2004 Quick NL Preview
NL East
With the losses of Sheffield, Maddux and Lopez, this finally looked
like the year that the Braves would tumble out of their lofty division
titleist perch. But the Cubs and Reds felt obliged to restock
their pitching staff with Juan Cruz and Chris Reitsma, and the Cards,
their offense with their donation of JD Drew, so the Braves now have a
chance to defend. They're not the best bet to win the division
because they still have holes on the pitching staff (wherever Cruz
doesn't pitch) and on offense (third base, possibly first base as
well). But if JD Drew can stay healthy for a full season for the
first time in his career, they shouldn't miss Sheffield's production
too much. Not a great bet, but it's still possible. The
better bet to win the division is either the Phillies or the
Marlins. The Phillies are better on paper, but as long as Larry
Bowa can't keep his cool, they are still a meltdown waiting to
happen. Perhaps the additions of Eric Milton and Billy Wagner
will make them Bowa-proof. The Marlins are a very good playoff
team, but might not be a good regular season team. What that
means is they can do a lot of things to win a short series, but they
don't have the personnel to do the things to win a lot of games over
the course of 6 months with the losses of Derrek Lee and Ivan
Rodriguez. Hee Seop Choi and Ramon Castro are nice players and
could develop
into stars, but it won't happen overnight. The Mets have made
some good moves this offseason, but their starting pitching is
questionable and their offense only slightly less so. The Expos
are marking time until they get moved to Washington DC. Major
League Baseball has made some huge mistakes in it's history, but if
Selig and the owners don't put a team in DC/NoVa by the end of this
year, they will have made one of their worst blunders ever.
Virginia is unlikely to help finance a new stadium after this year, so
unless stadium plans are in place, meaning a team is promised to be
located there, baseball will have essentially lost it's second best
market for the forseeable future. That would put the Expos in
limbo, either to be moved to a market that can't support them or
contracted out of existence after 2006. The Phillies should win
this
division, but the Marlins will be there if they underachieve for the
third consecutive year. The Braves still have an outside shot
thanks to the generosity of the NL Central.
NL Central
The Cubs and Astros are the early favorites, but if Mark Prior is out
for more than a month or so, the race will swing towards the
Astros. Both teams have improved this offseason, but getting a
full season's production from Derrek Lee, Aramis Ramirez and Todd
Walker will have a little more impact than signing Roger Clemens and
Andy Pettitte, especially with the loss of Billy Wagner at the
end. Dotel will do just fine as the closer, as will Lidge and
Stone. But losing Wagner means that Jimy Williams has another
inning to manage through and for a guy who couldn't recognize that
Morgan Ensberg is a much, much better player then Geoff Blum, that
isn't a good thing. Plus, I like the fact that Kerry Wood and
Carlos Zambrano now have Greg Maddux to talk pitching with on a daily
basis. With their stuff, if they learn anything they could become
as dominating as Prior. The Cardinals have some potential in
their starting staff, and Matt Morris will be injury free, but Woody
Williams is showing signs of breaking down. After those two,
there's talent like Dan Haren, Jason Marquis and Adam Wainwright, but
none of them are sure things. Suppan and Carpenter are crap
shoots. Health is the biggest issue for the Reds, but if their
big guns on offense
(Dunn, Kearns, Griffey, Larson, Casey) can stay healthy, they have
enough pitching to make some noise. Jose Acevedo is probably the
best they have, but Brandon Claussen and Aaron Harang aren't bad and
with Paul Wilson and Cory Lidle eating up innings, this could be a nice
darkhorse in the Central. Thankfully, they moved Danny Graves to
the only spot on the staff where a one-pitch pitcher can succeed:
closer. He'll be set-up by the phenomenal Ryan Wagner, who will
be their closer no later than next year. The Pirates would be
interesting of they could figure out who can be an everyday hitter
(Craig Wilson) and who can't (Randall Simon). A lot of people
don't like their mish-mash veteran bullpen, but the same trick has
worked for a number of teams, most recently the 2001 Phillies.
The Brewers? Well, they'll have a good offense when their AA team
finally gets promoted. Like the East, this looks like a two team
race (Cubs and Astros) with a couple of darkhorses (Cards and Reds)
waiting for any fall-off.
NL West
The Giants keep rebuilding but, like the Braves, this may be the
year that it finally catches up to them. AJ Pierzinski is a good
hitting catcher, but there's a big difference between hitting in the
dome in Minnesota and hitting at Pac Bell. The same holds true
for newcomers Dustan Mohr, Michael Tucker and Jefferey Hammonds, all
coming from hitters' parks to one of the toughest pitchers' parks in
the majors. Marquis Grissom is due for a drop-off and with Neifi
Perez replacing Rich Aurilia, the Giants offense looks like it will
take a monstrous hit this year, even if Barry Bonds manages to keep up
to his historic levels. The bullpen is thinner without Worrell
and the rotation
isn't very deep after Schmidt and Tomko. In fact, this is looking
very much like a .500 team. The Diamondbacks' youngsters played way over their heads last year and
this year the team is depending on a repeat performance. For
example, Alex Cintron never hit more than 4 homers in any season
previous to last year. Yet in 2003, he set career highs in
doubles (7 more than previous high), triples (2 more) and home runs
with 15 while splitting time between AAA and the majors, getting the
majority of his time facing big league pitching. When a guy is a
career .350 slugger in the minors and suddenly slugs .500 in the
majors, something doesn't add up. And the starting pitching after
Johnson and Webb is just sad: retreads like Shane Reynolds and Elmer
Dessens aren't gonna get you to the playoffs. Until the Dodgers
find some offense, they have no chance of competing, even in what is
percieved to be a weak division. In the Dodgers favor, they do
have some solid starting pitching (Odalis Perez, Wilson Alvarez, Darren
Dreifort, Edwin Jackson) and the best closer in baseball (Gagne), but
the offense needed a lot more than Juan Encarnacion to even get to
mediocre level. If they somehow trade for Milton Bradley, they
could challenge for 85-86 wins. The Rockies are still too
experimental to take seriously. They don't appear to have any
long range strategy and are having no luck solving the Coors pitching
dilemma. The Padres will move into their new park and fill it
well into the playoffs. They are the only team in the division
that has quality depth at every position and if their boppers - Giles,
Nevin, Klesko, Payton - can stay healthy, they will win the division
with ease. Even with the departure of Rod Beck, their bullpen is
deep with good arms. Akinori Ohtsuka (pronounced OATS-kah) has
the talent to be the Rookie of the Year. The Padre rotation is
solid with David Wells (who has pitching at least 200 innings in 8 of
the last 9 years) and emerging aces Jake Peavy and Adam Eaton. As
a minor leaguer, Peavy's potential impact was compared to that of Prior
and Greg Maddux and it wasn't just scouting hyperbole. Brian
Lawrence is a solid 4th and the Pads shouldn't have much trouble
finding a solid 5th starter from Sterling Hitchcock, Ismael Valdes, Ben
Howard and Dennis Tankersley. Barring serious injuries, the
Padres will win 90 games and represent the West in the playoffs