My goal for the week was to hammer out a large preview for the upcoming baseball season since it's coming up in about a week and a half and I only have about a week left of freedom. I started this project yesterday and will tackle a division a day, with Saturday hopefully seeing an early playoff prediction.
I decided I will go in an alternating fashion between leagues, so tonight's entry is on the NL East.
This division is very similar to its AL counterpart, except it's not quite as top-heavy. There are still 3 or 4 teams that you would consider at worst, good teams or teams on the way up, but I don't think the ceilings are quite as high for all of these squads.
I hate the Marlins (still haven't forgiven them for 2003) but they made the right moves for this season. You figure Hanley Ramirez will hit better than .243 this year, and the middle of their lineup will get opportunities to knock in runs with Jose Reyes leading off. They also upgraded the rotation behind Josh Johnson. Even at his age, Mark Buehrle will eat up innings, and maybe the Miami temperatures will be hotter than Carlos Zambrano's temper this season in a new city. I dislike Ozzie Guillen since he doesn't know when to shut his mouth, but he knows how to get guys to play decent baseball.
I think the biggest problem for these guys will be the injury bug. When healthy (as we assume they'll be by the halfway point at the latest), they are one of the best teams in baseball. Even without Roy Oswalt, this rotation is still a scary one with the Three Aces of Doc Halladay, Cliff Lee and Cole Hamels, plus excellent guys in Vance Worley and Joe Blanton. They will suffer offensively for the first couple months without Utley and Howard though, and I think that will hurt them early on. This is not to say they can't make a late run and win the division, but I think those early injuries will put them in a hole in April and May.
Atlanta should be an interesting team to watch this season following their September collapse dwarfed by Boston's. They really didn't make any changes to the roster other than rookie shortstop Tyler Pastornicky, but having a full season with Michael Bourn at the top of the order, plus figuring Dan Uggla can't possibly hit only .233 again should get the Braves a decent year, but not quite to the level of Philly or Miami. I like this starting rotation more so than the next team on the list, especially when you consider 4 of their starters are no older than 26. This year won't be the year the Braves return to the top of the division, but those days are coming again soon.
This is another up-and-coming team that I'm not sure I trust yet. They will score runs, especially with Ryan Zimmerman anchoring a tough group of power hitters, and their pitching is also on the way up. I'll be interested to see what Stephen Strasburg can do coming back for a full year after surgery, and he's only a small part of an improved rotation that will do some damage. It's not unreasonable to expect a winning season for the Nats, but division contention is still a little ways off.
It's almost crazy to see how far the Mets have fallen in such a short time. In 2006 they won the division and looked poised to be the team to beat for the next few years. Instead, they fell apart at the end of 2007 and haven't been the same since. There are too many question marks with injuries to guys like Santana (who it's been sad to see fall since he left the Twin Cities) and David Wright. I talked to my friend Jared from WONC today, and he told me he sees the Mets as the worst team in baseball this year. Might happen, depending on what goes on in the Windy City this year (we'll get to them later this week).
That does it for the East Coast. Tomorrow will see a look at the smallest division in baseball, but one of the tougher ones in the AL West.
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