| One month left in the MLB season
How do you think everything will shake out? Here are the races (the leaders, and all teams within 10 games of them):
AL East
New York
Boston 7.5 GB
Toronto 9.5 GB
AL Central
Detroit
Chicago 5 GB
Minnesota 5.5 GB
AL West
Oakland
Anaheim 7.5 GB
Texas 8.5 GB
NL East
New York
Philadelphia 15.5 GB
Florida 16.5 GB
NL Central
St. Louis
Cincinnati 3.5 GB
Houston 6 GB
Milwaukee 8 GB
NL West
Los Angeles
San Diego 3 GB
San Francisco 5 GB
Arizona 6 GB
Colorado 8.5 GB
AL Wild Card
Chicago
Minnesota .5 GB
Boston 6.5 GB
Toronto 8.5 GB
Anaheim 9 GB
Texas 10 GB
NL Wild Card
San Diego
Philadelphia .5 GB
Cincinnati .5 GB
Florida 1.5 GB
San Francisco 2 GB
Houston 3 GB
Arizona 3 GB
Atlanta 4 GB
Milwaukee 5 GB
Colorado 5.5 GB
Obviously, the most interesting race is the AL Central. The Tigers have had a comfortable lead all season, but the White Sox and Twins have slowly been creeping up. I still think the White Sox are the best all-around team in the AL, and I think they will end up winning that division. Now, it remains to be seen if the Twins can topple them too. That would be crazy. Personally, I think it will the Tigers and the White Sox who make it, with the Twins falling just short
Then, there's the crazy NL wild card. Basically, 10 mediocre teams are in the running to see who will get swept by the Mets in the first round (unless it's one of the NL East teams). I'm going to eliminate some of the pretenders right away: The Reds have given up more runs than they've scored. Their run has been kind of a fluke. They'll fall off.
San Francisco is old, Barry is not the Barry of old (I just read today that his SLG% is .200 lower than any year since 2000), Jason Schmidt is the only pitcher I trust on that team. They wont make it.
Colorado and Milwaukee have nicce little teams, and have bright futures ahead of them, but they have to leapfrog too many other teams. And I dont think they have the talent to do so
Florida has played way beyond expectations. But, they simply have too many rookies, especially in their starting rotation. Those pitchers have never thrown this many pitches in a season, and are in danger of wearing down.
I dont know how Arizona has gotten this far. Besides Brandon Webb, they dont have a single player that I think is any good. I guess thats what happens when you play in the worst division in the game, in the weaker League. The same goes for the Padres. They have very few players that I would consider "good". But soemhow, they're the wild card leaders.
Which leaves us with 2 contenders: The Phillies have the hitting (Utley, Howard, Rollins, Burrell, etc.), the Astros have the pitching (Clemens, Oswalt, Pettite)
Personally, I think the Phillies will take it. The Astros offense is TERRIBLE, and the Phillies have some decent pitchers. |