Oscar Predictions: Best Lead Actor

It's time again for the Oscars. It's been a long as Awards season as always. Guilds, Globes, BAFTAs, and critics have all made their picks  and I'm here to figure out what it all means. Yes, it's time for my multi-part Oscar predictions.
I'm going to go through each category, tell you who has been nominated and won for what, give a context for what that means, and order the nominees from most to least likely to win on Oscar night. That doesn't mean I'll be right, but it does mean I'll be informed. Wish me luck.


Previously:
Best Documentary, Animate, and Live-Action Short
Best Documentary Feature
Best Foreign Film
Best Animated Feature
Best Visual Effects
Best Sound Editing and Sound Mixing
Best Production Design
Best Original Score and Original Song
Best Makeup and Hairstyling
Best Costume Design
Best Cinematography
Best Film Editing
Best Adapted Screenplay and Original Screenplay
Best Supporting Actress
Best Supporting Actor
Best Lead Actress

Glossary:
BAFTA Awards - British Academy of Film and Television Arts Awards
Golden Globe Award - Presented by the Hollywood Foreign Press Association
SAG Award - Screen Actors Guild Award

Finally, an acting award that shakes things up a bit. You know the drill by now. There's three awards I'm tracking for this. The Golden Globes have awarded 10 of the last 11 Oscar Winners. The SAG award has 10 in a row predicting the Oscar. A BAFTA helps, but they miss it a lot. Matthew McConaughey wasn't even nominated last year for a BAFTA.

Eddie Redmayne (The Theory of Everything) 
BAFTA - Lead Actor - Winner
SAG - Lead Actor - Winner
Golden Globe - Lead Actor - Winner
Time to throw a wrench in things. In the last 20 years, an actor has swept the BAFTAs, SAGs, and Globes nine times. Eight of those times, that actor left with the Oscar. That one other time would be 2001 when Denzel Washington won the Oscar for Training Day after Russel Crowe took every meaningful precursor home for A Beautiful Mind. That was a strange year though. Washington was only arguably the lead of his movie. Crowe had just won the year before. Training Day was ignored by the BAFTAs and generally isn't the kind of movie that wins Oscars anyway. None of the candidates this year are as weirdly off-brand as that. History is on Redmayne's side.

Michael Keaton (Birdman)
BAFTA - Lead Actor - Nominee
SAG - Lead Actor - Nominee
Golden Globe - Lead Actor - Winner
He does have that Golden Globe victory and it wasn't that long ago that it looked like someone would have to take this award from Keaton's cold, dead hands. Perhaps the momentum swings back to him?

Bradley Cooper (American Sniper)
Sniper joined the race a little too late to get a ton of awards love before the Oscars and Oscar voters love them some Clint Eastwood. With a batch of actors this strong, it's hard to see someone breaking through this late.

Benedict Cumberbatch (The Imitation Game)
BAFTA - Lead Actor - Nominee
SAG - Lead Actor - Nominee
Golden Globe - Lead Actor - Nominee
There's a lot of people who seem to think The Imitation Game is a stealth threat for the Oscars. I'm not sure if I believe it, but Cumberbatch could definitely benefit if that's true. He's been in the thick of this Oscar season.

Steve Carell (Foxcatcher)BAFTA - Supporting Actor - Nominee
SAG - Lead Actor - Nominee
Golden Globe - Lead Actor - Nominee
I can't be the only one seeing through the fact that this is more of a Supporting role. Oh wait, the BAFTAs agree, and he didn't win that either.