No matter what happens in the Super Bowl tonight, no matter how many more snowstorms barrel through our region and no matter how Season 3 of “House of Cards” holds up, there is something warming about knowing that Red Sox pitchers and catchers report to Fort Myers for spring training less than two weeks from now and actual games are only two months away.

What should make that certainty sound even sweeter to Red Sox fans is knowing that according to the experts who spend all winter applying esoteric algorithms and hard-nosed analysis to mounds of data, transactions and trends is that the forecast for the Red Sox is decidedly positive.

Maybe fans who are getting used to the worst-to-first-to-worst whiplash the Red Sox have gone through since 2012 were expecting this. But when the outlook for the Red Sox is bright — not “best team ever” blindingly bright, just bright — it can help lighten the burden of a New England winter.

Just look at the bullish outlook of Baseball Prospectus, a pioneer in forecasting player and team performances.

In their projected final standings for 2015, the Red Sox will be in the playoffs by virtue of a first-place tie with the Rays in the AL East. Each team is forecast to have a 86-76 record, which trails only the 90-win Angels and 87-win Mariners in the American League. What impressed Baseball Prospectus was the Red Sox’ beefed-up offense. The club is projected to score 802 runs, tops in baseball by a considerable margin. The next closest run producer is the Blue Jays at 768 runs, with only three other teams tabbed to score more than 700 runs in the AL, and just three in the National League (Dodgers, Cardinals and Rockies).

One note of caution: Baseball Prospectus is not impressed with the Red Sox’ run-prevention crew (pitching and defense). They are projected to allow 748 runs, four fewer than the Blue Jays, and a lot less than the 808 runs the Twins are projected to allow but still, that’s the third-most foreseen in the major leagues.

ESPN’s Dan Szymborski’s ZiPS projections on FanGraphs.com depict a team that may not overwhelm any observer with superstars, particularly on the pitching side of the roster, but is nonetheless impressive with how many good players are on the roster.

“What stands out the most for me on the Red Sox is that while they don’t have any real star pitchers or anyone who can replace (Jon) Lester, they have impressive depth there,” Szymborski wrote in an e-mail. “Lots of options.”

New starters Rick Porcello and Wade Miley project to have the highest WAR (a handy all-in-one reference statistic) in the rotation at 3.5 and 3.1 respectively, with Clay Buchholz a distant third at 2.0.

On the positional player front, David Ortiz (29 home runs and 88 RBI) looks as if he will have another Big Papi-type season at the age of 39. Newcomers Pablo Sandoval and Hanley Ramirez, the two biggest additions to the locked and loaded offense, are projected to have solid offensive seasons: Sandoval with 19 home runs and 83 RBI; Ramirez with 16 homers and 70 RBI.

Second baseman Dustin Pedroia stands atop the club’s WAR list at 3.8 (Pedroia’s defense is factored into the figure) but not far behind is outfielder Mookie Betts at 3.1 WAR. The ZiPS line for Betts’ season is eye-opening: a team-high 88 runs, 36 doubles and 30 stolen bases, with a solid .266 batting average, .336 on-base percentage and .408 slugging percentage.

Perhaps most exciting about the outlook on the 22-year-old Betts is what ZiPS calls “first comparisons.”

The “first comparison” for Betts is none other than Andrew McCutchen, the MVP outfielder for the Pittsburgh Pirates.

McCutchen is a five-tool superstar who has won one MVP award and finished third twice in the last three years.

“The comps themselves are backwards looking,” said Szymborski. “McCutchen at similar ages was the best comp for Betts’s play during his age 20 and 21 seasons, not necessarily the best comp for what his 2015 line will look like. I just let those lines speak for themselves.”

Sports Illustrated gave the Red Sox an “A-minus” for its offseason makeover. The venerable publication considers the ground-ball focused pitching staff “a good gamble” considering how good the team’s infield defense is.

Overall, SI wrote that the team’s “plans are well-laid. The Red Sox were aggressive in addressing their needs, landed two of the top free-agent hitters on the market and, when stymied in their efforts to reunite with Lester, quickly enacted a well-thought-out Plan B for the rotation that substituted strategy for star power.

“Having gone worst-to-first-to-worst over the last three years, the Red Sox appear poised for another radical change in fortunes. They’re not an obvious pick to win their division in the coming year, but that outcome would be far less surprising than another last-place finish given the work they’ve done this offseason.”

Manfred’s stance shifts

No sooner did new commissioner Rob Manfred begin his job last week than he created some minor turbulence with a comment about being open to the idea of eliminating defensive shifts. He backtracked after getting some pushback on how that exactly would be implemented, but his overall premise of banning shifts in order to inject more offense into the game was the larger issue.

Never mind that some don’t mind less offense. But shifts aren’t necessarily the leading cause of that drop.

No doubt defensive shifts have become almost standard practice, as teams deploy lopsided defensive formations to capitalize on hitters’ tendencies and inhibit offense. A study by Baseball Info Solutions showed that only 2,357 defensive shifts were used in 2011. Last year, the number jumped to 13,296. BIS, however, calculated that shifts could be blamed for roughly only 5 percent of the drop in offense. What’s causing the rest? Mainly, it’s a rapid rise in strikeouts, which is attributed in large part to better and harder-throwing pitchers, especially relievers.

That leads to the portion of Manfred’s wish list which he will hopefully gain traction on: pace of game.

Two slightly less radical ideas that have come up in the last week have to do with the use of bullpens. This is a logical place to begin, considering few baseball games ever drag in the first half. It’s the seemingly endless calls to the bullpen when eyelids droop, minds numb and TVs are clicked off. One idea would have every relief pitcher have to face at least two, if not three, batters. That would be bad news for left-handed relief specialists but so be it. The other option is to put a cap on the number of pitchers that can be used in a game, with, say, four being the maximum in a nine-inning game.

The relievers’ fraternity will likely scoff at any changes in their job descriptions, but it looks as if the last half of the ballgame is the place to start looking to lop off precious minutes.