Power Rankings
LEAGUE POWER RANKINGS
Updated: Wednesday, January 7th, 2009
() - Previous Ranking
1. Seattle Mariners- Out with the old, in with the new....manager that is. New manager this season after back to back losing seasons by caymen. Mariners still has a solid lineup with Ortiz and Phillips in the infield along with young studs, Votto, Sizemore, and Ethier in the outfield. Pitching is still the same, pretty good but questionable. If Beckett can lower his ERA a bit and stay healthy, Mariners are going to be tough this season.
2. Chicago Cubs- The Cubs have been quite loud this offseason by making a few trades with some big names. We saw leaving Volquez, Guerrero, Soriano but we saw come BJ Upton and Harden. Concerns are still the corner outfielders in Burrell and Bradley. Pitching will still be great even if Dempster comes back to earth. And with the National League so weak, the Cubs are favorites to win the divison before Yahoo! even opens up baseball.
3. Los Angeles Angels- Back by two top pitchers in CC and Peavy, Angels only really needs one more solid pitcher and he could have the top rotation. Depending if Joba and Kershaw can break into their teams rotations, they might find themselves back in the bullpens. Angels does only have one closer in Carlos Marmol but don't expect him to add more via trade. Soto and Quentin were great adds to this team last year as both had breakout seasons. As long as he still has Pujols and Holiday, this team will always be an offense you don't want to deal with.
4. Oakland Athletics- Just because you win the league doesn't exactly mean you had the best team. Phillies in 08' for example. A's does have a great team that will be contending for another championship come next fall. He did give up Chase Utley earlier in December but did acquire Rays top prospect David Price along with Rickie Weeks and Justin Verlander. Question still remains if Verlander can get out of his funk and become the Verlander of 06' and 07'. His pitching is starting to age a bit with his studs hitting 30, Johan (30), Oswalt (31), Halladay (31, 32 in May) by opening day. Barry Zito, Andrew Miller, Luke Hochevar, and Gavin Floyd will all be toss ups going into 09'. Adam Dunn possibly going to the Nationals would be a huge hit for Oakland as his other OFer, Brad Hawpe already lost teammate Matt Holiday in the Rockies lineup.
5. Baltimore Orioles- What has happened to this once amazing team? Injuries and old age, thats what. While Josh Hamilton has been a drug addict blessing in disguise, Baltimore's pitcher has not. Young pitcher Felix Hernandez still has some stuff to be worked out. While his 3.45 ERA and 175 K's in 200 innings wasn't to bad, his 1.38 WHIP from 2007 still didn't improve in 08' as it went up by .01. Not to mention we saw his walks go up by 30 this year. Along side Felix are Lackey, Liriano, Oliver Perez, Baker, Greinke, and Kelvim Escobar....which isn't saying much. As usual with O's, his pitching definatly needs help. On the offensive side, VMart is looking to bounce back from a horrible 2008 in which he played only 73 games and hit only 2 homeruns in 266 at bats. ManRam is still teamless. The O's have one of the best infields with VMart, Fielder, Utley, Reyes, and A-Rod. Now only if they could all stay healthy this year. Oh, and will someone please give Prince Fielder a hamburger?!!?
6. Colorado Rockies- There is always a trend with these power rankings. 1 is always a AL team. 2 is usually the top NL team. 3-5 is always AL teams and then 6th is usually the NL's second best team. And usually...its Giants. Not this time. Move over Giants, the National League has a new 2nd best team. The Rockies were in contention for a playoff spot most of last year. I believe this year will be his year. Evan Longoria broke out in his rookie campaign and hes only going to get better. 40 homeruns? Maybe. If Furcal and Crawford can stay healthy, the rest of his offense doesn't need to be all star type players to win a trip to the playoffs. Cliff Lee will definatly need to be atleast half of what he was last year. Don't bet on it though. If the playoffs fall through, at least Rockies has Matt Wieters to look forward to.
7. San Francisco Giants- Hmm....what can I say about this team? I don't know. It's starting to age on offense. Jeter, Lee, Ichiro, Dye, Mags....getting old. They all may able to keep it up for one more year possibly, but not much after that. Now youth at pitching is not a problem. Lincecum, Cain, Hamels, Lester, Maine....very young. Great pitching but David Wright and Miggy can't do it all on offense.
8. New York Mets- Mets were a disappointment in 08'. Huge. The pitching were a big part to blame. Chris Young had injury problems. Bonderman, Weaver, and Harang all had down years. Weaver has yet to really go a full year putting up great numbers anyways. Ervin Santana did bounce back and pitched great even when he wasn't playing at home! Big improvement there. Don't really know if Satly, DLee, Willingham, Hunter, and Abreu can support Hanley and Braun. A few more trades, and McCutchen and Laporta coming up, Mets could contend this year, but definatly in 2010.
9. Arizona Diamondbacks- Dbacks have been making at least one deal a week. Greatly improving his team with pretty much every move. The Backs are really banking on players like Chris Davis, Cameron Maybin, and Lasting Milledge on offense. Davis does have potential to hit 35+ homeruns. Maybin still has something to prove in the big leagues as his other stints didn't work out that much. Delmon Young still hasn't become the 40/40 man he was projected to be. Now Arizona's pitching, definatly the best of the lower 3rd of the league. Elbert will be stuck in the bullpen for the Dodgers so won't have much value until a rotation spot opens up. The potential is there, but when will it come out?
10. Chicago White Sox- ChiSox long prospect list alone interest me. And that list should get longer come Febuary. Jay Bruce will get an entire season as a starter in 09'. If Ryan Doumit could stay healthy, he could make a jump and become a top 5 catcher. Questions are still out on Alexei Ramirez and if he can repear 08'. Time will tell on him. Pitching is always a problem for the Sox. He could find some help in the FA draft if not by trades. This team should improve greatly upon last year, but hes still at least 1 year from contending.
11. Milwaukee Brewers- Youth is up and down this lineup. From catcher to his util spot, not one veteran. Gio, Gallahger, Volstad, and Josh Johnson should all be full time starters this year from opening day on. If they could all pan out, offense should be the only thing the Brew Crew will be concerned about.
12. New York Yankees- Ugh. It makes me upset just talking about this team.
I'LL LET YOU GUYS KNOW WHEN THE NEXT UPDATE WILL TAKE PLACE.