The Weekend F5ive

A look at the games getting some TV attention this weekend

1-Dodgers vs. Cardinals Saturday FOX

Kuroda vs. Wainwright

Interest Level: 5

The Dodgers and Cardinals continue with their series this weekend. My projection of a duel between Kershaw and Carpenter turned out to be horribly wrong. Carpenter did his part while Kershaw had a rough day in the office.

We're probably looking at another one-sided affair in favor of the Cardinals on Saturday as Wainwright has thus far one-upped his career year in 2009 and it appears very little is going to get in his way in 2010.

2- Rays vs. Yankees Saturday FOX

Niemann vs. Burnett

Interest Level: 7

This game gets extra interest points for fantasy purposes. On one of my teams, the starting pitching has been solid most of the year and Jeff Niemann has been one of the main reasons why...replacing Javier Vasquez with him has been one of the best decisions i've made all year.

While his strong performance has been aided by really good luck (.242 opposing BABIP). Still, he deserves credit for one of the more under-rated pitching performances of the 1st half as he's in 4th in Wins Above Replacement, 5th in WHIP, 5th in ERA+ so on and so forth....should be a likely win for the Rays in this one.

3- Rangers vs. Red Sox Saturday MLB Network

Lee vs. Lackey

Interest Level: 6

A couple things to pay attention to here. First, will the Red Sox be able to make up ground on whoever loses the Rays-Yankees game/series.

Second, OMG....the Rangers have Cliff Lee.....the Rangers traded for Cliff Lee (so who hasn't traded for Cliff Lee in the past year). In all seriousness, does Cliff Lee bounce back against an inexplicably bad start against Baltimore and take his rightful place in the role of that guy that swings a division race and leads his team to the World Series......he was that guy for the Phils last year....and with the Rangers having an 80% chance of making the playoffs....it's likely he's going to have the same role in Texas.

4- Rays vs. Yankees Sunday MLB Network

Price vs. Pettite

Interest Level: 3

While the pitching match-up is better than the rest of the series....this is where the over-exposure of this entire series being on national television and the Third/West coast bias of myself and this blog kicks in. The outcome will tweak the AL East/Wild Card standings but since both teams have at least a 75% chance of making the playoffs.....there will be more meaningful games between these two as we get deeper into the summer.

5-Phillies vs. Cubs Sunday ESPN

Halladay vs. Gorzelanny

Interest Level: 4

The only reason the interest level is this high is because Halladay is pitching. So, yeah this is pretty much a match-up of two high profile teams that have underachieved to various degrees. The Phillies have done so to a more moderate degree (that they have a 18% chance) of over-coming while the Cubs are the front-runners for the underachieving team of the year award. But the game has fantasy implications as I have Halladay which is about the only reason I personally have for paying attention.

Back From The Break, Five Things To Watch For

So the All-Star Break is coming to an end (after three long days) and i've finally mustered up the motivation to do some writing.

Thursday happens to be a light day (a soft launch if you will).....the only game being nationally televised is:

1-Dodgers vs. Cardinals MLB Network
Kershaw vs. Carpenter
Interest Level: 8

This is a pretty solid match-up to start off the second half and the beginning of things to come. First of all, there is the factor of this being a rematch of last years NLDS. Also, both teams come into this game with legitimate playoff hopes as the Dodgers are 2 games behind the Padres for the west and tied for the Rockies in the Wild Card race. The Cardinals are in decent contending position as well as they sit only 1 game back of the Reds in the Central.

Also, the pitching match-up is nothing to scoff at either. The Dodgers are starting Clayton Kershaw who in my opinion, is one of the under-rated young pitchers in the game. He barely turned 22 before the season started, he's capable of dominating at times, piling up high strikeout numbers (he leads the NL in SO/9) and has improved on his one weakness control (going from 4.8 BB/9 to 4 BB/9 from last year to this). In other words, once Kershaw gets his walk totals a little lower, he is bound to have his name in the discussion of young ace pitchers that has been dominated by Strasburg (despite the disadvantage of playing on the West Coast).

The Cardinals are countering with Chris Carpenter. While Carpenter obviously isn't as young as Kershaw, the last couple of years have proven he can still pitch. He nearly won the Cy Young last year and has followed it up with a strong 2010. This game also includes a conflict of interest element. Obviously, a Dodgers win over the Cardinals would help the Brewers increase their 1% chance of making the playoffs (albeit slightly) while a rough outing by Carpenter would hurt my fantasy team that is in the midst of a season high 3-game losing streak. Either way, expect this to be a close, low-scoring game


Other things that pique my interest:

2- How will the Brewers start the second half?

While the Brewers may have embarrassed themselves against the Giants, they still managed to sweep the Pirates last weekend giving them a 3 game winning streak and get themselves within single figures in the Games Back column. The Brewers have Dave Bush taking the hill. This may not guarantee victory (as indicated by a 4-6 record) but it at least means that more likely than not, the Brewers will at least have a chance to extend their winning streak to 4 as he held the opposing team to 3 ER or less in 14 of his 17 first-half starts.

3- How will the Gonzales/Escobar trade affect the Braves?

We will begin to find out starting with their game against the Brewers. Personally, i'm not sold on it being as positive of an impact as the Braves are hoping. Sure, Gonzales went on a tear in the first half and hit a bunch of homers. Personally, it's more he had an extended hot streak than Gonzales turning a corner (at 33 and with a .296 OBP). The Blue Jays were smart enough to sell high on Gonzales while the Blue Jays were able buy-low to pick up a younger, talented but struggling Yunel Escobar (who's younger (27) has a better OBP than Gonzales (.334...so he's getting on base more often in his worst year than Gonzales has in his best year) and he also happened to be 10th the NL in Wins Above Replacement last year while Gonzales has never had an OPS+ over 100 in a full season.

My take, i'm not convinced the Braves upgraded themselves going from Gonzales to Escobar and there is a fair possibility that they may regret this trade a few years down the line.

4- How long can R.A. Dickey keep this up?

If you would have told me on opening day that R.A. Dickey would have been the Mets best pitcher in the first half and asked me how many games out of first they would be, I would have said 20. However, R.A. Dickey has been a major factor in the Mets having a legit shot at the playoffs. In terms of the NL East race, a major factor for the Mets being a player will hinge on whether Dickey reverts to the journeyman pitcher he was through his age-34 year or if he's made a permanent breakthrough with the knuckle ball that will keep him effective into his 40s.
We'll begin to find out tomorrow as he goes up against Tim Lincecum and the San Francisco Giants.

5- Is this the 3rd straight year the AL Central gets decided in a one-game playoff?

The reason I ask this question is the Twins and White Sox get started in a crucial 4-game series coming up this weekend. In 08 it was White Sox over Twins, last year it was Twins over Tigers. Leads me to think about a couple of weird scenarios. Scenario #1 being that neither team wins it as it would be the Tigers turn to win the AL Central via a one-game playoff. Scenario #2 being an unprecedented 3-way tie that leads to a 3 team round-robin playoff. Considering that Coolstandings.com gives all 3 teams at least a 25% chance but none of them have a 50% chance to make the playoffs.

My prediction, with pitcher Jake Peavy out for the year, the White Sox eventually take the AL Central via the Ewing Theory.

Early Week National TV Baseball Preview

Time to see what's in store to start the second week of the season

Red Sox vs. Twins Monday ESPN

Lester vs. Pavano

Interest Level:6

The Twins finally get to open Target Field. It should be interesting to see how this stadium plays out in terms of whether it will be hitter friendly or not. The Red Sox come into this game at 3-3, the Twins have started 5-2 and at this point and appear to have not missed a beat despite not having Joe Nathan closing games out.

Reds vs. Marlins Monday MLB Network

Cueto vs. Nolasco

Interest Level: 4

The Reds were a lot of peoples pick to be a sleeper team in 2010. With a 3-3 start, they haven't really done anything to prove or disprove this notion. The Marlins had a nice first week going 4-2 and bring Ricky Nolasco (one of my picks to bounce back in 2010) to the hill.

Angels vs. Yankees Tuesday MLB Network

Santana vs. Pettite

Interest Level: 5

The Yankees started off pretty strong this week at a 4-2 clip. The Angels, well they have had better weeks. Hideki Matsui looks to be an excellent signing for the Angels early on as he came up clutch against the A's in last nights game. One of the few bright spots in their 2-5 week. Speaking of bright spots, Brandon Wood has been the exact opposite of this in his first week with a full time starting gig. Is this a sign of things to come or just the result of a bad week? We'll find out in due time.

D-Backs vs. Dodgers Tuesday MLB Network

Kennedy vs. Kershaw

Interest Level: 6

An early season NL West divisional battle. Not too much of a shock that one of these teams is sitting in second and one of them is sitting in fourth. The surprising thing is that the D-Backs are the team sitting in second and the Dodgers are the team sitting in 4th. One good reason to check this game out is that Clayton Kershaw is taking the hill for the Dodgers. Kershaw still struggles with bouts of wildness from time to time but has the talent/potential to be a Cy Young award caliber pitcher. Does this happen in 2010? Stay tuned to find out.

Nationals vs. Phillies Wednesday MLB Network

TBD vs. Kendrick

Interest Level: 4

The Phillies were expected by just about everyone to take the NL East so the fact that they are 5-1 and hanging out in 1st place shouldn't be shock to anyone. The Nationals were expected to drop straight down to the cellar but had a respectable 3-3 first week which was aided by random big games from the likes of Cristian Guzman and Willy Taveras (who did their part to place me in the basement of my Razzball league).

Astros vs. Cardinals

Myers vs. Penny

Interest Level:5

Another game where there isn't too many surprises about the teams respective places in the standings. No surprise at St. Louis at the top. No surprise that the Astros are at the bottom. The one surprise with the Astros is just the degree of ineptitude they have displayed in the first week of the season. They carry the title of being the only team to not win a game in 2010........ouch.

Cardinals-Brewers Series Preview

The first series of the season turned out fairly well with the Crew taking 2 out of 3 from the Rockies. As it stands the Crew trails Pirates and Cardinals by 1/2 a game (they'll either be tied or a game back when the series actually starts.

Friday

Lohse vs. Bush

Chico, California product Kyle Lohse gets the start Friday night. Not a star but always finds a way on someones rotation. Historically, this hasn't been enough for him to be effective against Brewers hitters. Gerut, Braun and Counsell have all hit him fairly well....wouldn't be surprised if Gomez and/or Escobar end up getting the night off.

Dave Bush....well there's no way to go but up from his 2009 performance. The reigning NL leader of Hit Batsmen makes his 2010 debut on Friday. Like his counterpart, Bush hasn't exactly dominated the opposition. Pujols, Molina, Schumaker and Ludwick have all hit him around pretty good. In other words, don't be shocked if both terms score runs by the bunch.

Saturday

Carpenter vs. Gallardo

Well, Carpenter has made it through one start healthy. The health thing all about taking it one start at a time. The reigning 2009 NL Leader in ERA, ERA+, Win Pct. and HR/9 gets the start here. Counsell, Edmonds and Fielder have all hit him pretty well but in general Brewers hitters have struggled against Carpenter (then again who hasn't) to the tune of an .580 OPS

The last time (Monday) Gallardo went up against someone on one of my fantasy teams (Jiminez) he ended up coming away with a loss. Considering Carpenter is on one of my fantasy teams, this isn't a good omen. Another bad omen is that Pujols and Molina have hit him relatively well and current cards hitters have rocked him to the tune of a .846 OPS. Based on the past, this game isn't looking too good for the Crew.

Sunday

Garcia vs. Wolf

In this ESPN-televised Sunday night game, the Cardinals are giving Jaime Garcia his 2nd career start (and 11th appearance). The Brewers may struggle against pitchers making their big league debut but Garcia has started before (albeit once) which alone increases the Brewers hopes.

Sunday marks start number 2 of the Randy Wolf era. His start Tuesday didn't exactly go great but the Brewers did enough on offense for them to win (i.e. for this to not be that big of a deal). Wolf has historically struggled against Lopez, Pujols and Holliday. Wolf going against hitters that have hit him well versus a young inexperienced pitcher, we could be in for another high-scorer on Sunday.

Finally.....Winter's Over....Here's some baseball games that will count

Well, it's FINALLY time for the 2010 baseball season. No more winter, no more spring training....time to see how this goes down....how my predictions (and everyone elses will stand up over the season).....and also how Chedderhead/My Razzball team and the random Cbssports.com fantasy league i'm in that I haven't talked about does.......

Yankees vs. Red Sox

Sunday (Sabathia vs. Beckett) ESPN 2

Tuesday (Burnett vs. Lester) MLBN

Wednesday (Pettite vs. Lackey) ESPN 2

On a scale of 1-10 my interest is a: 1

Like a bad TBS movie that they "give you 3 chances to watch" you get 3 chances to watch the Yankees take on the Red Sox. The Sunday game stands out because its the first game of the season that actually counts. In the context of this season, this series is fairly insignificant but i'm pretty sure ESPN is hyping it like the ALCS because to them, the other 28 teams might as well be Triple-A teams for all they care.....as evidenced by this 2007 expose by the Onion.

In all seriousness, I don't care who it is...baseball is back. You have ex-Brewer Sabathia taking the hill against Beckett who is currently in negotiations for a massive extension (will this keep him in contract year blow the world away mode?)

On Tuesday, MLB Network gets in on the fun as they show game 2 of this series. MLB Network gets a pass on the Red Sox-Yankees criticism I give ESPN as they are taking the step of showing all 30 teams within the first 30 days of the season.

Wednesday marks the first Red Sox start for John Lackey....does he justify the piles of money thrown at him last summer or not? We begin to find out Wednesday

Cardinals (Carpenter) vs. Reds (Harang) Monday ESPN

On a scale of 1-10, my interest is: 6

A few interesting things here:

1) First look at a couple of NL Central rivals: The first look at a Cardinals team that just about everyone (except myself....and I don't see them missing by much) against a Reds team that is a perpetual sleeper in the NL Central

2) A first look at whether Chris Carpenter can replicate his strong 2009 season. Talent isn't the issue, the ability to stay healthy....well that's a completely different story......also he's one of my starters in the CBS league (Baseball, Beer and Bahkas) so i'll be a bit more interested in the results

3) Day 1 of Jay Bruce's breakout season: With Cliff Lee and Huston Street injured, someone is going to have to carry Cheddarhead on their shoulders, it might as well be Jay Bruce.

Indians (Westbrook) vs. White Sox (Buerhle) Monday ESPN2

On a scale of 1-10 my interest is a: 4

The Indians have lots of potential in 2010.....to be as bad or as worse than the Royals. If the Indians have any hope of making that last sentence sound horribly wrong, they are probably going to need Jake Westbrook to make more than 5 starts.

The White Sox on the other hand, have reasonable playoff expectations. They may not be a great team but then again they aren't in the strongest division either. Despite Joe Nathan being shelved for the season, I still think the Twins will win the division (barely.)

Another fun fact is that this game matches up 2 of the 3 pitchers who tied for the league in Hits Allowed in 2006. (The third player, Jon Garland gets the opening day nod for the Padres).

Cubs (Zambrano) vs. Braves (Lowe) Monday ESPN

On a scale of 1-10 my interest is a: 8

Well, the Cubs are involved so if nothing else I have a team to root against. Also, with Carlos Zambrano pitching you never quite know what your getting although this tends to equal itself out over each season as his ERA+ the last few years have been eerily similar (117,118,119) Usually an interesting and harmless experience unless you happened to be dressed like a Gatorade machine and Zambrano doesn't like the umpiring on a given day.

For the Braves, the have Derek Lowe taking the hill here. Lowe is coming off his worst year as a starter but I see him coming back strong in 2010....i'm confident enough in this assertion that he ended up on Chedderhead.

Giants (Lincecum) vs. Astros (Oswalt) Monday ESPN

On a scale of 1-10 my interest is a: 7

Good pitching match-up. Anytime Lincecum takes the hill, it's worth watching (right now he's my favorite non-Brewers player) because you never know whats going to happen. The Astros are looking to Roy Oswalt to anchor their staff this year.

From '01-'07 this would have been a fairly sound strategy. However, Oswalt's performance and his health have regressed a bit in the last couple years ......pretty much a microcosm of the Astors as a whole.

Twins vs. Angels

Baker vs. Weaver Tuesday MLB Network

Pavano vs. Santana Wednesday ESPN 2

On a scale of 1-10 my interest is a : 6

It should be interesting to see how the Twins come out of the gate. Will their saavy winter moves and the momentum of locking up Joe Mauer be the catalyst towards another playoff appearance. Or will the downgrade from Joe Nathan to whoever they have closing games bring them back to the pack.

For the Angels, will they rack up another AL West title or will the Mariners off-season moves allow them to overtake Los Angeles of Anaheim of North America of the Northern Hemisphere and be top of the class. To answer some of these questions but raise more questions than are actually answered, stay tuned to find out.

Brewers vs. Rockies Wednesday MLB Network

See, Brewers-Rockies Series Preview Post

NL Central Preview Part II:

In the quest to answer the ultimate question of where do the Brewers stack up against their NL Central brethren, it is time to complete the second park (pitching half) of the NL Central Preview:

Our standings after the first half are:

Brewers 22

Cardinals 23

Cubs 25

Reds 29

Pirates 34

Astros 35

Starting Pitching

Cardinals-Carpenter/Wainwright/Lohse/Penny --4

Cubs-Zambrano/Lilly/Dempster/Wells/Silva-- 8

Brewers-Gallardo/Wolf/Davis/Bush/Parra/Suppan's Expiring Contract--12

Reds-Harang/Arroyo/Bailey/Owens/Chapman-16

Astros-Oswalt/Rodriguez/Norris/Paulino/Moehler--20

Pirates-Malholm/Duke/Ohlendorf/Morton/Hart

The rankings for this are fairly relative and contextually based as none of these rotations are without their question marks. The Cardinals get the nod because their question marks are less glaring. For them the questions are Can Carpenter stay healthy ? Maybe Will Wainwright pitch as well as he did last year? Probably not Will Lohse do what Kyle Lohse usually does ? Probably Will we see the Brad Penny that struggled in Boston or the Brad Penny that pitched strong in San Francisco ? Arguments for the latter--He's still in the National League, he had Dave Duncan as pitching coach--Argument against--He doesn't get to make half his starts at Pac-Bell

For the Cubs--Can Zambrano stay healthy AND not be a distraction? Probably and Probably not Will Ted Lilly be an All-Star and be the only representative again? Maybe and Probably not Will Randy Wells sneak up on anyone again? Unlikely Will Cubs fans still rationalize that trading for Carlos Silva was a good idea even though he is one of the WORST pitchers in the league. Regardless of how rocky Miton Bradley's tenure was in Chicago, they reality is that they got ABSOLUTELY FLEECED IN THIS DEAL. Since we are on the subject here are five things the Cubs could have gotten in return from Milton Bradley and have it work out better for them than trading for Carlos Silva.

1) Random AA Player

2) Random A Player

3) $20 Starbucks Gift Certificate

4) CDs from any of the following artists......Nirvana, Heart, Pearl Jam, Alice In Chains, Queensryche, Jimi Hendrix, Soundgarden

5) Matt Hasselbeck......he might play a completely different sport but it's not that hard to top Carlos Silva's "production"

6) A bag of baseballs

On one hand I feel I am being too generous with the Brewers rotation rankings. On the other hand, the rotations ranked below them ain't setting the world on fire. The argument for....Yovani Gallardo has ace potential. He showed many flashes of promise as he struck out 200+ batters last year and he was the only Brewers starter that didn't make me absolutely cringe. I am a bit concerned that he walked 94 batters as well but he's only 24 and he's on the cusp of being one of the elite pitchers in the game.

The argument against--relative weakness from 2 to 5. The Brewers addressed their rotation needs by signing Randy Wolf over the winter. While the Brewers stretched it money-wise with their decision based on his career year, I still see him eating some innings winning about a dozen games and having an ERA close to 4. Not exactly #2 pitcher caliber stuff but an improvement over last year. The Brewers also brought back Doug Davis and its reasonable to expect his performance will be similar to Wolf.

In the 4-5 position it's likely that Suppan will get a spot he does not deserve well because he gets paid a lot of money. The last spot will be between Parra (who is too talented to pitch as bad as he did last year) and Dave Bush while not having the high ceiling as Parra has shown the ability in to put up Wolf/Davis type numbers. Not to be forgotten is that the Brewers have a new pitching coach (Rick Peterson) who does have a sucessful track record in the bigs.

In terms of starting pitching, the Reds are the biggest wildcard in the equation. In terms of how they actually do in terms of starting pitching comes down to 1) Is this the year Homer Bailey lives up to the hype surrounding him? and 2) Is Aroldis Chapman as good as everyone says he is?

For the Astros the question is begged Can Oswalt stay healthy and will Rodriguez pitch as well as he did in 2009? Maybe and Maybe and will the Pirates pitching be as bad as it looks on paper? Dude, it's the Pirates and the last time I checked the calendar it isn't 1992.

Bullpens

Brewers-Hoffman/Hawkins/Coffey-4

Reds-Cordero/Rhodes/Herrera-8

Cardinals-Franklin/Reyes/Miller-12

Cubs-Marmol/Grabow/Marshall-16

Pirates-Hanrahan/Asciano/Veal-20

Astros-Lyon/Lindstrom/Fulchino-24

While the Brewers starting pitching cost them a chance to contend for their second straight trip to the playoffs, the bullpen did what they could. Hoffman had a 2009 season that defied his age. It would be too much to expect a repeat of 2009 but Hoffman is still one of the better closers in the league. Like Wolf, the Brewers stretched a little bit on years and money for Hawkins. Still, Hawkins has shown he can be an effective pitcher as long as the team hes playing for isn't dumb enough to put him in the closers role. Todd Coffey is example one of too many to count of players that seemingly were going nowhere until Doug Melvin picked them off the waiver wire. There's a lot to like about Coffey....the full on sprints from the bullpen....the fact that it took him forever to give up a run when the Brewers signed him. Plus the full on vendetta he has against the broadcast team of the Reds.

The this single-handedly makes Todd Coffey the man story as found via a Google Search for Jeff Brantley Todd Coffey and the first organic result from the Dayton DailyNews:

Former Reds relief pitcher Todd Coffey, now with Milwaukee, pitched a 1-2-3 inning against the Reds then ran into a railing in front of the Brewers dugout because he was staring at the radio booth where Jeff Brantley was seated. When Coffey was with the Reds, Brantley said of him, "It is difficult to pitch with both hands around your throat."

If that's not epic I don't know what is.......

The Reds get the second spot with the back of their bullpen anchored by Francisco Cordero. I'm going to skip talking about the Reds bullpen and discuss a random Francisco Cordero anecdote. So the gym that I work out at has 7 TV screens. Five of them actually have cable (unfortunately one of these...sometimes two is dedicated to the vile that Sean Hannity calls "analysis".....but thats another rant for another day).....Anyways, the two other TV screens run a blatant inundations of local ads on a 5-10 minute cycle and usually there's some recent news and some sports trivia questions that run within the cycle of these advertisements. Anyways, I was working out one day and one of the trivia questions was who won the 2006 NL MVP. The first choice was the winner (Ryan Howard) the second choice (Barry Bonds) while off his MVP-peak would still pass for a plausible wrong answer....the third choice.....Mr. Francisco Cordero.....hmm I wonder which one isn't like the others. The same Francisco Cordero who while having a fine career being a 3 time All-Star and quietly putting up a career ERA+ of 148 but also the same Francisco Cordero who has never finished above 24 th in MVP-voting.

If we were going solely on what happened in 2009 instead of what's likely to happen in 2010 the Cardinals would have a higher rank based on Franklin's career year. I'm definitely not sold on Franklin repeating his career year........I'm not sold on Carlos Marmol getting through the year without giving the Cubs fits at closer.....I'm not sold on anyone that puts on a Pittsburgh Pirates uniform.......Also, if the Astros keep Brandon Lyon in the closers position....wait for disaster.......some people were made to be middle-relievers and not closers....Brandon Lyon fits perfectly within this scope of some people.

Final Results:

Brewers-38

Cardinals-39

Cubs-49

Reds-57

Astros-75

Pirates-79

Wow.....by every other projection and even my pre-conceived notions of this team......best case was second worse case was fourth and probable case was third. If this holds up we could be up for an epic battle for the NL Central title. Of course, this assumes a lot of things go right, i.e. the starting rotation getting their act together, the bullpen being strong all year and what I believe will be the make or break factor assuming little to no change elsewhere....the ability of Rickie Weeks to stay healthy AND effective all year. It will take seven months to figure out whether this is the smartest or dumbest posting I write all year. I'm either on to something that no one else is or I just gave homerism a really, really, bad name......not the avant gard homerism you see given to the Yankees by ESPN but Carlos Silva-bad homerism........now we play the waiting game.

NL Central Preview Part 1

So there are a lot of important questions to be asked for the upcoming baseball season. How bad are the Royals going to be? How epic is my fantasy team going to be? Who's going to win it all? Isn't dedicating a prime 9 to the Tampa Bay Rays sort of like making a greatest hits album for Vanilla Ice? But all of these questions are inferior to THE ultimate question........Where Can I expect the Brewers to finish in the standings this year?

Only one way to find out.....break it down the NL Central just like it's any other division

Catcher

1-Geovany Soto

2-Yadier Molina

3-Gregg Zaun

4-Ryan Doumit

5-Ramon Hernandez

6-J.R. Towles

Yes Soto had a terrible season last year. Note the emphasis on a terrible season, not being a terrible player. Easily attributable to an obscenely low BABIP. Yadier Molina had another All-Star season last year and he can play defense but I find it hard to associate a Molina brother with being an offensive juggernaut. For the Brewers, having Zaun instead of Kendall allows them to jump from the bottom to the middle of the pack in this position but a sense of reality and perspective needs to be placed in that Zaun is a middle of the pack catcher...no better...no worse.

First Base

1-Albert Pujols

2-Prince Fielder

3-Derrek Lee

4-Joey Votto

5-Lance Berkman

6-Steve Pearce

All I have to say about 1 to 5 is......wow. First Base is deep in this division. It's obvious that Pujols is the best at this position and in the league until proven otherwise....still in a love/hate mode with myself for drafting him onto Cheddarhead but c'mon it's Pujols. Prince Fielder is amongst the top candidates to dethrone King Albert as the best hitter in the league but wanting to be number 1 and being number 1 are two different things. There are talks of a contract extension in place so maybe this will motivate him to go from his status as an already great hitter to being in his own top echelon. Derrek Lee is a great hitter in his own regard but a notch below Albert and Prince. Votto and Berkman are fairly interchangeable. Votto is on the way up and could be in line for a breakout season. Berkman, while still a great hitter is getting up there in years and seems more vulnerable to injury and/or regressing numbers than Votto.

Second Base

1-Brandon Phillips

2-Rickie Weeks

3-Felipe Lopez

4-Akinori Iwamura

5-Kaz Matsui

6-Mike Fontenot

How production from this position actually shakes out is highly reliant on the ability of certain players (Rickie Weeks....cough...cough) to stay healthy. Phillips and Weeks are in the top tier for this division. Both Phillips and Weeks have the talent to put up 20-20 seasons. Phillips gets the nod because as of now, he's been the one to fulfill said talent.

Weeks is definitely a talented player and has been a breakout prospect for a long time but has been plagued by under-performance and health injuries. 2009 was beginning to look like his breakout year but then....BOOM....out for the season. Here's to Weeks fulfilling his potential in 2010.

Shortstop

1-Alcides Escobar

2-Ryan Theriot

3-Brendan Ryan

4-Ronny Cedeno

5-Tommy Manzella

6-Paul Janish

The shortstop position in two words......Paper Thin. Yes, I realize Escobar is a work in progress especially in the Power and Walks department but a combination of his assets (good contact, blazing speed, strong defense) and going up against players that peaked last year and even then didn't peak that high (Theriot) a prototypically bland middle-infielder (Ryan) and three players that despite being on the wrong side of 25 don't have anything screaming about them that they will ever be stars (Cedeno, Manzella and Janish)..leads to a pretty weak crop of Shortstops.

Third Base

1-Aramis Ramirez

2-Casey McGehee

3-Scott Rolen

4-Pedro Feliz

5-Andy LaRoche

6-David Freese

Another fairly weak crop. Despite the injury concerns/issues surrounding Ramirez the reality remains that he is by far the most talented amongst this crop. McGehee is definitely a Major-League caliber starter but how good he ultimately will be is still debatable. On one hand, McGehee's breakout season was aided by a fairly lucky BABIP. On the other hand, he had his breakout season without being completely healthy. While Scott Rolen's ability to stay healthy is highly questioned, hes still a fairly productive hitter. That is more than we can say about Pedro Feliz has overcome hitting double figure home runs on a yearly basis to consistently hit 20 percent below league average.

Left Field

1-Ryan Braun

2-Matt Holliday

3-Carlos Lee

4-Alfonso Soriano

5-Chris Dickerson

6-Lastings Milledge

This field busts out into 3 tiers. Braun/Holliday are in Tier One. If I were to reduce the face of the Brewers to one player, it would be Ryan Braun. All he's done since coming to the bigs is knock the cover out of baseballs. He's asserted himself as the vocal leader of this squad even saying things to the media that pretty much every fan was thinking (i.e. last year's pitching was terrible).

While Holliday is also amongst the elite hitters in the league, he does have the strike against him that he struggled a bit in his stint in Oakland (regardless of how much McAfee stadium is to blame). That and in full disclosure I am a bit biased towards Braun.

Carlos Lee is a distant third. He's become so reliable to hit .300 and go yard about 30 times a year that he's sort of fallen into the background. A great hitter, a solid producer its just that Braun and Holliday are better. Soriano obviously has lots of talent (its sort of hard to be a 40-40 player without it) but things have definitely gone south for him since becoming a Cub. Definitely a make or break year for him.

Center Field

1-Andrew McCutchen

2- Marlon Byrd

3-Colby Rasmus

4-Drew Stubbs

5-Michael Bourn

6-Carlos Gomez

McCutchen was good enough to actually make the Pirates decision to trade McLouth look justifiable. He should continue to improve and progress until the Pirates decide to trade him in the name of continuing their perpetual cycle of losing. Byrd had a nice year in Texas....not sure how the momentum of that and being away from Texas will affect his game this year. Rasmus had moments last year....he's better than the players below him....but haven't seen enough to rank him any higher.

Yes, Drew Stubbs had a nice run after getting called up but I would like to see him sustain that level of play for more than a couple months before signing off on him as a star. Bourn had his career year last year and I wouldn't be surprised to see him struggle at the plate this year....as I've mentioned here before....I am not very confident in the current ability level of Carlos Gomez and he is ranked accordingly.

Right Field

1-Jay Bruce

2- Hunter Pence

3-Ryan Ludwick

4-Garrett Jones

5-Corey Hart

6-Kosuke Fukudome

One of the tougher rankings by position. Jay Bruce may have only hit .223 last year and struggled with injuries. However, he is on the cusp (i.e. a couple months away) from stardom.....he was ridiculously unlucky at the plate as evidenced by a .222 BABIP. In other words, he should have hit closer to .260.....even with this bad luck he still went deep 22 times in 345 at bats. Also, he'll be 23 next month indicating he'll only get better than where he is currently. Even if he doesn't actually improve and the only difference is he doesn't get hurt and he doesn't get horribly unlucky we could be looking at .260-.270 hitter with 35-40 homers.

Two through five are fairly close. There's something about Astros hitters with power that makes them hard to notice. I don't know whether its the hitter friendly park or if its because their team isn't very good but Hunter Pence has managed to go deep 25 times the last couple years without anyone really noticing.

Where to rank Hart, Jones and Ludwick is a bit more ambiguous. That could be because their bodies of work are so similar, they make each others Top 10 lists for similarity scores. Both are average to slightly above average hitters whose reputations are expanded by a career year aided by an inflated BABIP (Hart in 2007, Ludwick in 2008). Both players could potentially drive in 100+ Runs because of pitchers opting to pitch around star hitters in the lineup (Fielder/Braun and Pujols/Holliday). Corey Hart is younger and likely has more years ahead of him while Ludwick has done more with the opportunities given as he has the advantage in OPS+ (117 to 106).

Thus Ludwick is 3rd and Hart is 5th. Why does Hart fall to 5th? Because i'm not quite sure what to do with Garrett Jones. On one hand, his monster season last year would have projected to a 40 homer season. On the other hand, the fact that he was aided by a generous BABIP (.327) and he didn't get his first chance to play regularly until 28 raises a few red flags. I don't think hes going to be total bust (i.e. Michael Bourn) and he's still better than Fukudome but I don't see him hitting 40 out this year. Not sure exactly where he will fall in the context of Hart-Ludwick but I could see him moving to a new normal of slightly above average and thus I am splitting the difference and ranking him 4th.

And our standings after one half:

Brewers-22

Cardinals-23

Cubs-25

Reds-29

Pirates- 34

Astros-35

Some surprises some non-surprises. I am slightly surprised that the Brewers have a lead (albeit slight one). I'm not shocked that Milwaukee, St. Louis, Chicago and Cincinnati occupy the top four positions. However, i'm surprised at the exact order of the four teams. To my absolute non-shock, the Pirates and Astros are not even to the top. In all fairness, the halves are broken down into hitting and pitching and one reason the Brewers are even close to the top (let alone at the top) is that the pitching staffs don't get ranked until the next post. Well whatever helps me sleep easier at night.

Monday Baseball Ramblings

Well, the Yankees are back in the World Series

While the Angels definitely helped the Yankees in this process due to some bad innings, un-clutch defense, so on and so forth.......at least they made the series somewhat interesting. The Yankees proved again that you can indeed buy at least a League Championship......They face off against the Phillies who are trying to repeat.......if they were real people.....it would give the gang from Its Always Sunny another chance to sneak into a world series game, deliver a letter to Chase Utley...or go up against the Fanatic for mascot supremacy......or not

Manny Acta gets another chance

When Acta got fired from the Nationals job....I mentioned that there was no way to tell whether the his bad record was because he's not a good manager or because he was managing a really bad team. Arguably, the same could be said about this Indians team he is inheriting. I'm not going to stretch and say the Indians are as bad as the Nationals....but they have traded away enough players in the last couple years that they could almost field a team. Still, Acta will have a better chance to win in Cleveland since he moves away from a competitive NL East to an AL Central division that is arguably the weakest in baseball. If he does a good enough job as a manager and catches a few breaks he could be heading a competitive team within a couple years.

Mark McGwire: Hitting Coach

Honestly, i'm a bit surprised by this development. Mark McGwire struck me as someone who was over the spotlight of being involved with the MLB as we haven't heard much from McGwire since he stopped playing (well except for that one time where he said he didn't want to talk about the past). It will be interesting to see how having McGwire around will affect the Cards. The two troubling things (for St. Louis) are that being a star as a player doesn't mean they are that good as coaches and b) if/when another steroid controversy breaks out about a current or past player, it has the potential to serve as a distraction to the Cards as McGwire's alleged use is inevitably going to come to the fore-front. Either way, it should be interesting to see how he holds up in a coaching role.

Outsmarting the experts and why I would vote Chris Carpenter for the Cy Young Award

This is the second (in a yet to be determined amount of columns) where I use logic and reason to outsmart Joe Morgan. This time, instead of taking a broad brush the focus is going to be on the NL Cy Young Race. During his chat last Tuesday, the following question was posed:

Steve (Middletown, CT)

Who is your NL CY Young winner?

Joe Morgan

(11:17 AM)

I would give it to Wainwright, but there are a lot of people that believe that Carpenter deserves it. Wainwright pitched more innings, he was there the whole year. Carpenter had the injury. Wainwright led the league in wins and had more innings than Lincecum and Carpenter. ERA and strikeouts don't impress me as much as wins do. The name of the game is to win.

Admittedly, the Cy Young Award race is close and all 3 of the pitchers mentioned (Wainwright, Lincecum and Carpenter) have pretty strong cases. The problem I have is the way he reaches his conclusion.....i'll breakdown the segments and then mention why I would vote for Carpenter

a) Wainwright pitched more innings, he was there the whole year

Fair enough. Wainwright did lead the NL in innings pitched but didn't necessarily leave his Cy Young competition in the dust. Wainwright had 233, Lincecum 225 1/3 and Carpenter 192 2/3, all three have a long body of work and pitched more than enough innings to contend for the lead in rate statistics (ERA, SO/9, WHIP, etc.)

Using innings pitched for Cy Young Criteria isn't the best logic. For example, Bronson Arroyo was 4th in innings pitched with 220 1/3, but it would be absolutely absurd to vote for him and his 15-13 3.84 era 115 ERA+ season for a Cy Young Award over a more deserving candidate such as Carpenter on this basis.

b) Carpenter had the injury

Alright, he was injured but he only missed about a month. Granted this doesn't help his case but it isn't an automatic dis-qualifier. Still, Carpenter was very dominant and was healthy in the June/July part of the season when the NL Central was close and needed him to step up (which he did). Also, Lincecum only gets a passing mention here and he didn't even lose time to injury.

c) Wainwright led the league in Wins

That's nice...the Cy Young Award is around for the purpose of recognizing the best pitcher. While being a superior pitcher generally leads to more wins, that is not always the case. On a theoretical basis, pitcher A pitches 5 innings gives up 6 runs, leaves with a 10-6 lead which his bullpen holds on to and gets the win. Pitcher B pitches a gem throws 8 shutout innings but gets no run support and gets a no-decision or loss. Is pitcher A a better pitcher because he got the win? no.........while this is one start and a small sample size it does illustrate that having more wins doesn't make one a better pitcher

In a world where wins was used as the criterion for Cy Young voting....a league average pitcher like Jorge de la Rosa 16-9 4.38 era 103 ERA+ would be in this Cy Young discussion while Tim Lincecum's much better 15-win season would be ignored....obviously most people see through the absurdity of the win-total statistic and thankfully no one is dumb enough to vouch for de la Rosa winning a Cy Young for this reason.

To further demonstrate the absurdity of win-loss totals, i'll use my Brewers as an example. Braden Looper (1/2 of the two-headed monster i've named Jaden Loopan) led the Brewers in wins with 14. Was he the best Brewers pitcher this year? Would anyone be dumb enough to argue this? No and I really hope not. Looper gave up a ridiculous amount of home runs but also had a ridiculous amount of run support.

In comparison, Yovani Gallardo had a much better season, was the ace of the staff and ended up with a record of 13-12. Anyone with half a brain would realize that Gallardo is a much better pitcher than Looper and the differences in win-loss records had a lot more to do with one pitcher getting much better run support than anything else........a vote based on win totals could lead to a Looper-esque pitcher being backed for Cy Young Award and that is a scary notion.

d) ERA and Strikeouts don't impress me as much as wins do

Since I just finished a very long-winded rant about the weakness of the win stati'll focus on the ERA part of the argument. Since I don't necessarily hold high batter strikeouts against a player if they are productive hitters otherwise (i.e. Adam Dunn/Mark Reynolds) i'm going to divert my argument towards the ERA side.

While ERA isn't a perfect stat, it does a much better job of measuring pitching effectiveness than wins. It does cut pitchers some slack in some cases such as if they give up a big hit after an error for example but there are worse stats (Wins)....but it gives a reasonable portrayal of how good or bad a pitcher is

Carpenter 2.24

Lincecum 2.48

Wainwright 2.62

Also, even though he hasn't been in the Cy Young discussion at all (due to bad luck in W-L column) i'd like to recognize Jair Jurrgens for having an excellent season and having a better ERA than Wainwright.....he had to work much more for his 14-win season than Braden Looper and Carl Pavano had to work for theirs.

Personally, I depend more on the ERA+ statistic as a better metric and to give context to where these pitchers rank within the league (Carpenter 185+, Lincecum 173+, Wainwright 158 ERA+)........to wrap around to the initial argument, why do I mention these numbers.....well because the object of the Cy Young Award is to recognize the best pitcher and the ERA stats are able to give us a quick and dirty measurement of who pitched better, pitcher A, pitcher B or pitcher C

e) If I had a Vote for the Cy Young Award I would vote in this order and because:

1) Chris Carpenter-By every measurable metric, he has the most well-rounded and dominant body of work....the missed starts weaken his case but it only makes the race closer....but not cost him the award

2) Tim Lincecum- Lincecum is a beast, a freak of nature (in a good way) and one of the most exciting players to watch. If the season had ended in August I may have been swayed to place him #1. However he has two flaws in his body of work which drop him to second. First, he didn't quite measure up statistically to Carpenter. Second, even if he did what he did with the season on the line would have been used as a tie-breaker that he would have lost. He had a bad month (by his standards) a 3.38 era in September and most importantly got rocked in a crucial game against LA on the 20th 5 ER in 4 innings when the Giants were playing for their playoff lives. Carpenter on the other hand, was unbeatable in July (when St. Louis was fighting for NL Central Supremacy) and in August (when they were pulling away).

3) Adam Wainwright- I know it may sound like i'm being critical of him in this article. But he had an amazing season and a strong breakout year. Carpenter's and Lincecum's seasons were just better.

First Impressions of This Years Playoffs

Alright, so the first three days of this years playoffs are in the books....while 3 of the 4 series have teams leading 2-0, the games have been more compelling than this may indicate....my impressions form

Rockies v. Phillies

Well, like most sequels, Rocktober II got off to a lack-luster start. The Phils have already done better in this version than they original as they've actually won a game this time. The weird thing is that while this is the only tied up series...this is the series that I haven't gotten the least into

Cardinals v. Dodgers

Prior to the series, I argued that the Dodgers would win this series due to having a better-rounded team. I also mentioned that while the Dodgers have several players who could step up on any given day...the Cardinals are revolved mostly around Carpenter, Wainwright, Holliday and Pujols.

This series isn't even over and the Cardinals have been hurt by 2 of these players not playing up to their regular season performance. Chris Carpenter did has non-stepping up on a more subtle level as he got out-pitched by Randy Wolf of all people.

Then there is Matt Holliday. Thursday started off well for him with him hitting a home run early on. However, thats not what people are going to remember. He's obviously going to be remembered for his missed opportunity to grab the final out of the game (plus getting hit in the groin with the baseball---usually you have to watch MTV for something like that...and the impending collapse that occurred afterwards.

While Holliday obviously made a crucial error, he definitely can't be blamed entirely for the loss. After this error the Cards were up 2-1 with a runner on base and 2 outs. I get the vibe that the defensive gaffe will cover-up the very non-clutch performance of Ryan Franklin.....its not like he gave up the game-tying/losing hits to the meat of the line-up...he blew this game against two players who did time on some bad Brewers teams in the late 90s (Ron Belliard and Mark Loretta).

Twins vs. Yankees

Todays match-up was a lost opportunity for the Twins. They were up 3-1 on a couple late RBI singles. A normally clutch Joe Nathan blows the game on the biggest stage.....can't capitalize on loading the bases with 0 outs and left 17 men on base...........14 of those potential runners that could have let them win this game......there are some things you can blame on payroll discrepancies...Game 2 is not one of them.........if this didn't ruin the Twins morale...the walk-off home run from Mark Teixeira pretty much finished off the job

Angels vs. Red Sox

Well, the Angels are one win away from beating the Red Sox for the first time in a playoff series. Whether they follow through on this is yet to be seen. They have to travel east to Fenway Park so anything can happen here. For what its worth out of the 4 times a team has come down 2-0 in the ALDS...the Red Sox have been the team to come back two of those times ('99 vs. Cleveland and '03 vs. Oakland)

Still, to pull this off (or win a game) they need to get their offense going. Scoring 1 run in 2 games is not a good things.

For a while this game looked like it was going to be more epic than the preceding Twins/Yankees game. Josh Beckett and Jered Weaver went blow for blow until the 7th inning until the Angels broke through for a 3-run inning.

On a misc. note, this series has allowed C.B. Bucknor has gotten his 15 minutes of shame. How hes umpring in the playoffs is beyond me. His work has been bad enough to have various edits made to his wikipedia page.

Well thats my gut reaction to the first few days of the playoffs......can't wait to see how the rest of this plays out.

Divison Series Preview Part 2: Dodgers/Cardinals

And on to the 2nd of the 4 part Divisional Series Preview Posts

Catcher:

Russell Martin .250/.351/.330 82 OPS+

Yadier Molina .293/.366/.383 99 OPS+

Russell has been an All-Star in the past but 2009 is not his year.

Yadier Molina has always been a strong defensive catcher and is slowly but surely becoming at least an average player at the plate. Plus Molina is in his own stratosphere defensively.

Advantage: Cardinals

First Base

James Loney .281/.358/.400 100 OPS+

Albert Pujols .331/.446/.667 191 OPS+

Loney has had some success in the post-season (specifically crushing the Cubs hopes in '08) but he's definitely a pretty light hitter, for a first-baseman.

Pujols has (for better or worse) had the MVP lined up for him since about mid-season.

Advantage: Cardinals

Second Base:

Orlando Hudson .283/.357/.417 104 OPS+

Skip Schumaker .301/.363/.391 100 OPS+

Hudson, has been one of better free agent pick-ups this year has been steady at second and picked up his second all-star appearance.

Schumaker has had a nice season in St. Louis. He doesn't have as much power but he's pretty good at getting on base.

This is the first close positional match-up. Both of these players will be making their post-season debut. Hudson gets the nod here since he's had to wait longer to make the post-season and this will give him that extra bit of motivation.

Advantage: Dodgers

Shortstop

Rafael Furcal .269/.334/.375 87 OPS+

Brendan Ryan .291/.340/.395 95 OPS+

Another pretty close match-up. If you based it on talent Furcal would win this match-up in a rout but he's had one his worst seasons in '09.

Brendan Ryan strikes me as another run of the mill light-hitting middle infielder.

While Furcal hasn't been the greatest post-season hitter...he does have plenty of post-season experience and has the potential to quickly make people forget about his uninspiring season.

Advantage: Dodgers

Third Base

Casey Blake .278/.362/.468 117 OPS+

Mark DeRosa .226/.291/.409 83 OPS+ (St. Louis) .252/.320/.436 96 OPS+ (Overall)

Casey Blake has a solid veteran contributor since being traded from Triple-A Cleveland last summer.

Mark DeRosa was the Cardinals first attempt to get some significant protection behind Albert Pujols in the line-up. Things haven't quite worked as expected as DeRosa has battled injuries and struggled at the plate since he's been in St. Louis. Like Furcal, DeRosa has the talent to make people forget about his struggles with a really good series. However, in this case it isn't enough to get the nod

Advantage: Dodgers

Left Field

Manny Ramirez .290/.419/.534 150 OPS+

Matt Holliday .352/.410/.604 165 OPS+ (St. Louis) .313/.392/.514 142 OPS+ (Overall)

Manny Ramirez may have not been the wrecking-ball that he was in late '08 but he's still one of the games greatest hitters who strikes fear in opposing pitching staffs.

Matt Holliday was the Cardinals second attempt at acquiring protection for Pujols in the line-up. This attempt worked out much better than DeRosa. He has been a beast in the line-up ever since coming over from Oakland. This match-up is pretty close but Holliday has made a deeper impact on his team by being the X factor that allowed the Cardinals to run away with the NL Central.

Advantage: Cardinals

Center Field

Matt Kemp .299/.354/.493 121 OPS+

Colby Rasmus .254/.309/.412 90 OPS+

Matt Kemp has made another move towards becoming an elite-center field both at the bat and on the field.

Colby Rasmus has had a promising rookie season but still has a ways to becoming a great player.

Advantage: Dodgers

Right Field

Andre Ethier .273/.360/.510 127 OPS+

Ryan Ludwick .267/.329/.451 105 OPS+

Ethier has further solidified himself as one of the better right-fielders, even if not many people know who he is.

Ryan Ludwick has been solid this year but has regressed a bit from his career-year last year. Ethier gets the nod in this match-up

Advantage: Dodgers

Starting Pitchers

Randy Wolf

Clayton Kershaw

Hiroki Kuroda

Jon Garland/Vicente Padilla

vs.

Adam Wainwright

Chris Carpenter

Joel Piniero

Todd Wellemeyer

This one isn't even close. Randy Wolf has been described as the de-facto ace for the Dodgers......definitely not buying it....Kershaw is likely to be one of the elite pitchers within a few years but tends to get wild from time to time....not too much else about the Dodgers rotation is inspiring

The Cardinals on the other hand, have two pitchers in Wainwright and Carpenter who have solid cases for winning the Cy Young Award and a third pitcher Piniero who is in the midst of a career-year.

Advantage: Cardinals

When the game's on the line, these are the pitchers you are likely to see:

Jonathan Broxton

Ramon Troncoso

Ronald Belisario

vs.

Ryan Franklin

Kyle McClellan

Jason Motte

Broxton has been steady all year in the closers role. Troncoso and Belisario have been solid and under-rated in their late-inning roles.

Franklin has been okay in the second half but he has definitely cooled-off from his unstoppable performance in the first-half. McClellan and Motte haven't been as unstoppable in their roles and that's why the Dodgers get the nod here.

Advantage: Dodgers

X Factor:

The Dodgers are weak in this area. They did get hold on to win the NL West and they were never in danger of missing the playoffs but they weren't the same team in the Second Half as they were in the first half. They played well when Manny Ramirez was suspended and looked unstoppable for half of the season. However, they seem to have rested on their laurels and when you almost blew your division lead to a team that was 15 1/2 out at one point...your mojo has been lost.

The Cardinals have been on the opposite course. They were in contention in the first-half but appeared to be beatable and stoppable. Until late July..the NL Central was open for the taking. However, once they acquired Matt Holliday that all changed. With a 1-2 combo of Holliday and Pujols, the Cardinals went on a tear and turned the NL Central into a one team race.

Advantage: Cardinals

Final Tally: Dodgers 6 Cardinals 5

The Cardinals do have a lot going for them but are dependent on about 4 players (Pujols, Holliday, Carpenter and Wainwright)...considering it's a short 5-game series anything can happen.

The Dodgers, despite their second-half struggles seem to have a more balanced team and more players that could win the game (or series) for them on any given day

Prediction: Dodgers in 5

It's the end of the season as we know it: Brewers-Cards

Well, we've reached it....the end of the 2009 Baseball Season and a return to the wrong side of .500. What did the Brewers accomplish this week? They helped the Rockies make the playoffs and made sure the Braves did not advance to the playoffs. For the final series of the season, they get to face off against a St. Louis Cardinals team that is tuning up for the playoffs

Brewers 77-82 vs. Cardinals 91-68

Friday

Looper 13-7 5.10 era 82 ERA+ vs. Wainwright 19-8 2.58 era 162 ERA+

This game has a a few interesting questions that will be answered. 1) Will Braden Looper somehow manage to lead the Brewers in wins this season without actually being good. 2) How far will he push himself up the single-season charts for home runs allowed in a season (he's tied for 23rd coming in to today) 3) Will Adam Wainwright win his 20th game and strengthen his argument for the Cy Young Award

Saturday

Villaneuva 3-10 5.24 era 80 ERA+ vs. Lohse 6-9 4.84 era 86 ERA+

Carlos Villaneuva gets a chance to end his disappointing season on a strong note. The Cardinals counter with Kyle Lohse as he finishes off a typical Kyle Lohse-type season.

Sunday

Narveson 2-0 4.01 era 105 ERA+ vs. Piniero 15-12 3.44 era 121 ERA+

Chris Narveson gets the last start of the season to finish off his case for being included in the 2010 rotation. He's had good moments (striking out 10 Cardinals, the last time he faced them). If he can address his durability issues in the off season and make it past 5 2/3 innings the Brewers may have a solid middle-of the rotation starter in Narveson.

Joel Piniero has a chance to mark an exclamation point on one of his finest seasons to date. The main thing to ask here is if his strong play will carry over through the playoffs and into 2010.

Flash Forwarding to Week 3 NFL Action

For the second straight week, I am writing my NFL preview post in context of a season premier of a TV show. This week i'm multi-tasking between this post and the series premier of Flash Forward. Not even 10 minutes in and everything has delved into chaos (there was even a billboard for oceanic airways in the background)

Anyways, i ain't here to talk about the island (tonight) 8 15s or synchronized blackouts.....its time to talk about some football.

Packers 1-1 vs. Rams 0-2

I'm still trying to figure out how the Packers lost to Bengals of all teams. How did Cedric Benson manage to have a good game? How did Chad Ochocinco (or whatever he's calling himself this week) manage a successful Lambeau leap? What happened to the good old days (2006) when an opposing player attempting to pull this stunt got pushed back onto the field.

As bad as things were for the Packers they have at least one thing going for them, they're not the Rams. This is a golden opportunity for the Packers to add one to the win column before their Monday Night showdown against the hated Vikings.

Colts 2-0 vs. Cardinals 1-1

The Colts are coming off a thrilling late win over the Dolphins on MNF. It hasn't been pretty or dominating but the Colts still look like they're going to be strong even with a change at head coach.

The Cardinals were able to bounce back with a win over the Jaguars. The Jags look like they're heading for a terrible season. Pretty much, this game will do a lot to determine if the Cardinals still have some of that mojo that almost got them a Super Bowl win (and the Armageddon that would have followed) or if they're going to be amongst the many Super Bowl-losing teams to not even sniff the post-season.

Redskins 1-1 vs. Lions 0-2

Well, the Redskins about as little as possible to beat a pathetic Rams team last week. Lucky for them, they get to play the one team that's even worse the Detroit Lions

The Lions are only 14 games away from being the first team to have two straight 0-16 seasons. Honestly, I wouldn't be shocked to see it happen. Point being, the Redskins could be one of the most uninspiring 2-1 teams in NFL history after this weekend is over.

Broncos 2-0 vs. Raiders 1-1

I'm not sold on either of these teams. The Broncos 2-0 looks okay on the outside. However, those wins came against the Bengals and Browns. Also, with the train wreck circus revolving Brandon Marshall's legal troubles, the fact that Kyle Orton is their quarterback and whatever controversy Josh McDaniels finds himself in between now and Sunday, I don't see the Broncos winning ways holding up the rest of the season. (But they'll get to 3-0 before that happens)

Fortunately for the Broncos, they are playing the one team that has an even bigger circus surrounding their team. So the Raiders pulled out a win against the Chiefs, the Raiders team still looked like a train wreck even in this rare instance where they managed to not lose. I just can't take any team seriously that involves head coaches punching assistants, Al Davis involved in any capacity (let alone as owner) and JaMarcus Russell as a starting quarterback.

Falcons 2-0 vs. Patriots 1-1

So far, the Falcons strong 2008 seems to be legit. The NFC South is braced for an exciting 1-2 race between Atlanta and New Orleans.

The Patriots are coming off a loss to the Jets. They seem to have lost the mojo that they've had for most of the decade. They're one crazy comeback away from being in an 0-2 hole. Still, they are team that is not to be taken lightly. Tom Brady may have been injured all of '08 but he still needs to be taken seriously in opposing teams game plans. Probably one of the more intriguing match ups of the week.

Seahawks 1-1 vs. Bears 1-1

The Seahawks are coming off a bad loss to divisional rival San Francisco. Considering how mediocre the NFC West has been in recent years, it shouldn't be too hard to make up this early deficit.

The Bears seem to be pretty tough to figure out. Are they the sloppy team that played in week 1 or are they the team that's able to pull out a win against the defending champion Steelers? Well, they're playing another team that hasn't figured out whether they will be good or bad this year so this game is unlikely to reveal the answer, regardless of what happens.

Texans 1-1 vs. Jaguars 0-2

Still not sold on the Texans, especially with Steve Slaton off to a good start. Still, they have a pretty easy opponent in the Jags so they still have some time to get things together enough to contend for their first playoff bid.

The Jaguars.....look to be getting worse......absolutely nothing about this team inspires me.

Baseball Weekend Preview

The second to last weekend of regular season baseball is upon us. The pennant races are not as thrilling as usual but there's still a glimmer of hope that if Detroit or Colorado struggles an entertaining week could still happen. As always, the games are ranked from 1 to 5 based on how interesting I find the series.

Red Sox vs. Yankees =1

FRI-TBS, SAT-FOX, SUN-ESPN

Lester vs. Chamberlain

Matsuzaka vs. Sabathia

Byrd vs. Pettite

There are 28 other teams that play major league baseball but these two are the only ones to get slobbering obsessive coverage from the national media. If a playoff series was at stake I could see having all 3 games on national TV but in reality this series is a play-off tune up for both teams. The Yankees have a pretty healthy lead in the AL East and the Red Sox have the wild-card more or less locked up.

Still, there are a few things to watch for this weekend. First, OMG Joba Chamberlain is starting. OMG the Joba Rules....lets see how bad we can mishandle Joba Chamberlain and how much hype we can give an average pitcher who had two really good months...back in '07. This is the real life equivalent of that South Park episode where it's revealed they build up stars at a young age only to watch them self-destruct (Britney Spears/Miley Cyrus).

Second, Can Dice-K bounce back from a bad year and be a factor in the playoffs? He's pitched better in his first two starts back. How he does against the Yankees will go a long way to determine this.

Third, will C.C. Sabathia pitch strong and strengthen his grip for the battle of who's going to finish 2nd in the Cy Young voting to Zack Greinke?

Cubs vs. Giants =3

Sat-FOX Gorzelanny vs. Zito

The Cubs playoff hopes are more or less done. However, they do have a chance to play spoiler and bring the Giants down with them. The Giants have exceeded preseason expectations all year and still have a slim hope at the wild card despite having a horribly inept offense (except for Pablo Sandoval).

The main reason to watch this one is to see if Zito can keep his hot streak alive. After signing a massive contract for the Giants, he has performed significantly worse than the contract given to him. This year he's experienced a resurgence as well and a big start from Zito would do a lot to keep the pressure on the Rockies.

Cardinals vs. Rockies = 3.5

Sat-MLB Network

Wainwright vs. Jimenez

Probably the best series of the weekend. For the Cardinals, this series serves as a play-off tune up as they've long since left the rest of the NL Central in the dust. That doesn't mean they're going to take it easy on the Rockies as they co-ace Adam Wainwright.

For the Rockies, they need to play well in this series to maintain their lead in the wild card race and to seal off their playoff hopes. The Rockies have their own developing ace, Ubaldo Jimenez taking the hill on Saturday.

In other words, expect a really good pitchers duel in this game. Also, as much as I hate to admit...the Cardinals playing well this weekend would be good for MLB overall as it would increase the chance of a thrilling end of season showdown between the Rockies, Giants and Braves.

Baseball For the Weekend: These Races Need to be Closer

So, Baseball is coming down the stretch run, another weekend closer until we can talk about the Playoffs?!!....Also, with the weekend is another batch of games....as always games are ranked on a scale of 1-5.

Angels vs. Rangers =4

SAT-MLB Newtwork (Weaver) vs. (Feldman)

Sun-TBS (Lackey) vs. Holland)

Well this is he Rangers last chance to steal the AL West from the Angels. They've had a solid year to build on in 2009 and seem to have found a formula for the next few years (provided they're able to keep Maddux as their pitching coach). However, when it comes to their 2009 Playoff hopes, they need to sweep the Angels to keep themselves in contention. If this don't happen the Rangers playoff hopes are most likely put on hold for another year.

The Angels, are in a much better position as they sport a comfortable 6 game lead as of this writing (thursday morning). They've gone through a lot of adversity this year, have had struggles in the starting rotation (though Lackey and Weaver are their two starters who have pitched well)..and have benefited from Kendry Morales' breakout year.

The Rangers start one pitcher having a good year (Feldman) the value of which is inflated by his 16 wins and one pitcher having a terrible year (Holland). They counter Morales in the breakout year department with ex-Brewer prospect Nelson Cruz.

Giants vs. Dodgers =4.5

(Penny) vs. (Billingsley) SAT-FOX

The Giants/Dodgers games have a tendency to be entertaining in September regardless of their places in the standings. They have a tendency to play spoiler to each other which is expected out of bitter in-state rivals.

This year it's the Giants who are fighting for their playoff lives after falling 3.5 games out of the Wild Card race and being shut out by Jorge de la Rosa, a pitcher who was so bad when he played for the Brewers that he got exiled to the Royals for Tony Graffanino. Brad Penny had an excellent start against these same Dodgers on Sunday and they need him to repeat that performance to keep their fading playoff hopes alive.

The Dodgers have the best of both worlds. They are likely playoff bound as they have a comfortable 5 game lead in the NL West AND they get a chance to spoil the Giants playoff hopes.

Either way, expect an intense back and forth game with a slight chance of this game being talked about years later.

Twins vs. Tigers =4

(Pavano vs. Verlander) Sat-FOX

Well, it's do or die time for the Twins. They have managed to get themselves within 4 1/2 games of the Tigers and a weekend sweep would be the first step towards wiping out 140 or so games of mediocrity and sneak into the playoffs.

The Twins start Carl Pavano in this one. Despite his injury/mediocrity laden past, he has a chance at redemption in Minnesota. When the Twins traded for him, I argued that the trade was unlikely to make an impact on the race. So far that argument has been weakened as Pavano has pitched reasonably well in Minnesota 3-3 3.75 era 111 ERA+. A strong start by Pavano here as the chance to kill my original argument and make me look like an idiot. Still, I wouldn't mind if this happens since this season needs an epic pennant race (or two) and the Twins playing well this weekend would be a first step towards that.

The Tigers counter with ace Justin Verlander who takes the hill in an attempt to shut down the Twins' said playoff hopes. Also, Verlander has a chance to increase his league lead in Strikeouts and Strikeouts/9IP.

Cubs vs. Cardinals =2

(Dempster vs. Smoltz)=Sat-FOX

(Zambrano vs. Carpenter)= Sun ESPN

In most years a September, Cubs/Cardinals match-up would be more compelling as these two teams are fighting for a playoff spot more often than not.

However, 2009 is a whole different beast as the Cardinals have left the rest of the NL Central in the dust, thus making this series less compelling.

The Cubs only post-season hope is if the Rockies and Giants BOTH choke and stop winning games all-together. That's unlikely to happen so for the Cubs the only motivation is playing for pride while for the Cardinals this series will be a likely playoff tune-up.