the 08 midsummer classic was a thoroughly entertaining game, regardless of the problems it faced (ie running out of players). so now we're ready for the second half or the remaining 70 games or so. four games are already in the books and the mets have gone from 7.5 games back to tied for the nl east lead in a matter of a couple of weeks. i'll list my predictions for the rest of the season below:
American League:
East: Tampa Bay Rays - they have the starting pitching, the bullpen and defense to compete. even though they had a rough stretch right before the all-star break, they have more than enough prospects to make a move before the trade deadline for another bat to help their inconsistent offense. plus, they have the best minor league pitcher waiting to be this year's version of joba chamberlain (in david price). (runner-up, the red sox who with the injury concerns of ortiz and the likely regression of matsuzaka will fall a game or two short)
Central: Chicago White Sox - they have a 6.5 game lead over the only other team i can see winning the division (tigers). their offense is good and they have decent starting pitching. it really comes down to the fact that i don't have any faith in the twins and the tigers are too far back and need some serious pitching help. (runner-up, the tigers who will beat out the twins, but still trail the sox by about 5 games)
West: Los Angeles Angels of Anaheim - their good record does not reflect their poor run differential, but they have the talent to overcome that in the second half. they also have some prospects in case they want to add a bat. the A's are selling off their parts and have played above their heads in the first half anyway. and the rangers are the rangers, with or without josh hamilton, at least for 2008. (runner-up, the athletics who have probably the deepest farm system in the majors after their trades of harden and blanton)
Wild-Card: Boston Red Sox - the team is too good and too deep to lose a 5 and 6 game lead over their two biggest threats, the A's and Yanks, respectively. the plethora of young pitchers will help their bullpen and starting pitching depth and the return of ortiz next week should be a big lift to the team, as long as he comes back healthy. now if only jason varitek didn't suck so much. (runner-up, the Yankees, who will miss the playoffs for the first time in god-knows-how-long; maybe the number of pastel Yankee caps will start their decline this year)
Playoffs: Red Sox over the Angels; Rays over the White Sox
AL Champ: Red Sox - their the best run organization in american team sports.
National League:
East: New York Mets - they have some holes, esp in corner outfield, but they have arguably the best starting pitching in baseball. they also have the win-now attitude to make a trade toward the deadline for a lethal leftfield bat (barry bonds anyone?). also, the marlins are not for real, the braves are in limbo and the phillies, regardless of joe blanton, have terrible starting pitching and no chips to trade for any sort of difference-maker. (runner-up, the phillies who have the offense to still win a bunch of games; the mets won't let their five game lead in september disappear this year)
Central: Chicago Cubs - they have the most complete team in the national league and with or without a healthy rich harden, they have a 5 game lead over the brewers. cc sabathia makes the brewers legit contenders, but enough to overcome a 5 game head-start? i wouldn't bet on it. (runner-up, the brewers, who now have the offense and starting pitching to win the world series)
West: Los Angeles Dodgers - the Dbacks were once considered the darlings of baseball, the young up and coming team, the next dynasty perhaps. it's somewhat apparent, however, that star prospects who don't show up in their first couple of years usually don't EVER live up to expectations (see Stephen Drew, Conor Jackson, Chris Young AND delmon young, alex gordon, et al). anyway, the dodgers have the talent, the balanced offense, starting pitching to win a terrible division (runner-up, the dbacks by default)
Wild-Card: Milwaukee Brewers - Ben Sheets and CC Sabathia and a stacked line-up. (runner-up, the phillies, whose fans should stop talking trash and think about how long it's been since they've even sniffed a championship)
Playoffs: Mets over Brewers; Cubs over Dodgers
NL Champ: the Mets (it's called loyalty in the Manuel-era)
WORLD SERIES: it's all about new york beating up on boston this year - METS OVER SOX IN 6
AL mvp: Ian Kinsler. I love Josh Hamiton also, but 150 runs? 100 rbis? 330/400/550 with 25 home runs and 45 stolen bases? WOW
AL cy young: Roy Halladay. He's the most consistent and least-pubbed pitchers in baseball... and maybe the best to boot.
NL mvp: does 305/395/540, with 30 hr/130 rbis/25 steals win the mvp this year? i think so, especially when that player is on a winning team: David Wright wins the mvp award he so deserved last year
NL cy young: Brandon Webb. he's got 13 wins. 22-6? with santana and peavy having sub-par seasons and injuries to other up and coming stars and the eventual decline of edinson volquez. it's his to lose.
Friday, July 18, 2008
Thursday, July 10, 2008
to sign or not to sign... BARRY BONDS
his name has been thrown around for the past week or so... as it was earlier this year. the dbacks were rumored to be interested just by saying that they were not not interested. i've heard the yankees and mets both rumored as well, at least by analysts, if not by team officials. i think this question is one of the more intriguing stories of the year thus far.
who is barry bonds? well, ped (performance enhancing drugs) use aside, he's arguably the greatest baseball player of all-time. he holds records in career homeruns, single season home runs, season on-base percentage, season slugging percentage, is about a career 300 hitter, has close to double digit gold gloves and hundreds of stolen bases, although the gold gloves and stolen bases are a thing of the past.
barry bonds is also a bad teammate, a clubhouse "cancer" and distraction, a widely accepted former steroid and growth hormone user, 43 years old, and incapable of playing defense with his bad knees. he was all of this last year as well, when he had an on-base percentage close to 500 and a slugging percentage close to 600. to put this in perspective, great players like a-rod, pujols, vlad, ortiz, etc. would be mvp candidates in any year where they had an obp of 400 and a slugging of 600.
so what's stopping teams from signing mr. bonds? that should be obvious enough to sports' fans, but are the arguments against bonds really strong enough to stop a gm from taking a chance? personally, i think not. and furthermore, i would love to see bonds play for a contending team... especially my own.
it's really a three-part question: first, is barry bonds able to continue his offensive prowess at the age of 43? second, even if barry bonds continues to be a stellar offensive player, do his defensive liabilities hurt your team more than his offensive power? and third, even if barry bonds is a productive baseball player, are his distractions in the clubhouse with the media worth the risk?
first, i see no reason why his offensive numbers would decline. he's gotten lots of rest and although maybe he's not in game-shape, he's shown to be a player that ages well (even post-steroid use). i would expect an obp of over 400 and a slugging percentage of over 500 at the very least.
second, it's obvious that he's best suited to be a dh for some american league team. playing leftfield lowers his value to a ballclub, not solely cuz of his defensive limitations but also because he probably wouldn't be able to play everyday or at least every inning.
third, this depends on the make-up of your team and also whether you believe that these distractions are really all that important to whether a team wins or loses.
if i were a contending team in the american league with a dh opportunity (rays, a's, possibly the tigers, yanks and sox) i'd jump all over this opportunity. the al is so stacked this year (and most years recently) that any advantage would be huge. you don't have to give up anything to get bonds (except money) and you can slot him in the dh spot without worrying too much about fatigue and dropped fly balls. you can talk as much as you want about distractions, but teams have always signed trouble-makers like sheffield and bradley or drug-users like mota and sosa and none of these players ever had the ability that bonds has.
if i were a team in the national league, i'd be a little more wary. however, i would still probably take a chance. teams are quick to take little risk, but in a sport where only four teams make the playoffs and it's essentially a crap-shoot when you get there, i'd push in my chips for a player like bonds, who could make all the difference. let's see if the mets would be a good fit.
the mets have two corner outfielders, in alou and church, who are both very productive players and who both may not play again this year. so should they sign bonds? well, everyone knows that in new york, this would be a gigantic story. and especially after the debacle that's been their first half, with the firing of willie and the constant criticism of this team, maybe the team would be better suited to avoid such a media blitz. i disagree.
the mets bench includes players like easley, tatis, chavez, anderson and some random guys we brought up from the minors... none of them will ever approach numbers like bonds'. if church and/or alou are out for the rest of the season then our options are either to play chavez/anderson/easley everyday or trade for someone like nady or dunn. well, still none of those players can match bonds' output.
the mets are a good fit for bonds because they don't have to play him all the time. chavez is a great defensive player who can come in for bonds late in games as a defensive sub. if alou and church or either or come back then you can always platoon bonds a little bit to keep him fresh. if the mets ever make it to the world series, bonds can be your dh option.
then what really matters is the issue of distractions. i'm of the opinion that distractions are overrated. the yankees won when they had lots of distractions in the 70s. bonds, himself, was on maybe good teams and made it to the world series with the giants. i'm not going to say that distractions have no influence b/c i'm sure they do, but who's to say what sort of influence they have... maybe certain distractions can be a good thing, like taking the spotlight off other problems and putting them on one player (like in this circumstance).
this is just my opinion of course and it's hard to say either way what would happen. but as it stands today, the mets are just a very good team in a not so good league where it seems that the two best teams, by far, are the cubs and brewers. the mets are no better (or worse) than the phillies, braves, cards, dodgers or any other contending team... esp without church and alou everyday. if the mets want to take the safer route and hope that church/alou come back, i can't fault them for that, but i'm a risk-taker and i think that with bonds, the mets are in a much better position to put themselves into the class of the cubs and brewers in terms of talent. the mets needs to move past last year's disappointment and signing the best player of the last 25 years would be one way of doing just that.
who is barry bonds? well, ped (performance enhancing drugs) use aside, he's arguably the greatest baseball player of all-time. he holds records in career homeruns, single season home runs, season on-base percentage, season slugging percentage, is about a career 300 hitter, has close to double digit gold gloves and hundreds of stolen bases, although the gold gloves and stolen bases are a thing of the past.
barry bonds is also a bad teammate, a clubhouse "cancer" and distraction, a widely accepted former steroid and growth hormone user, 43 years old, and incapable of playing defense with his bad knees. he was all of this last year as well, when he had an on-base percentage close to 500 and a slugging percentage close to 600. to put this in perspective, great players like a-rod, pujols, vlad, ortiz, etc. would be mvp candidates in any year where they had an obp of 400 and a slugging of 600.
so what's stopping teams from signing mr. bonds? that should be obvious enough to sports' fans, but are the arguments against bonds really strong enough to stop a gm from taking a chance? personally, i think not. and furthermore, i would love to see bonds play for a contending team... especially my own.
it's really a three-part question: first, is barry bonds able to continue his offensive prowess at the age of 43? second, even if barry bonds continues to be a stellar offensive player, do his defensive liabilities hurt your team more than his offensive power? and third, even if barry bonds is a productive baseball player, are his distractions in the clubhouse with the media worth the risk?
first, i see no reason why his offensive numbers would decline. he's gotten lots of rest and although maybe he's not in game-shape, he's shown to be a player that ages well (even post-steroid use). i would expect an obp of over 400 and a slugging percentage of over 500 at the very least.
second, it's obvious that he's best suited to be a dh for some american league team. playing leftfield lowers his value to a ballclub, not solely cuz of his defensive limitations but also because he probably wouldn't be able to play everyday or at least every inning.
third, this depends on the make-up of your team and also whether you believe that these distractions are really all that important to whether a team wins or loses.
if i were a contending team in the american league with a dh opportunity (rays, a's, possibly the tigers, yanks and sox) i'd jump all over this opportunity. the al is so stacked this year (and most years recently) that any advantage would be huge. you don't have to give up anything to get bonds (except money) and you can slot him in the dh spot without worrying too much about fatigue and dropped fly balls. you can talk as much as you want about distractions, but teams have always signed trouble-makers like sheffield and bradley or drug-users like mota and sosa and none of these players ever had the ability that bonds has.
if i were a team in the national league, i'd be a little more wary. however, i would still probably take a chance. teams are quick to take little risk, but in a sport where only four teams make the playoffs and it's essentially a crap-shoot when you get there, i'd push in my chips for a player like bonds, who could make all the difference. let's see if the mets would be a good fit.
the mets have two corner outfielders, in alou and church, who are both very productive players and who both may not play again this year. so should they sign bonds? well, everyone knows that in new york, this would be a gigantic story. and especially after the debacle that's been their first half, with the firing of willie and the constant criticism of this team, maybe the team would be better suited to avoid such a media blitz. i disagree.
the mets bench includes players like easley, tatis, chavez, anderson and some random guys we brought up from the minors... none of them will ever approach numbers like bonds'. if church and/or alou are out for the rest of the season then our options are either to play chavez/anderson/easley everyday or trade for someone like nady or dunn. well, still none of those players can match bonds' output.
the mets are a good fit for bonds because they don't have to play him all the time. chavez is a great defensive player who can come in for bonds late in games as a defensive sub. if alou and church or either or come back then you can always platoon bonds a little bit to keep him fresh. if the mets ever make it to the world series, bonds can be your dh option.
then what really matters is the issue of distractions. i'm of the opinion that distractions are overrated. the yankees won when they had lots of distractions in the 70s. bonds, himself, was on maybe good teams and made it to the world series with the giants. i'm not going to say that distractions have no influence b/c i'm sure they do, but who's to say what sort of influence they have... maybe certain distractions can be a good thing, like taking the spotlight off other problems and putting them on one player (like in this circumstance).
this is just my opinion of course and it's hard to say either way what would happen. but as it stands today, the mets are just a very good team in a not so good league where it seems that the two best teams, by far, are the cubs and brewers. the mets are no better (or worse) than the phillies, braves, cards, dodgers or any other contending team... esp without church and alou everyday. if the mets want to take the safer route and hope that church/alou come back, i can't fault them for that, but i'm a risk-taker and i think that with bonds, the mets are in a much better position to put themselves into the class of the cubs and brewers in terms of talent. the mets needs to move past last year's disappointment and signing the best player of the last 25 years would be one way of doing just that.
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