<<Fled, is this based on sound meterological reasoning or just a gut feel...either way it's OK, was just wondering on what you are basing that statement.>>

I won't lie, it's based on a gut feeling according to the way the few storms we've already had have acted. Of course, as another poster has mentioned, there is a constant oscillation between high and low amplitude pattern.

However, even for the past several seasons, the general pattern has been for trofs off the East Coast to steer storms out to sea, a factor which Gray himself has mentioned in his reports as being the reason far fewer major hurricanes have hit the U.S. coast--in particular, the East Coast--since 1995 than would be dictated by the long-term averages.