Baseball Musings
Baseball Musings
March 31, 2007
AL Central Preview, 2007

The AL Central became a little more muddled on Friday when we found out that surgery sidelined Kenny Rogers for half a season. Originally, the Tigers came out on top of my prediction for the division, but I need to rethink that.

The Indians are the trendy pick to win the division in 2007. Looking at the team, I'm not sure why. Cleveland pulled off an amazing feat in 2006, out scoring the opposition by almost 90 runs but posting a losing record. It was in fact, the second year in a row they underperformed their projected wins based on their runs scored and runs allowed. Some blamed the bullpen, and Shapiro rebuilt that over the winter. A big part of the blame can be placed on the infield defense, however. Cleveland was the most porous AL team in 2006 in allowing batters to reach on ground balls. Shapiro tried to plug those holes as well, as he starts a different first, second and third baseman than he did last April.

But will it be enough? The Indians pitching staff is constructed to put a lot of ground balls into play. There's uncertainty to that kind of staff, as bad hops or bad fielding can really hurt. A staff of strikeout artists might be the better way to go. And going with younger, unproven hitters doesn't mean the offense will be as good as the 2006 squad. After getting burned in 2006, I'm not jumping on the bandwagon. If the Tribe continues to under-perform, watch for Eric Wedge to get fired.

Before the Rogers injury, I liked the Tigers to succeed where they failed in 2006 and take the division. They boasted the best rotation in the Central, but fall short without the gambler. Still, despite Chad Durbin, it's not bad. Unlike most teams, there's no clear ace on the staff, but every one of the starters gives about the same level of good performance. I expected Kenny Rogers to decline but thought improvements by Bondermand and Verlander would help make up some of the gap. This injury took them from being slightly better than Chicago to a couple of steps behind. We'll see if any of the Tigers prospects get a chance to pitch in case of a Durbin failure.

On offense, the Tigers return the same solid lineup, with the addition of hard hitting Gary Sheffield. That should provide the boost to increase their run total from the previous season and keep them in contention in the AL Central. The caveats, however, are the older players like Ivan Rodriguez and Magglio Ordonez. Magglio was healthy for the first time in a while in 2006 and there's no guarantee he'll repeat that.

The defending division champs, the Minnesota Twins, boast three of the best players in the division in Mauer, Santana and Morneau. It's a great way to assemble a team, putting three superstars on the field and surrounding them with good players. Unfortunately for the Twins, the rotation lost two pitchers as Brad Radke retired and Francisco Liriano is out after undergoing Tommy John surgery. That leaves little certainty behind Santana. They'll depend youngster Boof Bonser to fill one of those roles. But despite a strong farm system, the back of the rotation gets filled by three poor quality veterans in Ortiz, Silva and Ponson. That might cost the team the division.

The White Sox come out as the number two team in the Central based on my quick and dirty calculations. However, a number of arrows point down on the team. The biggest ones come on offense. They added Darin Erstad because of the extremely poor offense of Brian Anderson, but that just made an aging team older. They'll field six 30+ hitters, and that means there's a higher likelihood to decline than to get better. The pitching is solid top to bottom and Chicago is likely to say, "Danks you," to the Rangers for their new fifth starter. A rebound by Buerhle after a down 2006 puts this rotation heads shoulders above the rest of the division. Still, if Dye and Thome fall off from their great seasons, there might not be enough runs to win.

And bringing up the rear once again is the Kansas City Royals. They hired a new number one starter, but Gil Meche would be no better than the third starter on any other team in the division. And the rotation gets much worse after that. On the offensive side, Mark Teahen and Alex Gordon promise to be the start of something better for the Kansas City. If they can surround them with decent players over the next few years, the Royals can contend again.

So here's my projected order of finish.

  1. White Sox
  2. Tigers
  3. Twins
  4. Indians
  5. Royals

This is a change from my radio programs. The Tigers losing Rogers and the Twins going with Ponson, Ortiz and Silva knock both of those teams down in my estimation. The emergence of Danks means Chicago owns the best rotation in the Central. And while I expect the offense to decline on the south side, there still are good hitters on that team. This is another division that's shaping up for a very close race for the title.


Posted by David Pinto at 02:11 PM | Predictions | TrackBack (0)
Comments

How any self-respecting statistical analyst/baseball expert can pick the White Sox to win this division, I will never know.

Posted by: anon at March 31, 2007 02:45 PM

Indians - 93-69
Tigers - 89-73
Twins - 85-77
White Sox - 76-86
Royals - 69-93

Posted by: Santos Sorrow at March 31, 2007 03:10 PM

I must agree with the others. The White Sox rotation had career years in 2005 and regressed back towards normal in 2006. I do not see that rotation doing well and they are killing their offense by playing Erstad and Pods full time. Jenks is going to be a disaster in the closers role and the bullpen in general is not that strong. I see this as a .500 team tops and probably lower.

Posted by: Ender at March 31, 2007 03:31 PM

The White Sox? Really?

I was definitely thinking they're a 75 win club. That offense is pretty bad outside the obvious Konerko-Thome-Dye, and even Konerko was terrible a few years ago and Thome is like 46 years old. Podsednik and The Punter at the top of the lineup, reportedly? LOL.

Plus, I think they have the worst pitching staff in the AL this side of the Royals. I wouldn't be shocked if no one in the rotation posts a sub-4.5 ERA. When Javier Vazquez is probably your best pitcher, you're in for a long season. At least the backend of the bullpen should be pretty good with MacDougal and Jenks.

Posted by: Whoa at March 31, 2007 03:35 PM

talk about self-respecting? picking the Indians to win the division? Did they really make such great offseason moves to warrant a 20-game improvement? They have two solid pitchers in Lee (injured) and Sabathia (soon-to-be). Unless you are a fan of guys like Byrd, Borowski and Roberto Hernandez.

The Tigers have done nothing to suggest that they will have any fall-off. Rogers will be missed, but the Tigers staff is so deep, they can cover for him. If Durbin falters, Ledezma, Miller or Jurrgens can fill in. We are talking about a 5th starter here.

Tigers 92-70
White Sox 87-75
Indians 85-77
Twins 78-84
Royals 65-97

Posted by: clemma at March 31, 2007 03:36 PM

I think it is safe to say the Wild Card is not coming out of the Central anymore. As David Pinto said before, the two best teams in the AL are in the East. 1 through 4 the Central is good, but not great. Just good enough to beat eachother up, and keep their win totals hardly above 90.

In the East the top 3 teams will beat eachother up, but they've got two whipping boys in the O's and Rays. And given the strong rotation and excellent starting depth of the Jays, serious injuries to the Yanks or Sox could allow them to slip into the Wild Card.

Posted by: Dan at March 31, 2007 04:12 PM

Wow, gutsy call - and that's coming from a Sox fan!

Posted by: Joseph J. Finn at March 31, 2007 04:38 PM

well, the indians don't really need to make up 20 games. as david pointed out in the orginial post, they underplayed their pythagorean by 11 games. david seems to think that this was because of the defense, but i guess i don't understand that line of thinking. i'm willing to be convinced that some of their negative pythag was real, but i think most of it was probably bad luck (with some bad base running).

Posted by: amos at March 31, 2007 05:36 PM

I know I'm waaay late for this discush, but how "trendy" are the Indians a pick this year? On ESPN.com, only Rob Neyer has them winning anything (WS, division, or wildcard). They were the "trendy" pick last year, and prob the year before that too (I remember Gammons in 2005 lovin' 'em.) You just sound a little burned David.

Posted by: Erik at April 1, 2007 01:52 PM

Whoa, the team with no offense other than Konerko, Thome, and Dye scored the third most runs in baseball last year. 2 runs behind Cleveland. So, like, you don't make any sense.

Posted by: Pdubs at April 1, 2007 04:10 PM

Tigers 94 - 68
White Sox 86 - 76
Indians 85 - 77
Twins 83 - 79
Royals 50 - 112

Posted by: Syd at April 1, 2007 07:34 PM
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