Predictions? We don't need no stinking ...

I want to pick Danica Patrick today. I do.

Like her I'm a fool for the happily-ever-after, the glass slipper and handsome prince and  Disneyland  ending. And it wouldn't really be all that Disney-ish, when you get down to cases. Her many detractors aside, she's always been good on this biggest day in motorsports. She's run up front more times than she hasn't -- six top tens in seven Indianapolis 500s do not just happen, people -- and after seven years away, she stepped right back into the seat last weekend and was quick again.

Made the Fast Nine on Saturday, she did. Qualified on the inside of Row 3, one spot better than three-time winner Helio Castroneves and two better than 2008 winner Scott Dixon, her rowmates.

That, too, doesn't just happen. So it wouldn't be completely insane, picking her. It wouldn't be like that year I picked Marco Andretti, knowing full well that ... well, that he's an Andretti, and this is the Greatest Spectacle In Jacking Up The Andrettis.

Besides, like Danica, I know a cushy narrative when I see one.

"That would be the perfect way to never come back. Don't you think?" she said earlier this month, daydreaming about a yard of brick, a checkered flag and an ice-cold bottle of milk. "Just mic-drop the thing."

I wish, for her sake and that of all the media grunts begging just once for a storyline that writes itself, that she really can mic-drop the thing. But I've been hanging around Indy in May long enough to know it tends to be hell on wishes.

So, no, I will not pick Danica to win. In fact I'm not going to pick anyone, because for once I have no feel whatsoever for what's going to happen when they come to the green shortly after noon today.

Could this be Castroneves' year to finally win No. 4, after coming so close so many times in the nine years since No. 3?

Maybe.

Could Will Power, who wins everywhere else and who just won the Indy Grand Prix here two weeks ago, finally win the Big One that's so long eluded him?

Could happen.

I could see Josef Newgarden, the charismatic American and reigning IndyCar champ, screaming down through the shadows to the checkers, accompanied by what would surely be an immense waterfall of sound from the requisite Indy Mass O' Humanity. I could see the hometown Butler boy Ed Carpenter, who always goes fast on Pole Day, becoming what would surely be the most popular 500 winner since ... well, maybe since forever.

Simon Pagenaud?

He's dominated here before in spots, so why not?

Dixon? Ryan Hunter-Reay? Super-rookie Robert Wickens? Tony Kanaan? Sebastien Bourdais, who (speaking of cushy narratives) could go from victim to victor after the horrific crash last May that turned his pelvis into a jigsaw puzzle?

Sure. Fine. Whatever.

Now, if you pushed me, I'd tell you it's gonna be Newgarden, for the completely inadequate reason that this seems to be his time. Or I'd tell you it's gonna be Carlos Munoz. He's starting back in Row 7, but he's finished second, fourth, second and 10th in five previous starts, and he always, always seems to find his way to the front when the laps get skinny.

Guy like that, his number's gotta come up sooner or later. Right?

On the other hand ...

On the other hand, maybe I should flip a coin. I'm pretty much at that point right now.

Only, I'm not ready to flip just one.

What the hell. Go ahead and give me 33 of  'em.