2010 Baseball Preview

In the next week or so I will be previewing a division for the upcoming baseball season.  Talking with my fellow meatball about a roadtrip to Yankee stadium this summer got me in the baseball mood.  We'll start with the NL East.

NL East

Order of Finish
            2009
1. Phillies     93-69
2. Marlins    87-75
3. Braves     86-76
4. Mets        70-92
5. Nationals 59-103

            2010                                      
1. Atlanta Braves                        
2. Philadelphia Phillies (wc)        
3. NY Mets                                
4. Florida Marlins                      
5. Washington Nationals             

 Young Players to Watch

Jayson Heyward - OF ATL (1)*
Stephen Strasburg - P WSH (2)*

Key Player for Each Team

Atlanta - Brian McCann - C - Needs to be the guy in the middle of the order, must be more consistent.
Florida - Hanley Ramirez - SS - Contunies to get better, has he tapped all of his potential?
NY Mets - David Wright - 3B - Is he ready to make the Mets his team?
Philadelphia - Cole Hamels - SP - Can he shake World Series nightmare?
Washington - Jason Marquis - SP - Must be productive so Strasburg doesn't have to rush into the Show

Notable FA Signings

Jason Bay - OF NYM
Matt Capps - RP WSH
Troy Glaus - 3B ATL
Adam Kennedy - 3B WSH
Jason Marquis - SP WSH
Placido Polanco - 2B PHI
Ivan Rodriguez - C WSH

One more could be on the way with the Nationals continuing to be very busy this off-season.

Summary

The Nationals were the busiest of the group this off-season.  They added Marquis, Kennedy, Capps, Pudge, and are close to signing former Yankee ace, Wang.  Brian Bruney was also added from the Yankees.  Stephen Strasburg will likely make his debut sometime this season, but doubtful that he makes the team coming out of Spring Training. 

The rest of the group is pretty even with Philly being the most talented.  The Mets still have all sorts of issues, Santana and Beltran are major question marks and noone has a clue what they will get out of them.  The Marlins are a crazy team to me.  They have talent, but their owner refuses to spend money to keep the young core together a la Jeremy Hermida who signed with the Red Sox.  The Phillies are the favorite to win this division and they deserve to be the favorites.  They are the defending NL Champs and return almost everyone and they added Roy Halladay. 

The main reason I will take the Braves in this divison is because of 2 things.  Their outfield and pitching.  The Braves reportedly offered a one year deal to Damon for less than 4 million.  This most likely won't happen with the Tigers offering a 2 year 20 million dollar deal, but this would be a  great compliment to their already talented outfield.  Nate McClouth (28), Melky Cabrera (25) and Jayson Heyward (20) have the potential to be a great trio for many years to come, all are under the age of 30.  The rotation will probably start with Lowe, Jurrjens, Hanson, Hudson, and Kawakami.  The latter part of the rotation must stay healthy for this team to win the division.  Gonzalez leaving hurts especially if Billy Wagner can't close out games.

(wc) - Wild Card
* - denotes ranking in ESPN's top 100 prospects.

-Mikey