What's Good:
A damn good lineup…Soriano, Lee, and Ramirez make this team a formidable offensive threat…Ya gotta love Big Z. I’m still pissed that he didn’t allow the Yanks to make a run at him...And the rest of their starting rotation is certainly solid with Lilly, Hill, Dempster and Jason Marquis.
It’s going to be a long time before I refer to Geovany Soto as anything other than “the first guy taken in this year’s fantasy draft who I knew nothing about.”…Likewise, when people drafted Kosuke Fukudome, I thought they drafted Japanese real estate….and good luck with Kerry Wood as your closer. He’ll be effective if healthy, but that’s a Francessa-sized if.
Prediction: 90-72
The names on this team. Prince Fielder, Tony Gwynn Jr., “Teen sensation” Corey Hart. And between Prince, Hart, J.J. Hardy, and Ryan Braun, this should be the best lineup in the NL in about 3 years assuming the Ghost of Bud Selig holds this team together…and if Ben Sheets can stay healthy, hello ace of the staff.
What Isn't:
The pitching staff. I refuse to believe that Jeff Suppan is anything close to a major league starting pitcher, forget about a #2 in a rotation. World Series ring be damned, the fact that there are 3 pitchers below him in a 5 man rotation exemplifies the sad state of Brew Crew pitching…oh and Milwaukee fans should ask their New England cousins if Eric Gagne is a competent closer…and you don’t have to be Mahatma to realize that Kendall pretty much sucks.
I’ll give the Astros credit-they have a much better lineup than I thought they had: Berkman, Wiggy, Carlos Lee, the always underrated Mark Loretta, and Mr. B-12 himself, Miggy Tejada…Man, I must be getting old because I remember when 4th outfielder Darren Erstad was one of the better centerfielders.
As per NL Central standards, the Astros have one ace (Oswalt) and then crap. Wandy Rodriguez is many things, but a #2 starter shouldn’t be one of them.
(Mahatma will have a more detailed Pirate preview early next week for both of you that care.)
What’s Good:
The fact that the Penguins have a shot to be playing until June, enabling the locals to forget that they have a baseball team. But seriously, they probably have the second best pitching staff in the division. Snell, Gorzelanny, and Maholm are all pretty solid and more importantly, young, with room to improve. Matt Morris isn’t what he was, whatever that was, but there are worse #4 starters out there.
X-man! LaRoche!
79-83 (First half surprise team before pulling a ’07
5 words: Albert Pujols and little else. And Pujols might be hurt. Glaus and Ankiel are decent hitters, but Glaus will get hurt, and let’s see how a post-Mitchell Report Ankiel fares.
Pitching. Pretty much every aspect of it. Adam Wainright is their ace. And ask MissMet about their #2 starter, Braden Looper. Kyle Lohse, their #3 starter is this year’s winner of “best mediocre pitcher who the media wrongfully hypes as being worth anything more than $7.00/hr.”
Cincinnati
The lineup isn’t perfect, but it’s pretty solid with Dunn, Griffey, and Brandon Phillips. (Is it just me or does this apply to all the NL Central teams except for the Pirates?) Aaron Harang is coming off a damn good year and should continue his success into next season.
Has anyone seen Harang’s photo? Damn that’s eerie. Starters 2-5 aren’t that great, but the more of these previews that I do, the more I realize that starting pitching depth isn’t a necessity. But you might not want to have two of the stars of the ’96 Yankee bullpen, David Weathers and Mike Stanton, as your top two bullpen guys. And while Adam Dunn hit .266 last year, that happens to be a career high that he may or may not ever accomplish again.
Prediction-76-86
Posts
No comments:
Post a Comment