Baseball at the trade deadline

Posted July 25, 2008

with the trade deadline approaching im going to give my analysis on
everything so far as well as make my picks for the rest of the year for
every division and the wild card and i will also give my player of the
year, surprise player of the year, and pitcher of the year for each
division.


NL East

I'll
start with the NL east, going into today the NY mets have a 1 game lead
over the Phillies and a 2 game lead over the Marlins. not many people
saw this coming. earlier this year the Phillies and the marlins were
the two teams atop the NL east and all the other teams were a mostly
non factor because of how far they were out. but now with the mets
going 23-12 under Jerry Manuel including a 10 game winning streak they
have taken the lead from the Phillies and made it a 3 person race that
could very well go down to the wire.

Player of the year: i had a hard time not choosing Ryan Howard for this but his 135 strikeouts already this year make it easier to choose Hanley Ramirez,
so far he is batting .300 with 24 Homeruns and 47 RBI's along with 24
stolen bases. not to mention he has kept the Marlins in this Division
by playing consistently all year except for one slump.

Pitcher of the year: Tim Hudson takes
this award and definitely deserves it. he hasn't gotten the same kind
of coverage he normally gets with Braves being out of the Division
pretty much all year long. but right now he is leading the NL east with
11wins a 3.17 ERA and hes 8th in strikeouts with 85.

Surprise player of the year: Jorge Cantu takes
this one because while he may have played well before (24 HR and 117
RBI's in '05) he has not played exceptionally well since then. at least
until now he is so far batting .294 with 18 HR's and 59 RBI's plus he
is definitely the biggest reason why the Marlins are not missing Miguel
Cabrera that much this year.

Winner: I hate to do it but i will pick the Philadelphia Phillies
to win the NL east this year. i think that now with the addition of Joe
Blanton they have a solid enough rotation and they have plenty of power
in their lineup with the likes of Ryan Howard and Chase Utley.


NL Central

Now
i will do the NL central and what is definitely the story this year in
the NL central is how good the top 3 teams are. this was the division
where the winner had to just be over .500 but now it is easily the nest
division in the NL. with the top 3 teams separated by 4 games and the
brewers playing very well this division is nowhere near decided yet and
could go all the way down to the last day.


Player of the year: this one has to go to Lance Berkman he
was earlier in the year a triple crown candidate but is now just
batting a mere .338 with 22 HR's and 74 RBI's he was also the starter
for the NL at the all-star game and has a .437 on base percentage this
year so far.

Pitcher of the year: if
someone is a CY Young candidate then they will most likely be the best
pitcher in their own division. that is exactly true here with Edison Volquez. He is first in the NL with a 2.49 ERA, tied for second in wins with 12 and 5th in strikeouts with 129.

Surprise Player of the Year: Xavier Nady takes
this award because even though he has always been a good consistent
player this year he has been quite exceptional, he is fifth in the NL
with a .330 batting average and has hit 13 HR's and 57 RBI's this year
so far.

Winner: the winner of this division will be the Milwaukee Brewers because
right now they are hot and the Cubs are not. also with the acquisition
of CC Sabathia to go along with Ben Sheets they have easily the best
rotation in the division and with Prince Fielder and Ryan Braun they
can outhit most teams.


NL West


who
actually cares about this division? i mean the team in first place of
this division this year is under .500! right now any team in that
division besides maybe San Diego has a chance of winning this division
if they just win more than half of their games left.


Player of the Year: even with how horrible this division has been one player has played exceptionally well and that is Matt Holliday so
far he is batting .345 with 17 HR's and 60 RBI's the only problem is
the rest of his team isn't playing as well as him and they are 7 gmaes
behind the first place Diamondbacks.

Pitcher of the year: this is a simple one, Brandon Webb easily takes this award because right now he is leading the Majors with 13 wins and has a 3.11 ERA with 116 strikeouts.

Surprise Player of the Year: Aaron Cook may not be doing anything extremely spectacular but he still has 13 wins with a 3.46 ERA and 73 strikeouts.

Winner: The Arizona Diamondbacks will
win this division because they have the best pitcher in this division
and just winning every 5 days should be enough to win this division.

AL East

Easily the biggest surprise
of the AL east this year is the Tampa Bay Rays did anybody this year
think they would be tied for first place at the trade deadline? well i
have to admit that i had a funny feeling when i heard that they were
losing the devil from their name but i dint know that it meant this.
however those pesky Red Sox are still right there with them and the
Yankees are right there behind them and now they added what they wanted
in Xavier Nady they could be very pesky.

Player of the Year: A-Rod hasn't
been talked about as much as normal but thats only because its hard to
follow up the season he had last year and make people excited. however
hes batting .320 with 21 home runs and 61 RBI's.

Pitcher of the Year: at
first i had trouble deciding between Mike Mussina and Roy Halladay
because Mike Mussina is tied for first place with 13 wins but Roy Halladay is so much better than him in every other major pitching stat with a 2.82 ERA and 133 strike outs to go along with his 12 wins.

Surprise Player of the Year: anyone wearing a Rays uniform
deserves this award because if your a team that everyone expects to
lose your division every year and your winning it now then you deserve
this award.

Winner: while i would love to say the Rays i don't think they will be able to deal with the pressure and the Boston Red Sox will win this division.


AL Central

well
this is the division where you say how are they in last and they are in
first? what im talking about is how a lot of analysts were picking the
Indians to win the World Series and now there in last place while other
people weren't even mentioning the White Sox or the Twins next to the
Tigers or the Indians. And everyone was mentioning how the Tigers would
score a record breaking amount of runs this year and they started the
season 0-7 with a horrible offense even though they have slightly
recovered from that they are still feeling the affects.

Player of the year: Carlos Quentin has come out of nowhere this year to lead the AL in homeruns with 26 be second in the AL with 76 RBI's and bat .277

Pitcher of the Year: this is a no doubter Cliff Lee will
most likely win the AL CY young award winner this year and he
definitely will deserve it right now he is 14-2 with a 2.29 ERA and 110
strikeouts. the only problem for the Indians is he cant pitch every
night.

Surprise Player of the Year: see above

Winner: the Chicago White Sox will
win this division because right now they are the best team and unless
Justin Morneau and Joe Mauer get extremely hot the twins will not give
them very much trouble.


AL West


at first people thought the A's might
actually be close to contending in this division but now the Angels are
easily running away with this division and have the best record in the
Majors to boot.

Player of the Year: another no brainer here Josh Hamilton easily
wins this one and as of now is definitely a front runner for the AL MVP
award the only thing that might not help him is that his team is
definitely not contending this year. i mean he already has 98 RBI's to
go along with his 22 home runs and a .305 avg.

Pitcher of the Year: Francisco Rodriguez may
be a closer but right now he is nine saves ahead of Bobby Thigpens
record of most saves in a year. he also has 2.14 ERA and48 strikeouts
in 46 1/3 innings pitched.

Surprise Player of the Year: you
know that guy who i said is the player of the year so far in the AL
west well he also happened to come out of nowhere and so therefore Josh Hamilton is also the surprise Player of the Year.

Winner: the Los Angeles Angles will
win this division very comfortably and will most likely also get the
best record in AL and home field advantage throughout the Playoffs.



Wild Card


AL Wild Card Winner: the Tampa Bay Rays will
win the AL Wild Card because even though they will lose the AL east to
the Red Sox they will not want to do as good as they did this year for
nothing and try their hardest to get the final playoff spot.

NL Wild Card Winner: the Florida Marlins will
win this years NL wild card because even though right now people think
it will have to be the NL central runner up the Marlins will Very
Important series at the end of the year against the Cubs and Cardinals
which could give them the edge in the NL wild card.

E-mail me at talansports@gmail.com