March 18, 2004
Weak East?
In comments to yesterday's post on a balanced schedule, Dean writes:
Do you think that by being in the AL East, they will ever be a strong team in a weak division, barring moving to another division or revenue sharing? That is, will the Yankees or Red Sox ever be a weak team?
My answer is yes, but not very often. The Yankees in particular are approaching a tipping point in terms of age. They are putting out an old starting lineup, and an older pitching staff as well. I can easily see age decline + injuries lessening the impact of that team this year. In other words, lots of things can go wrong. If they go wrong for both the Yankees and Red Sox, the other teams in the division would be at an advantage in a balanced schedule, because they would get to play those weakened teams often. Now, both those teams have money and good management, so I would expect they could plug holes, but stranger things have happened. I remember a season in the mid-70's where the Yankees came into spring stocked with outfielders, and by mid summer they were playing two catchers in the outfield.
Posted by David Pinto at
10:27 AM
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Scheduling
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While this is true, this can be said for any team. Angels? Vlad has a bad back, and their pitching staff is coming off a bad year. Red Sox? Pedro & Schilling are coming off injuries AND they're old, too. Phillies? More injuries and pitching questions. Cubs? Can their young pitching staff hold up with all the work they've been getting, and can Sosa rebound?
My point is that every favored team has weaknesses, whether it's an old pitching staff, or stars coming off injuries. What David says in his post shouldn't be confined to the AL East, but should be generalized even more, and by then the statement kinda loses some of its strength.
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Their should be a balanced schedule if there is a Wild Card. The wildcard should not be determined by division. This year if Boston and an improved Tor and Balt beat each other up it's quite possible that a much better Boston club could lose out on the Wild Card to a team like Minnesota whose schedule will be magnitudes easier in the unbalanced format. If a 92 win Minnesota team playing in the weak Central won the wild card over a 91 win Red Sox team where the unbalanced schedule is the determining factor on who advances, is that be good for baseball?
Golly, so the Rays might have a chance at a wild card someday. That fact alone may keep me going another year.
Seriously, there are good things to be said about both arrangements, but a balanced schedule seems better suited for wild card position, so that you're comparing apples with apples as was mentioned in the original St. Pete Times article.
The Yanks are rapidly aging. But George likes veteren players and once this batch retires he will pluck some slightly younger guys. So I don't think they will be weak anytime soon because of the amount of money they have coming into their system.
The Red Sox seem commited to developing minor leaguers better than they have in the past. They also have a smart general manager in Theo Epstein who is great at signing bargain players and can balance the payroll nicely. I don't seem them being poor neither because of their lofty payroll combined with some slick roster moves.