It’s time for the Eye’s annual baseball preview series – and there have been some huge changes around baseball in the offseason, many of them out west. We’ll take a look at the AL and NL West divisions this week, with the eastern divisions to follow next week. Let’s start in the NL:
NL WEST
Arizona Diamondbacks
2011 Record: 94-68 (1st)
Last year’s Glass Eye Prediction: 5th place
Key Additions: LF Jason Kubel, SP Trevor Cahill, RP Craig Breslow, RP Takashi Saito
Key Losses: SP Jason Marquis
Colorado Rockies
2011 Record: 73-89 (4th)
Last year’s Glass Eye Prediction: 1st place
Key Additions: C Ramon Hernandez, RF Michael Cuddyer, 2B Marco Scutaro, 3B Casey Blake, SP Jeremy Guthrie, RP Josh Outman
Key Losses: RF Seth Smith, 2B Mark Ellis, SP Jason Hammel, SP Aaron Cook, SP Kevin Millwood, RP Huston Street
Los Angeles Dodgers
2011 Record: 82-79 (3rd)
Last year’s Glass Eye Prediction: 3rd place
Key Additions: 2B Mark Ellis, SP Aaron Harang, SP Chis Capuano, RP Todd Coffey
Key Losses: C Rod Barajas, SP Jon Garland, RP Jonathan Broxton, SP Hiroki Kuroda
San Diego Padres
2011 Record: 71-91 (5th)
Last year’s Glass Eye Prediction: 4th place
Key Additions: 1B Yonder Alonso, LF Carlos Quentin, SP Edinson Volquez, RP Huston Street
Key Losses: SP Mat Latos, SP Aaron Harang, RP Heath Bell, C John Baker
San Francisco Giants
2011 Record: 86-76 (2nd)
Last year’s Glass Eye Prediction: 2nd place
Key Additions: LF Melky Cabrera, SS Ryan Theriot
Key Losses: OF Pat Burrell, OF Carlos Beltran, SS Orlando Cabrera, OF Cody Ross, SP Jonathan Sanchez
Predicted standings:
Arizona (88-92 wins)
Colorado (81-84 wins)
San Diego (80-83 wins)
San Francisco (74-78 wins)
Los Angeles (70-74 wins)
Division Analysis: Starting at the bottom…the Dodgers have Kemp and Kershaw…and a whole lot of mediocre-or-worse players. Losing Kuroda really weakens the rotation, and I don’t see how they can score enough runs to compete even in this relatively weak division.
I think this is the year the Giants really tumble – the outfield is a disaster, their entire offense is predicated on Posey staying healthy and Sandoval hitting .320, and even at that they will be one of the three worst offenses in the NL. Their only path to a good season relies on the continued excellence and durability of their rotation, and sooner or later one of those guys is going to get hurt or have a bad year (more likely both). This team has NO margin for error, and I expect a bit of a crash in 2012.
San Diego played over their heads in 2010 but played below their numbers in 2011 – teams outscored by 18 runs typically are within a few games of .500, not 90-game losers. The loss of Latos hurts, but if Volquez is even marginally effective this team will pitch plenty well (aided by their cavernous park, of course). Alonso and Quentin are the key for this team – if both meet expectations, they provide a jolt of much-needed power to the lineup and make the Padres a dangerous team again. I look for the Padres to fight all season to stay around the .500 mark.
Colorado made wholesale changes to both the lineup and rotation – and they still have two fine offensive weapons in Tulowitzki and Gonzalez, along with a decent supporting cast – but I don’t like their rotation AT ALL, and given their home park I expect this to be the worst pitching staff in the game this season. If the young pitching develops this could be a team to watch in 2013, though.
I’m still not entirely sold on the Diamondbacks, because as I said last spring about San Diego, teams that come out of nowhere tend to regress the following season. However, the Dbacks acted aggressively this winter to improve the team, buying low on Cahill and signing Kubel to give them envious depth in the OF. I expect SOME regression, but the truth is that this division is likely the weakest in the game…and 90 wins will almost certainly claim it. Arizona has the starters and the offense to be the favorites this season.
AL WEST
Los Angeles Angels
2011 Record: 86-76 (2nd)
Last year’s Glass Eye Prediction: 3rd place
Key Additions: 1B Albert Pujols, SP CJ Wilson
Key Losses: SP Joel Piniero
Oakland A’s
2011 Record: 74-88 (3rd)
Last year’s Glass Eye Prediction: 2nd place
Key Additions: RF Seth Smith, SP Bartolo Colon, DH Manny Ramirez, OF Yoenis Cespedes
Key Losses: SP Trevor Cahill, OF David DeJesus, DH Hideki Matsui, OF Josh Willingham
Seattle Mariners
2011 Record: 67-95 (4th)
Last year’s Glass Eye Prediction: 4th place
Key Additions: C/DH Jesus Montero, C John Jaso, RP George Sherrill, SP Hishashi Iwakuma
Key Losses: 2B Adam Kennedy, RP David Aardsma, SP Michael Pineda
Texas Rangers
2011 Record: 96-66 (1st)
Last year’s Glass Eye Prediction: 1st place
Key Additions: RP Joe Nathan, SP Yu Darvish
Key Losses: SP CJ Wilson
Predicted Standings:
Texas Rangers (90-92 wins)
Anaheim Angels (88-91 wins)
Oakland A’s (78-81 wins)
Seattle Mariners (64-68 wins)
Division Analysis: Again starting at the bottom…I said last year that the Mariners offense would get better in 2011 if only because it couldn’t get any worse…and I was right, they improved by 50 runs, but that still left them as the worst offense in the AL by FAR. The addition of Montero will help, but giving up Pineda is a huge blow to the rotation – unless Montero becomes a star-caliber hitter, this is a deal the Mariners may regret for years. Overall, there is still not nearly enough offense to compete, the rotation is full of question marks after Felix Hernandez, and Seattle is more likely to lose 100 games than to finish above .500.
Oakland is a team seemingly always in transition…their offense looks a lot different with Willingham and DeJesus gone, and Cespedes is still an unknown quantity in CF. The left side of the infield is manned by players I literally have never heard of, the rotation is patchwork after Brandon McCarthy…the only true strength of the team is the back of the bullpen with Balfour and Fuentes. The A’s were a mediocre team a year ago and I see little reason to expect a massive jump this season – they might flirt with .500 if some of the hitters pan out, but in this suddenly top-heavy division I think that’s about the best Oakland can expect.
The Angels definitely won the offseason, picking up Albert Pujols AND C.J. Wilson – the latter move having the benefit of weakening their main rival while strengthening an already formidable Angels’ rotation. They also boast one of the game’s top prospects in OF Mike Trout – the problem is, there’s no spot for Trout at the moment due to the crippling financial commitments the team has to Torii Hunter and (especially) Vernon Wells. Even with Pujols in the fold, this does not project to be a great offense by any means – but they should definitely score more runs than they did in 2011, especially if they eventually bench Wells and let Trout play. They ranked 11th out of 14 in on-base percentage a year ago – to win the division, they need to at least get into the top five or six in that category.
The rotation is easily the best in the division and assuming Ervin Santana doesn’t regress to his 2010 form, they have a case as the best rotation in the AL. Weaver and Haren are fantastic, and given Texas’ hitter-friendly ballpark, you can make a case that Wilson was better than either of them a year ago. The rotation alone makes the Angels a threat to win 85+ games – let’s face it, the pitching carried this team a year ago, their offense was well below average – and if Pujols doesn’t enter a steep decline and some of the younger bats perform to their expectations, this team has a very real shot to win the division. I’m picking them second only because I still question their offense – I doubt they will have the guts to bench Wells and his huge contract, and his terrible bat will cost them several wins – and because I think Texas made some savvy moves to counter the loss of Wilson.
Speaking of the Rangers…yes, they lost their ace, but they had a plan for that – they figure they have an ace-in-waiting in closer Neftali Perez, who was a starter his entire minor league career. Perez’ stuff is better than anyone Texas could acquire, and if he successfully re-acclimates to starting then Texas still has enough starting pitching to compete for this division. But the Rangers didn’t stop there – they made a bold move to sign Japanese ace Yu Darvish, and if he approaches his potential this rotation could be even better than last season. The bullpen is deep and talented, and even if Joe Nathan isn’t at his best there are other options to close out games.
The third-best offense in the game returns intact, and while it’s not a young group by any means I don’t see too many candidates for a steep decline aside from Michael Young. If Josh Hamilton can stay healthy (admittedly a BIG if), the offense should be as good as last season – but I do think the bats will take a minor step back this season, due in part to age and in part to injury.
Overall this Texas team should not be quite as good as the 2011 squad – but they should be plenty good enough to compete for the division. Anaheim is much-improved and this battle will likely come down to which team suffers a key injury or two – but on paper I like the Rangers to JUUUUST squeak by the Angels. However, the Angels might be good enough (and the AL East runnerup poor enough) that the wildcard may well come out of the West this year – something to keep an eye on.
Next week, we’ll review the AL and NL East divisions. Sneak preview – I’m not very high on the Phillies or the Red Sox – more to come!
Dave Glass can be reached at buggyracer@verizon.net.