2016 Baseball Preview Special

It’s going to be the Houston Astros this year.  Glad we got that out of the way.  “How?” you may ask.  The Royals came into 2015 on a mission after coming so close to a championship in 2014.  After what the Royals did to the Astros on their way to winning the World Series last year, it’s hard to imagine how angry they are.  The young talent on the Astros will blossom as the season goes on.  Using their stockpile of minor league talent, management will make a couple of shrewd trades for pitching that will put them over the top.

Don’t like that pick.  How about this one?  This will finally be the Texas Rangers’ year.  Their injury bug behind them, the Rangers’ pitching staff will be awesome with Darvish and Hamels.  The team’s mix of seasoned veterans and up and coming new talent will prove relentless against their opponents.  Even Josh Hamilton will have a good year (not sure in what capacity, but it will involve getting lots of hits). 

I might be a bit biased.  You can take or leave my picks and the following analysis for what it’s worth: nothing.  But keep in mind, last year’s Lindy’s baseball preview issue managed to correctly pick two of the 10 playoff teams.  Two.  They didn’t even bother picking a World Series champ.  I’ll be quickly breaking down what will be unlikely to actually happen this year in the MLB, division by division.

AL East

Somebody’s going to make into the playoffs here, but we won’t have any winners.  The Blue Jays’ awesome offense will be undone by their mediocre pitching.  There’s also a chance that that Tulo’s injury bug is contagious.  The Red Sox got David Price which will insure that they’ve cornered the market on players that will prove disappointing.  Did anyone in management notice his 0-7 playoff starting record?  Small sample?  Just a fluke?  I watched him with the Tigers.  I think his skills are already in the decline, much less seven years from now, which is how long his contract is.  They’ve got a great bullpen, but the Yankees likely don’t have the starting pitching to get to them and their hitters are going to break down.  The Rays have pitching, but no hitting.  The Orioles have hitting, but no pitching.  

AL Central

The Indians and the Twins have some awesome young talent ready to take over, but not this year.  If the White Sox keep sucking, they can look forward to getting plenty of good, young talent too, via the draft.  I think everyone has given up on the Tigers by now.  For whatever reason, management just couldn’t put a bullpen together, and now their great starting pitching and hitting have been lost to injuries and free agency.  The Royals are still the team to beat.  Look for them to make a big trade at the deadline to help them with the playoffs.  This trade will deplete their farm system and blow their budget, probably wrecking the franchise for the next 10 years.  It’ll be worth it, if they can win another World Series this year.  The Royals at least made my Spring Training.  I saw El Paso Chihuahuas fan favorite, Cody Decker, with the team during a game.  He hit a double and made a good play a first.  The Royals announcers liked him as well.

AL West

I’ve already discussed the Rangers and Astros.  I really think either of these two could win it all.  The Rangers are the smarter pick, and I think they’ll win the division.  Though the Astros have terrible uniforms and a terrible stadium (which makes their hitters pull-happy and prone to striking out), they’re mad and youthful, much like last year’s Royals.  The Mariners and Angels are going to waste their abundance of talent again this year, because they don’t have the right pieces to make a good team.   The A’s don’t even merit discussion. 

NL East

It’s going to be the Mets.  Make whatever argument you want for the Nationals with Harper, Scherzer, and Strasburg, but New York has four #1 starters, possibly five if Zach Wheeler comes up to potential.  I think the Mets will be able to acquire some more hitting, and the Nationals will continue to be toxic in the clubhouse, because they won’t be able to win as a team.  (Think teamwork is overrated?  Remember who the current champs are.)  The Marlins at least have some good players to watch.  The Phillies are bad and are rebuilding.  The Braves are bad.  Since they’re about to get a new stadium next year, they won’t have to put a quality product on the field for a while.

NL Central

We can skip over the Reds and Brewers for now and likely a couple of years to come.  The rest of the division is harder to predict.  The Cubs are loaded with talent and should run away with the division.  The problem is that they’re an American League team playing in the National.  Schwarber is going to have to play a position to be in the lineup every day, and he’s likely to be a defensive liability.  Likewise, much of the rest of their youthful bombers are going to be striking out too much going for home runs.  That strategy works better when you have nine batters, not eight and a pitcher.  The Pirates are so solid, but they just seem to be lacking that one extra star they need to win this tough division.  With free agency subtractions, it’d be easy to count the Cardinals out this year, but don’t.  They’re organizationally strong and still have plenty of good pieces.  I’ll pick the Cubs with reservations.    

NL West

I was going to pick the Giants thanks to their offseason pitching acquisitions and Matt Cain’s return (and not because it’s an even year).  Spring Training results are changing my mind.  At best if they’re in the playoffs, they can’t even use Cueto on the road (he’s been heckled off the mound twice by opposing fans).  On the plus side, the Giants are so good at developing talent, if they’re bad, they won’t be bad for long.  The Rockies are going to be terrible (sigh).  The Padres made a splash in trades last offseason, which turned into a belly flop.  Unfortunately, they’ll probably be dealing the consequences of that dealing-making for a couple of seasons.  They don’t have massive, deep pockets like the Dodgers, to quickly rebound from bad front office decisions.  Losing Greinke will like hurt the team in wins, but in actuality, they need to lose even more cancerous players to win a World Series.  They’ve probably got the right manager in place for when they start filling in vacancies with home-grown, team-oriented players.  Which all paradoxically leads me to picking the Diamondbacks to win the division.  Greinke will help them into the playoffs, along with Goldschmidt and their other good players.  Will Greinke finally become a team leader, like he should have already become?  Is he just looking for his next big contract?  I don’t trust him yet.  (The Royals trading him actually lead to their success.  That’s the most value he’s had to any franchise.)  Look for La Russa to make a big move if the D-Backs are in contention.

So, Astros over Royals in the AL championship, and Mets over Diamondbacks in the NL.  The Astros somehow grit their way past the Mets to win it all.  (Alternately, Rangers over Cubs, which would also be interesting.)  I’m fully anticipating these picks to be good for nothing but comedy material later in the season.  If I’m right, I’ll never let anyone forget about it.  In the meantime, we can all watch and enjoy the season unfold.