The Giants Baseball Blog

Finally, we end up in NL West, where the top 3 teams all believe that they have a shot at winning the division. Manny Ramirez's return to LA likely pits the Dodgers as the favorite, but they have a few teams (Giants and D-Backs) right on their heels that are looking to improve on what they did in 2008. 1st Place, Los Angeles Dodgers Lineup: SS Rafael Furcal 2B Orlando Hudson CF Matt Kemp LF Manny Ramirez C Russel Martin RF Andre Ethier 1B James Looney 3B Casey Blake Pitching: RHP Hiroki Kuroda LHP Randy Wolf RHP Chad Billingsley LHP Clayton Kershaw RHP James McDonald SU: Hong-Chih Kuo CL: Jonathon Broxton DL- RHP Jason Schmidt (May) Position-by-position, the Dodgers are the best team in the division, hands down. The re-signing of Manny Ramirez puts them right back into the drivers seat in the NL West and unless Manny gets hurt, that's where they should stay all season. They have speed, they play good defense and they'll score runs, but the only question surrounds their star...

The NL Central is one of the more evenly matched divisions in baseball. The top three teams in the division have a legit shot at reaching the playoffs, which should make for an exciting regular season. 1st Place, Chicago Cubs Lineup: LF Alfonso Soriano SS Ryan Theriot 1B Derek Lee RF Milton Bradley 3B Aramis Ramirez C Geovany Soto CF Kosuke Fukudome 2B Mike Fontenot Pitching: RHP Carlos Zambrano RHP Rich Harden LHP Ted Lilly RHP Ryan Dempster LHP Sean Marshall SU: Carlos Marmol CL: Kevin Gregg The Cubs are once again loaded with talent, top to bottom. The problem they've had over the last couple of years though is keeping everybody healthy, especially their starting pitching. Zambrano and Harden are a potentially great 1-2 punch at the top of the rotation, but it's really anyones guess as to whether or not these guys will last the whole season. Their bullpen should be a strength as they have two guys who can close in Carlos Marmol and Kevin Gregg. Pinella has hinted that Gregg ...

The National League East is going to be one of the best divisions in baseball in 2009, much like their American League counterpart. There is a ton of talent in the division, including the reigning world champs, so whoever comes out of the NL East will likely be the team to beat in NL playoffs. It also wouldn't surprise me to see the top 3 teams (Mets, Phills and Marlins) all finish within a few games of each other. 1st Place, New York Mets Lineup: SS Jose Reyes LF Daniel Murphy 3B David Wright CF Carlos Beltran 1B Carlos Delgado RF Ryan Church C Brian Schnieder 2B Luis Castillo Pitching: LHP Johan Santana RHP Mike Pelfrey LHP Oliver Perez RHP John Maine RHP Livan Hernandez SU: J.J. Putz CL: Francisco Rodriguez DL: RHP Tim Redding (late-April/early-May) The Mets are bringing back the exact same lineup that ended the season for them last year and are hoping they all can stay healthy. If they do so, they should have one of the better offenses in the league. I'm still waiting for D...

The AL West seems like one of the easier divisions in baseball to predict this year. There's the class of the division, the LA Angels, then the rest of the bunch could basically finish in any order behind them. Here's how I think it will go: 1st Place, Los Angeles Angels Lineup: 3B Chone Figgins 2B Howie Kendrick RF Vladimir Guerrero LF Bobby Abreu CF Torri Hunter 1B Kendry Morales DH Gary Matthews Jr. C Mike Napoli SS Erick Aybar Pitching: RHP John Lackey RHP Ervin Santana LHP Joe Saunders RHP Jered Weaver RHP Dustin Moseley SU: Scott Shields CL: Brian Fuentes DL: RHP Kelvin Escobar (late-April) The Angels' move to obtain Bob Abreu went way under the radar, but that move really completed their offense if you ask me. Their lineup has everything; speed, power, average and clutch hitters all the way down the order. Their starting rotation has some question marks entering the season, as both Escobar and Santana may not open the year on the 25-man roster, although Santana shou...

I wanted to break away from the divisional previews for a post because there has been a lot going on in Giants camp recently, including a game Monday which included appearances from both Randy Johnson and Tim Lincecum vs. the Mariners. Johnson didn't throw quite the way he wanted to, throwing only 3 innings, giving up 2 earned runs on 3 hits. Lincecum threw a little better as he was the second Giants starter to go 6 innings in an outing this spring, giving up 3 runs on 4 hits while striking out a batter. Bruce Bochy said that from here on out, starters are going to start getting into the 5 th and 6 th innings with more regularity as there is only about a week left on the Cactus League schedule. Another positive to come from Monday's game in Scottsdale was the play of Pablo Sandoval. The Giants 22 year-old third basemen hit his 3rd home run of the spring while going 3-4 Monday, raising his spring average to .442. Again, nobody is going to expect Sandoval to carry this into...

The AL Central, in my mind, is going to be one of the tougher divisions to pick this season. They're really isn't a clear-cut favorite, but here's my take: 1st Place, Minnesota Twins Lineup- CF Denard Span 2B Alexi Casilla C Joe Mauer 1B Justin Morneau RF Michael Cuddyer DH Jason Kubel 3B Joe Crede LF Delmon Young/Carlos Gomez SS Nick Punto Pitching- RHP Scott Baker LHP Francisco Liriano RHP Kevin Slowey LHP Glen Perkins RHP Nick Blackburn SU: Jesse Crain CL: Joe Nathan I think the Twins will stay the most consistent in this division because of their starting pitching. Scott Baker is vastly underrated and Francisco Liriano looks like he's fully healthy and ready to rock after finishing strong in '08. If he stays healthy all year, he should be amongst the AL Cy Young candidates. Their lineup is also young and has the potential to be very good. I think Joe Mauer (if he gets healthy sooner than later) and Justin Morneau are ready to take another step and become even be...

Like we've done here at The Giants Baseball Blog over the last few springs, it's time to take a closer look at baseball in general as I will be spending most of the final 2 weeks in March breaking down each team and division in baseball and predicting how I see things turning out this season. So here we go, as always, starting with the AL East and eventually finishing in our very own NL West: 1st Place, Tampa Bay Rays Lineup- 2B Akinori Iwamura CF B.J. Upton LF Carl Crawford 3B Evan Longoria 1B Carlos Pena DH Pat Burrell C Dioner Navarro RF Matt Joyce/Gabe Kaplar SS Jason Bartlett Pitching- RHP James Shields LHP Scott Kazmir RHP Matt Garza RHP Andy Sonnanstine LHP David Price SU: Grant Balfour CL: Troy Percival The "wonder team" from last year was no joke and they should be even better equipped to take on the tough AL East this season. They made all that noise last season despite getting full years out of arguably their two best players, Evan Longoria(122 games) and C...