2010 Baseball Preview: AL East

Fictional famous baseball player - "So who's your favorite player? (beat) It's Johnny Damon, isn't it?"
Veronica Mars - "He's sooo hot."

You know you have a baseball problem when you start judging and being disappointed in fictional characters because of their favorite baseball players. In any case, thus begins my preview of the upcoming baseball season, starting with the AL east, the meat grinderiest of baseball divisions. Later previews will detail the other divisions of course, and at the end of the season all of my picks can be judged for the incorrectness that they are. I'll try to be objective here, but we all know that my hatred for so many players, teams, fanbases, and mascots can lead to that not happening. My fantasy addiction will of course cloud my judgment, but hopefully I can overcome that. Nevertheless, we'll see what happens.

So as we all know, the AL East contains 5 teams; 3 good and 2 mediocre.

The Yankees, last year's World Series winner, don't look any weaker, and with the signing of Curtis Granderson and Javier Vazquez look just as strong. I am incredibly glad that I root for an NL team and hardly ever have to play them. Many people I know hate the Yankees for buying their championships or whatever reason they claim, but (I blame Dan) I don't hate them. Personally, they know how to get wins, and I wish we could know how just as well. Hopefully, after we get rid of some of our bad contracts we can do just as well as they have. And now that we've recently decided to be Yankees NL Central version, in a few years I think we will. But I can easily see the Yankees repeating as AL East champions. Their pitching is better (even though Vazquez isn't going to be sub-3 ERA again thanks to new Yankee stadium), and Granderson, even though he has a few problems (notably against LH), is still gonna be YUGE in Yankeeland. Still champs, still something I don't want to face in the Series if we get there. But we'll see how our division breaks down when I get to it.

The Boston Red Sox last year came in second. The last bahzillion years, the wild card has come out of here. This division is freaking tough, and the Red Sox...are no longer the reason why. I just glanced at the depth chart and from what I can see there is no real offensive powerhouse here. There's a bunch of GOOD players, but there's no one in this lineup that I don't want to face, were I a pitcher. Kevin Youklis is tough, but not crazy difficult. David Ortiz is over the hill and not the powerhouse he once was. Adrian Beltre and Marco Scutaro are mediocre to freaking terrible, I don't care what their defense adds. Defense is important but so is scoring a few runs. Dustin Pedroia is a decent 20 HR - 20 SB guy, but he didn't deserve that MVP. Meanwhile, Mike Cameron and JD Drew are about five seconds removed from an injury. At least their pitching staff with the exception of Daisuke is pretty good. I think they'll hit a close third behind...

The Tampa Bay Rays, America's favorite team. From getting fans to shave mohawks into their hair to actually having a devil ray mascot in a tank near the field, this is my favorite AL East team. If I ever move to Florida, screw the Marlins, I'm gonna be a Rays fan. They have some great power threats on this team, from Carlos Pena to Evan Longoria to Ben Zobrist. Plus they got the speed in Crawford and Upton, and one of the best home-grown pitching staffs I've ever seen. Shields, Garza, Price, Davis, they're all really good and home-grown. The benefit to tanking for most of your first 11 years is that you get a lot of good players together at one time. Sadly other teams haven't been able to get that same level of talent. If things go well for the Rays, I can see them taking second place and the wild card. Because I'm a Rays fan of course. Boston still might be able to get things done, but I'm cheering for the Rays, and they're the ones I'm giving the card to.

The Toronto Blue Jays came in fourth last year. Adam Lind does provide some excitement, but you can't have a team with one good player. Aaron Hill isn't going to be as good as he was last year, Lyle Overbay is relatively meh, as is Edwin Encarnacion, Vernon Wells makes me glad that my team doesn't have the worst contract in baseball currently, it's a blah team. Blahhhhhhhhhhhhhhh. The pitching staff has a lot of could-be's, potentials, and possibles. But that's sort of assuming they're not in the AL East. They aren't finishing higher than fourth this year, and they need more help to make their team able to compete in the future. Good luck, Toronto.

The Baltimore Orioles came in 5th last year, with a record of 64-98. That is abysmal. That is just grotesque, no matter what division you're in. And this offseason has not been filled with confidence for this team. They willingly gave Cesar Izturis a job, and hired Miguel Tejada and Garrett Atkins to play 3rd and 1st, respectively. Granted, they're not blocking anyone at those positions, but there had to be better players on the market than those two. Their outfield is filled with good players but none of them have the chance to play. They have to split two positions between Felix Pie, Nolan Reimold, and Adam Jones. Meanwhile, there pitching staff is just depressing. Yeah I know they're supposed to be focusing on the future, but that's one faraway future with this team. 5th again.

Stay tuned for more division previews in upcoming weeks.