Season 36 NL North Preview

Montreal Expos

Season 35: 91-71, lost to Houston in Round 1

GM: BastanRedsox

The Offseason:  Shook things up by trading coveted OF Leonardo Grimm to Seattle for SP Mitch Lee, and slugger Danny Barr and reliever Yunesky Baez to Houston for OF/1B Vin Almonte and  RP Mitch Mirabelli.  Free agency took a heavy toll this year, with ace SP Jim Colin jumping to Houston and 2B Miguel Arias leaving for Tampa Bay.  They countered in FA by signing SP Paxton Buhner (lifetime 3.32 ERA) and C Jose Gongora (lifetime .295 BA).

Outlook: Montreal led the NL in runs last year (799), but it's hard to see that happening when 3 of their top 5 OPS'ers (Barr, Arias and Grimm) have moved on.  2B looks like it might be a shared arrangement between defensive wiz Cesar Nicasio and the more offensively-talented Felipe Flores.  The arrangement may work out OK (especially in the budget department, as both are minimum-salary), but it won't produce runs the way Arias did.  They didn't really replace Barr, as most of his action last year came as a RF replacement for Orlando Figueroa. Backup or not, they'll miss the 23 longballs. Almonte is essentially an older, right-handed version of Grimm, so they replaced that production.  Still a good offense with those guys plus 1B Wesley Duffy (.274/25/88) and CF Jordy Pierre (.288/24/76).

I don't know what to make of Paxton Buhner.  I look at this ratings and don't expect to check his stats and find a career 3.32 ERA.  OK, 8 years pitching in ultra pitcher-friendly San Diego, but he did almost as well for 2 years in neutral Atlanta.  You never know, but I'd expect his ratings to eventually catch up with him.  Lee looks pretty good, but he's also benefitted from a big ballpark (Seattle) and it remains to be seen if he can really handle lefties.  Their other 3 starters (Stroman, James and Ross), all had better seasons last year than their career norms (in a year when their overall pitching ranked 13th in NL).

So, their pitching looks like a risk.  It could well be OK, but I'd guess it still come in in the lower half of the league.

Chicago Cubs

Season 35: 71-91

GM: helop

The Offseason:  They only lost some over-the-hill pitchers and backup C Jumbo Diaz in FA, and signed C Jamie Shibata and short reliever Malcolm Buxton.

Outlook:  The future is now for the Cubbies; slugger deluxe Walker Brooks has 4-5 prime years left, gets another lineup compliment this year in Adrian Garcia (Season 32's #5 overall pick), and has a pair of nice young starters at the top of the rotation (Alex Lloyd - probably the best pitcher in the Season 31 draft at #7 - and Nelson Jenkins).  Season 32's #4 overall, LF Reggie Hunter, had a very nice 266/31/90 as as a rookie; he'd be a real monster at 2B but they're an OF short of being able to do so.  In the meantime, Luigi Merced is adequate at 2B.  They also have to like what CF Steve Mench has done his first 2 seasons.  There was doubt about whether his range would play in CF, but he's been OK on +/- split and caught everything he's gotten to.  I know they only scored 629 runs last year, but I think this lineup is ready to go well beyond that.

After Lloyd and Jenkins, unfortunately, the pitching is a black hole.  There are a bunch of guys who have 1 good year out of 3 (Rocky Clinton ERA last 3 years: 4.35, 3.36, 5.12) and you never know which year this is.  The Cubbies were dead last in ERA last year...they could be better this year but it would register as a mild surprise.

Milwaukee Brewers

Season 35: 70-92

GM:  mjdato

The Offseason:  This offseason was about dropping payroll as the rebuild continues under mjdato.  The Brewcrew let 3 starting pitchers go (Doug Mateo, Al Polonia and Geraldo Iglesias) and replaced them with youngish holdovers...no free agents this year.

Outlook:  Let's face it, this year will be rough (keep that minimum win requirement in mind, mjdato).  But a bright future is already in sight, thanks to 4 seasons of good drafting and a bargain on a star IFA:

Season 35:  landed 3 #1's including #9 Nestor Bautista

Season 34:  Scored Ernest Chamberlain at #1 and added another supplemental #1

Season 33:  oops, whiffed on #4 Jorge Campos

Season 32:  Five #1's from #'s 13 to 42

And in Season 33, for the bargain price of $10MM, they signed monster IFA pitcher Salvador Johnson ***

By Season 38, Milwaukee could have a front 3 of Johnson***, Chamberlain and Bautista, and have about another dozen #1's on the ML roster. 

***yep, I missed that low durability, so he won't be a starter, and won't even get many innings as a reliever, but you still gotta love an arm like that

Cincinnati Reds

Season 35: 75-87

GM: wrecks

The Offseason:  Released pitchers Brad Knight, Furio Jefferson and Bob Philips; traded 3B Melvin Becker to Seattle for P Lyle Bush; signed P Cliff Smith; promoted 2B Enrique Johnson (Season 32 IFA).

Outlook: Speaking of rebuilds, look no further than here for one that's about to come to fruition.  After 6 years in the desert, Cincy is just about ready to unleash hell on the rest of us.
The Reds won 75 last year, and that was with prized #1 Stan Robinson struggling (.235/20/50).  Look for a vast improvement in his sophomore campaign. Likewise ace starter Pablo Suarez, who didn't really struggle at 11-10, 3.12 but can be even better.  We'll likely see C Cecil Dougherty (Season 32 #3) and Thomas Seanez (Season 32 IFA) at Game 20, and there's a boatload of ace prospects still in the low minors.

I don't know if the big breakthrough is coming this year or next, but the NL North status quo will be shaken up soon.

The Division Race: One of the tougher calls, as it looks like the Expos will fall off some and the Reds and Cubs are charging.  I'm going out on a limb and predicting Cincinnati will nip Montreal in a squeaker.

Season 36 AL South Preview

Kansas City Royals

Season 35: 77-85
GM: tdfactory


Offseason: Lost their top home run hitter (32) Orlando James to FA (Toronto) and released 3B Adys Bethancourt.  Signed 3B/OF Jin-Chi Donald and SP Zach Lennon to FA contracts.

Outlook:  After winning 86 and 91 in the first 2 seasons of the tdfactory era, the Royals face a crossroads after seasons of 78 and 77 wins.  The Season 35 offense was competent with 726 runs (7th in AL), but the pitching imploded with a 4.74 Team ERA despite sterling defense behind them.

Donald will be an obvious upgrade over Bethancourt; I think they'll sorely miss James' power, but the offense should still be OK with aging but still-potent pros like Henry Mercedes and Rabbit Grilli in the lineup.

Pitching will be a different story; Lennon's not likely to offer much help and they can't bank on Kent Pederson and Spud Bando to spin up sub-4.00 ERA's again.  Tony Rivera is among the league's
best relievers, but can only go so many innings.

Even with a payroll approaching $118MM, the Royals are going nowhere this season.  Next year is their last big payment to Grilli, so this year and next may see some dramatic departures.  Watch for Mercedes, Rivera and CF Kyle Lintz to be prominently mentioned at the trade deadline.

Tampa Bay Rays

Season 35: 90-72, won Division for 3rd straight year and 10th time in 11 seasons. Lost in playoffs to Boston in 2nd round.
GM: jthornton75

Offseason:  Landed one of the top hitters in free agency in Miguel Arias (formerly of Montreal). Arias is one of the rarest commodities in the game -  a lefty-swinging, power-hitting (43 long balls last year), good defensive infielder.   He replaces Juan Park (off to Seattle) in the lineup and represents a good upgrade both on offense and defense.  The Rays also added SP Ed Reed (Florida), RP Adrian Beck (Colorado) and 3B Walker Cather (Houston) in a very active free agent season.



Outlook:  Arias will be a much-needed addition (at least for a couple of seasons) to the offense, which was a little under the AL average last year.1B Chris Freel led the team in OPS last year with .821, and I'd give 10-to-1 he won't be better than that this year.  Eugenio Tejada offers some bonus power (26 HR, .800 OPS), but overall I'd guess they'll be run-challenged again.  The pitching was 4th with a 3.92 ERA, and it's where the stars are.  Max Mullens had a monster Season 35 (23-9, 2.80 ERA, 254 IP) and will be looking to repeat and nail down his last monster contract.  He's capably complimented by 1-inning specialist Brady Rapp, the effectively-wild Harry Prado, and the even-more-effectively-wild J.R. Voight.

Texas Rangers

Season 35: 67-95
GM:  bperkins

Offseason: Some minor free agent comings and goings, but the major improvements (or lack thereof) for this team will come from the dividends of last year's trade of Walter Brooks to the Cubs.  The biggest name, Antonio Washington (Season 31 #10 overall), debuted with a promising 3.28 ERA in 85 innings last year.  Relievers Ernest Black (Season 32 #65) and Dellin Vega (Season 34 IFA) could the the call at game 20 this year.

Outlook:  Everything took a step backwards last year with the Brooks trade, but there's talent here.  New 3B Joseph Cho hit .375 in a 56-AB cup of coffee last year.  1B McNicoll and DH Logan are solid hitters, and the enigmatic LF, Harry Ruiz, OPS'd .916 as recently as Season 34 (and is still just 26).  Not a sure thing by any means, but they could eclipse last year's 649 runs (13th in AL) by a lot. With Max Basile and Macbeth Kohlmeier at the top of the rotation and Washington getting 120 IP in multiple roles, maybe this is the year the Rangers' pitching breaks through.  The rest of the staff looks a little shaky; if they bring up Black and Vega at Game 20, Texas' pitching just might crack the top 7 or 8.

Nashville Sounds

Season 35: 71-91
GM:  fallball

Offseason:  No free agent moves for the Sounds...they promoted a couple of minor-leaguers to compliment last year's bumper crop of rookies.  They did lose 3B Lenny Taylor (San Diego), who posted a more than competent .757 OPS.

Outlook:  Nashville's offense surged to tie for 5th in runs last year (732) behind AL ROY Gus Kirby's .331/24/88 (with help from 4 other players who hit 20+ home runs).  Taylor's likely hot corner replacement is Vinny Karl, who got 373 AB's last year playing 7 different positions.  Ringo Frye secured the SS position for the forseeable future with his Gold Glove performance.  Currently there are only 12 position players on the roster; they'll probably add an OF or 2 somehow during Spring Training.

The Sounds' pitching was dead last in the AL with a 4.87 ERA, and they have pretty much the sam staff entering tis year.  They did promote Jolbert Montero (after 4 seasons no higher than High A); needless to say, he's not the answer.

The offense will be pretty entertaining, but another long year in Music City.

DIVISION PREDICTION:  Tampa Bay wins it again; Texas makes a little run at them and finishes 2nd.

Are Lower-Scoring Worlds "Better"?

As my hamster-mind attempted to distract itself from the task at hand (Season 36 previews - yes, we'll have them this year) and marveled at Minnesota's defensive prowess (122/11 on +/- plays last year, continuing a long run of 100+ good plays and bad plays in the teens/twenties), I started wondering about the correlation between "Good" (meaning a high level of play, I think) worlds and scoring.

I've long thought that as worlds got "better" ( and I'm not real sure what I mean here...it could be that I mean "as the owners of a world get more experienced"), they manage their pitching better and play better defense (and sacrifice a little offense here and there), and scoring goes down.

So I took a look at 7 private worlds I consider to be "High-level" (either from personal experience, reputation or your recommendation) and noted runs per team for their latest completed season (the worlds were Major Leagues, Kinsella, Hobbs, NCAA, Mantle, Moonlight Graham, NCAA II).

Then I did the same thing for 7 public worlds (Are there only 7 public worlds now?):  Aaron, Clarkson, Minor Leagues, Musial, Puckett, Ryan, Williams.

The average RPT for the private worlds was 728, with a high of 767 (NCAA) and a low of 690 (Major Leagues and Moonlight Graham).

The average RPT for the public worlds was 813, with a high of 867 (Aaron) and a low of 744 (Minor Leagues).  All the other public worlds averaged over 800 RPT.

Just for the heck of it, I compared the average +/- plays in Mantle (at 729, the closest to the average RPT of our private worlds) to those in Musial (at 817, the closest to the average RPT of our public worlds).

Mantle teams averaged 69 + plays and 34 - plays.  Musial teams averaged 55 good plays and 42 bad plays.

Maybe this is self-evident and maybe it means nothing. Subjectively (as an owner in both worlds) I'd say Major Leagues and Hobbs are about on par in quality of play, but Hobbs teams outscored their counterparts here in their recently-completed seasons by 75 runs per team (that said, I've also subjectively thought of Major Leagues as a pitcher-dominated world and Hobbs as a slugger's paradise).

Is there a point here?  Do worlds score less as they get "better".   What else affects scoring?  Interested in your comments.

New Owner Intro - BastanRedsox

Who is BastanRedsox in real life?

I am a Loss Prevention Manager at a hotel in Houston.  I play softball 3x a week and play on a tournament team that travels the country. I play high stakes fantasy, and recently learned I am in the top 1% that spend money in fantasy baseball every year. I don't know if that is a good thing or not though. ;)

Cubs or Indians? Why?
Have the Indians to win the WS at 15/1 so I'll let you guys decide on who I'm rooting for. Plus, can't have the lovable losers if they don't lose... 

Best and worst HBD moments?

Best HBD moment was my first WS win in Rickey. I had maybe the best pitching staff ever assembled from top to bottom and played in Augusta. We all remember these stupid players names when they cherry gets popped. My worst? Man I don't know, I lost the love for the game a year ago, so maybe that's it. I'm hoping that it can come back in this world with this team.

HBD strategem you tried that didn't work?
When I first started I tried to win in international free agency but didn't know how crazy it was and who to wait on or who to pounce on. I ended up leaving 25-30 million on the table in one of my first seasons.
HBD strategem you tried that didn't work?

Welcome New Owner (OK, new last year) jsturgis5866

Who is jsturgis5866 in real life?

Jack Sturgis the 5866th. OK, not the last part. Just the first. Resident of Massachusetts, USA, although some might argue that it's really it's own socialist republic. Yes, Red Sox - slash - Patriots - slash - Celtics - slash - Bruins fan. Turned 6-0 this year, Previously lived in the Washington, D.C., and New York City metro areas as a newspaper journalist, then rebounded to Mass. where I took up a second career as a community college professor (of journalism and English). 

Cubs or Indians? Why? 

I'll flip a coin on the World Series participants. They both have ties to the Red Sox: I'm a big fan of Theo Epstein and chronically ill franchises, and Terry Francona is the best manager the Red Sox have had, maybe ever. I'll be happy either way, but right now I'm hoping: Indians, 2016 champs; Cubs 2017 champs.

Best and worst HBD moments? 

Best moments WS titles, rebuilding destroyed franchises, commissioner of two worlds plus commissioner "assistant" in others. Most of all the connections I've made to the owners over the years, probably met in person 10-12 different guys, maybe more.

Worst moments: Consistently good teams in divisions that are ultra competitive so playoffs always just out of reach. Constant trade rape and destruction of minor league systems by quote-unquote "good" owners. 
WIS continued idiotic tweaks, e.g. budget transfers.

HBD strategem you tried that didn't work?

I don't go crazy with strategy attempts in the fringe. Perhaps the most disappointing was the era where pitch-calling became all the rage then turned out not to matter a whit. The few times I've used closer conistently: dumb, dumb, dumb. Recs put 'em there, and owners think it's necessary.