Had your fill of all those millennium lists? Wearied by all the "Best of Century" rankings? Tired of rehashing the past? Then join us as we leap forward 100 years to provide the birds-eye low-down on baseball's next century ...

2000: After trading for Pedro Martinez in spring training, the Yankees continue their domination by winning their third consecutive World Series, beating Atlanta in just three games.

2001: Desperate to keep the game's most popular player happy and looking for another quick revenue source, major league owners grant an expansion franchise to Ken Griffey Jr.'s gated community in Isleworth, Fla. In order to help cover the $1 billion expansion fee, the new franchise sells its name to corporate sponsors, thereby adding "Nike and Disney Present: Isleworth 4COM" as the American League's 15th team.

2003: The Nike, American Express and Disney Present: Isleworth 4COM club opens its new home field, "Sprint PCS Park@Nasdaq Yards," baseball's first all-luxury suite stadium. The sellout crowd of 8,250 responds to the home team's exciting opening day victory (an extra-inning 23-19 pitcher's duel) by briefly placing their brokers on hold to ask corporate vice-presidents whether the game has started.

2005: After owners refuse to increase the major league minimum salary to $1.5 million (plus stock options), the players strike during the final week of spring training. The strike wipes out the entire season, the World Series, the winter meetings and the next three seasons as well before the owners finally agree to a $2.8 million minimum.

In later years, this becomes known as "The Short Strike."

2010: The Orioles threaten to move from Baltimore unless the city builds them a state-of-the-art domed, multi-sport stadium with artificial turf to replace antiquated Camden Yards.

2014: A quarter century after his lifetime ban for betting on baseball, the big day finally arives for Pete Rose -- he autographs a fan's baseball without charging any money.

2021: In an attempt to speed up the seven-hour, 47-minute average game time, baseball's rules committee votes to eliminate the fourth, fifth and seventh innings.

	Matt McGwire belts 126 home runs in 2024 to shatter the single-season record.

2022: Ken Griffey Jr.'s sons, Ken III, Ken IV and Ken V play in baseball's first all-Griffey outfield for Disney, Intel, AT&T and Hostess Present: Microsoft's Isleworth Baseball Team. Their proud 52-year-old papa, however, steals the show as the team's designated walker.

2026: The corporation formerly known as the Boston Red Sox wins its first World Series since 1918, boosting previously sinking ratings for the autumn classic on ESPN23.

2035: The new generation of players is "loud, obnoxious, concerned only with money and doesn't show fans proper respect," according to a Sports Illustrated interview with former Atlanta pitcher and current New York City mayor John Rocker.

2039: In an attempt to recapture the simpler, less commercial times of the past, "Seattle, a wholly owned subsidiary of Microsoft," announces it will wear a different uniform every inning instead of after every out.

2048: With global warming still on the rise, the last teams leave Florida and Arizona to move their spring training sites to Minnesota.

2051: The Montreal Expos, baseball's last team without corporate sponsorship, finally end their long-standing payroll problems with an unfavorable exchange rate when U.S. President DiCaprio annexes Canada and adds it to the United States of Microsoft.

2066: In a Turn-Back-the-Clock promotion, a time machine literally turns back the clock to a Yankees-Tigers game in 1934. Fans are confused by the use of bats, balls and gloves.

2081: After 11 seasons, spacefielder Willie Henderson's 2,588-game playing streak ends shy of Cal Ripken Jr.'s record when the traveling secretary accidentally teleports him to Saturn.

2099: The Cubs' desperate hopes for reaching the World Series for the first time in 155 years end when the club again fails to get an at-large birth into major league baseball's 256-team postseason tournament.

The Yankees win January Madness again by sweeping Atlanta.

Jim Caple's Off Base column appears each Wednesday.