First baseball post
2006 AL Power Ranking, Pre-ST version
1. White Sox I was not a believer last year, but the improvements they've made to a WS champ are unbelievable. Major weaknesses include holes in the lineup at 3B and SS, injury risks at the power positions DH and RF. Major strengths include offensive depth (Mackowiak was a huge, and underrated, acquisition, ( Read more... )
1. White Sox I was not a believer last year, but the improvements they've made to a WS champ are unbelievable. Major weaknesses include holes in the lineup at 3B and SS, injury risks at the power positions DH and RF. Major strengths include offensive depth (Mackowiak was a huge, and underrated, acquisition, ( Read more... )
The Indians, I'll be honest, I'm not sold on myself. But they have the potential to win something like 110 games this year if nobody regresses dramatically, and it's hard to predict any of those guys doing that. If anything, their lack of depth on the pitching side is what will do them in.
I feel very strongly that just about everybody is underestimating the A's. Sure, they're young, but none of them are rookies. In a funny way, sucking so badly for the first 2 months last season is the best thing that could have happened to their 2006 team. All the kids got plenty of PT, got to go around the league a couple of times, got to get used to the major league grind, with no expectations whatsoever.
It's Crosby's third year, and he was held back by injuries all last year. Swisher, Johnson, Haren, Blanton are all in their second years. These are not raw kids we're talking about. Also, with the depth they've got: Payton/Kotsay/Bradley, Kielty, Swisher, Johnson, Thomas for the three OF spots, 1B, and DH, they can lose two starters and legitimately replace them without missing a beat. Or Bradley could implode. Or Payton could throw another hissy fit. They've managed to insure themselves against catastrophe better than any team I've seen in a long while. Their rotation is sick. Two years in a row? I gave up on Zito in 2003, and he's still proving me wrong. Harden, Haren, and Blanton all have astounding pedigrees; look up their ml numbers and you can see they all made the transition to the majors as smoothly as you could hope, and aside from Harden's injury history and Blanton's conditioning, there's virtually not a single warning sign.
I'm telling you.
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