | 5.41 | 0.621 | 100.544 | 3.143 |
| Brian Wilson | 0.474 | 0.582 | 0.124 | 0.338 | 0.029 | 7.2 | 2.319 |
| Sergio Romo | 0.439 | 0.485 | 0.101 | 0.359 | 0.041 | 6.651 | 2.891 |
| Ramon Ramirez | 0.625 | 0.452 | 0.212 | 0.609 | 0.066 | 9.751 | 4.147 |
| Santiago Casilla | 0.288 | 0.264 | 0.116 | 0.243 | 0.023 | 4.557 | 3.606 |
| Chris Ray | 0.38 | 0.276 | 0.159 | 0.376 | 0.047 | 6.104 | 4.59 |
| Guillermo Mota | 0.185 | 0.144 | 0.071 | 0.175 | 0.019 | 2.928 | 4.167 |
| Denny Bautista | 0.013 | 0.013 | 0.007 | 0.01 | 0.002 | 0.208 | 4.38 |
| | | | | | | | |
| Clayton Kershaw | 6.524 | 7.602 | 1.939 | 5.644 | 0.469 | 102.81 | 2.696 |
| Johnathan Broxton | 0.482 | 0.72 | 0.155 | 0.318 | 0.031 | 7.593 | 2.021 |
| HongZhi Kuo | 0.508 | 0.687 | 0.132 | 0.375 | 0.023 | 7.85 | 1.854 |
| Kenley Jansen | 0.732 | 0.959 | 0.245 | 0.555 | 0.042 | 11.602 | 2.339 |
| Matt Guerrier | 0.345 | 0.279 | 0.098 | 0.348 | 0.038 | 5.375 | 3.875 |
| Vicente Padilla | 0.621 | 0.622 | 0.159 | 0.602 | 0.077 | 9.695 | 3.567 |
| Ron Mahay | 0.161 | 0.15 | 0.054 | 0.162 | 0.022 | 2.587 | 4.131 |
| Blake Hawksworth | 0.007 | 0.007 | 0.002 | 0.007 | 0.001 | 0.118 | 3.974 |