Rocket Ramblings

2009 MLB PREDICTIONS

Like every other baseball fan, I have a way-too-high opinion of my baseball knowledge. I'm convinced I could run a major league baseball team as well as, if not better, than the yahoos who run them now. Of course, this is all butkis cause these guys do it for a living while we are all arm-chair GMs and managers. However, a number of Fantasy Baseball Championships over the years has given me a swelled head and the fact that I have predicted three of the last five World Series winners (Boston in '04 and '07 and St Louis in '06) has convinced me that I know what I'm talking about.

Which I most likely do not.

As always I will try and not let my fanatical nature get in the way 0f my predictions. In reality I have only picked the Mets to win the world series once in the last eight years, but have picked them to make the playoffs every year since 2005.

I'm not going to get into HUGE detail here, but if anyone wants to debate my predicitons I would be very much into that. Of course these predictions are stringent on the teams staying relatively healthy except in places where the players have a history of injury (Yeah I'm looking at YOU Burnett). In other words, if any of these teams loses one or two big time players to an extended DL stay, then all bets are off.

Ok... here we go:

AMERICAN LEAGUE EAST
1 - Boston Red Sox
2 - NY Yankees (Wild Card)
3 - Tampa Bay Rays
4 - Toronto Blue Jays
5 - Baltimore Orioles

Why Boston at the top? Even with the Yankee's huge influx of high priced free agents I see Boston as a stronger team. I think the pitching is close but A.J. Burnett's health is always a question, Pettite struggled last season and is a questionable fourth, and Joba should be in the bullpen. The Bullpen's are the main difference where as awesome as Rivera is, the rest of that bullpen (with Joba in the starting rotation) is suspect, whereas Boston's strong bullpen got stronger over the winter when they signed Satio from the Dodgers as a set up man. The Rays are no fluke and their absence from the playoffs is due more to the Red Sox and Yankees strengths than their own weakness. The Rays have some amazing young talent in Longoria, Crawford, Kazmir, Shields and Price, but like the Yanks their suspect bullpen can be their undoing but unlike the Yanks they don't have a no-doubt closer to rely on. Of course if A-Rod misses the year due to his hip and the Rays trade for a big time closer during the season those teams might flip flop. The Blue Jays are always a few players short of a seriously contending team and injuries to Marcum and McGowen and losing Burnett to the Yankees seriously hurts this team. Roy Halladay is one of the best pitchers in all of baseball and Veron Wells is as solid a player as there is, but add in the fact that closer BJ Ryan is struggling and Toronto is looking at another decent year that goes no where. The Orioles are getting better and should actually start to look soild next year, but this year still have way too many question marks and young players needing experiance to do much.

AMERICAN LEAGUE CENTRAL
1. Minnesota Twins
2. Cleveland Indians
3. Chicago White Sox
4. Kansas City Royals
5. Detroit Tigers

This was a hard division to predict. All of these teams have serious flaws. None of them stand out in any way. In the end, the main reason I gave the advantage to the Twins? Cause they always seem to get it done. The Twins are a very soild TEAM. They are an excellent example of soild teamwork day in and day out. Yes they have to worry if Joe Mauer is sidelined for any real length of time, but overall they have some soild hitting, excellent defense and very good (if unspectacular besides their closer) pitching. The Indians have a soild closer finally in Wood and since he was healthy pretty much all of last year, maybe being in the bullpen is the best thing for him. If Wood is healthy, he becomes one of the better closers in the Majors. The Tribe have a lot of question marks like if Travis Hafner and Victor Martienez are going to return to form after both of them had nightmarish 2008 seasons. They need Cliff Lee to be close to what he was last year and need Carmona to pick it up after he stumbled somewhat last year (after a great 2007) for this team to have a chance to win the division. The difference between the White Sox and the Royals isn't as large as some people might think and the Tigers? Well, Despite having some great hitters, their starting pitching is in tatters and their bullpen isn't any better. Unless Rodney stays healthy and becomes the closer people think he can be and Verlander and Bonderman return to their pre-2007 forms, this team is in serious trouble.

AMERICAN LEAGUE WEST
1. LA Angels
2. Oakland A's
3. Texas Rangers
4. Seattle Mariners

This division would pretty much be a no-brainer of not for the fact that the Angels are starting the year without three of their starting pitchers. Lackey should be back by the end of April and should be fine. Escobar should also be back by early/mid May. Ervin Santana though? He might be out much, much longer. If Lackey and Escobar are both back and healthy in May, then this team should be fine. It has a lot of talent and Mike Socia is one of the best managers in baseball and has won world series' with less talented teams. Losing K-Rod hurts the bullpen but new Closer Fuentes is a solid one in his own right. The offense does all the little things right and though there aren't going to be a lot of home runs hit, they'll do enough to win. The A's are a mix of very young (Gallager, Cahill, Andersen) and kind of older (Giambi, Chavez, Cabrara) with a superstar thrown in (Holliday) and a hurt ace (Duchscherer). The offense could be strong and the pitching (if all goes right) could be the next coming of Zito, Hudson and Mulder in their prime. That's a lot of "ifs" though. Both the Rangers and Mariners should be improved although the Rangers have little pitching and the Mariners have little offense.

NATIONAL LEAGUE EAST
1. NY Mets
2. Atlanta Braves
3. Philadephia Phillies
4. Florida Marlins
5. Washington Nationals

Ok, first off, just because I have the defending World Champs ranked third does not mean I think they are going to be bad. I expect them to be able to win around 85 or so games and contend into Sept. The two things I have heard the most when looking at predictions for the 2009 season is:
A - The Phillies have almost the exact same team as last year so they should win again
B - The Mets have almost the exact team as last year so they won't win.
Ok, this makes no sense. To pick the Phillies to win the NL East because it returns basically the same team from a year ago with the exception of left fielder Pat Burrell and then say the reason the Mets will not even make the playoffs is because they did nothing to upgrade this team offensivelly is a total farce. Last year the Mets were 2nd in the NL in offense (tied with Philly)behind only the Cubs. They'll have a full year out of Murphy who most people agree is a "hitting machine" and Church will likely be healthy since his concussion issues are behind him. This will help and besides, the offense was NOT the problem last year. The bullpen was. The Mets blew 27 games last year after the 6th inning. TWENTY SEVEN. If they won just 15% of those games they would have won the division. With the MAJOR upgrade in the bullpen the Mets have seriously improved upon a team that won 89 games last year without a single reliable arm in a relief role in the 2nd half of 2008.
So, the Mets improved their bullpen with two of the best closers in the game setting up and closing and have a seriously reliable arm in Green for the 7th inning... meaning, the bullpen, which was the main reason the Mets lost at the end of the season last year, is no longer a problem. However, to claim the Phillies are going to win because they are the same as last year when they did NOT upgrade their team at ALL is being overly optomistic. First it's not really realistic to expect Lidge to do the same thing this year as he did last year and be perfect? The Phillies should expect to have at least a marginal decrease in their bullpen this year just due to the fact that being perfect after the 7th inning like they were last year is highly unlikely. The Mets were only two games worse than the Phillies last year and that was due to a bullpen that couldn't have gotten my son Tyler's 10 yr old Little League team out. The Mets improved on their biggest weakness. The Phillies did not. Add in the fact that their one true solid pitcher (Cole Hamels) has already had elbow tightness and he had a history of injury issues and that their second best relief pitcher (JC Romaro) will miss the first 50 games of the season due to suspention for testing positive for steroids, I cannot see how the Phillies are better than then Mets, world series title defense not withstanding. Yes, the Phillies offense is impressive, and they have a very good team, but it's not enough.
Forgotten in all this is a seriously improved Atlanta team who may not have a lot of power in their offense but have upgraded their starting pitching big time and have a great manager in Bobby Cox. Their bullpen is seriously talented, yet seriously fragile since both of their top bullpen arms (Soriano, Gonzalez) have spent more time on the DL the last two years than on a pitching mound. The Marlins are young and brash and talented but I think last years improbable run at the wild card was a fluke. This team is way too free swinging and the defense if not soild. They have seriously talented arms in their starting rotation though and if some of the young newcomers (Maybin, Boinifico) can put it all together quickly and Herminda ever lives up to his hype this team could contend again. The Nats are actually improved a little from last year but their pitching is a total mess. If they win 75 games Manny Acta should win manager of the year.

NATIONAL LEAGUE CENTRAL
1. Chicago Cubs
2. St Louis Cardinals
3. Milwaukee Brewers
4. Cincinnati Reds
5. Houston Astros
6. Pittsburg Pirates

This is a basically easy division because the Cubs should (note I said SHOULD) be one of the top teams in the NL overall. They have a solid starting rotation (Zambrano, Harden, Lilly, Dempster), a decent bullpen and a rock solid offense (Soto, Rameriez, Lee, Soriano). Winning the Division shouldn't be too hard, but winning in the playoffs? Not too sure about that when you look at history, but this is a good team that can go far. The Cards, Brewers and Reds are all very close to each other. If Carpenter comes back to his old form after a mess of injuries the last two years and the bullpen can pull itself together, the Cards can push the Cubbies a little and content for the wild card. Their offense should be decent with oft-MVP candidate Albert Puljos leading hitters like Duncan, Ankiel and Ludwick. The Brewers lost Sheets and Sabathia but have gotten your hotshot pitcher Yovani Gallardo back which should ease the pain a little. A soild year from Jeff Suppan and Manny Para would give the Brew Crew the tools to contend for the wild card. The Reds have a soild base of young talent (Votto, Phillips, Bruce) and have some hot shot young pitchers (Cuerto, Volquez, Bailey) but will struggle to replace the lost offense of Adam Dunn's 40 home runs and 100 RBIs. The Astros don't have a lot to look forward this year despite a surprise run last year. The have some rock soild hitters in Carlos Lee and Lance Berkman but after Roy Oswalt and maybe Wandy Rodriquez their starting pitching is nothing to look at. The Pirates? The less said about them the better. There's a reason this team hasn't had a winning season since the early 1990s.

NATIONAL LEAGUE WEST
1. LA Dodgers
2. Arizona Diamondbacks
3. San Francisco Giants
4. Colorado Rockies
5. San Diego Padres

This is a tight division that sees each contending team have a glaring weakness. For the Dodgers simpley put, Manny give them the slight advantage. Their pitching is suspect and the offense is relying on some younger players who need to really put it together (Kemp, Ethier). For the Diamondbacks the starting pitching is strong (Webb, Haren, Garland) but the offense is way to free swinging and inconsistant. The Giants have extremely solid starting pitching (Lincecum, Cain, Lowry, Johnson, Zito) and absolutely NO offense. Hell, if Manny had signed in SF instead of LA those two teams might be reversed that's how close these teams are. The Rockies are a decent team with a lot of holes and trading Matt Holiday did not help them. Atkins, Tulowitzki and Hawpe are all decent hitter though. Their pitching is ok, but shakey and pitching in Coor Field is always an adventure anyway. The Padres have Jake Peavy and little else and Peavy is expected to be traded during the season (with the Cubs being the likely destination).

You'll notice I didn't pick a NL Wild card winner. Unlike the AL where I think it'll be the Yankees (or maybe even the Rays), the NL Wild Card could any of the following: The Braves, Phillies, Cardinals, Brewers, Red or Diamondbacks. If I HAVE to pick one, it would either be the Braves or Cards.