Hi, my name is Mark aka Beloved Former Commish, Previously Most Gracious and Wise. I still have authority as World Founder, and Overall Great Guy, so watch it, assholes!
It's time to bang out another tragically flawed prognostication based on what I see as your team's strengths and weaknesses. Going to borrow from nj's format and look at each division as a whole and determine who has the best fielding, offense, and pitching, as well as quirky things and best players in the division. Expect both tears of laughter and rage.
So without further ado...
NL NORTH:
In a surprising turn of events, Philadelphia scratched out the division title last season, to the apparent incredulity of indy_angels and his seemingly much more talented ABCs of Pittsburgh. We have a full on intra-state rivalry. The two best players in the division play for Pittsburgh and they are both really fine top end talent, Paco Amezaga and Vic Hoiles. In addition to those two there's a couple other fearsome bats. There's a couple prospects on the near horizon, as well, to upgrade, and in a few seasons there will be an absolute masher to compliment Hoiles and Amazega in Season 27 stud IFA Gorkys Duran. As it is the ABCs have the best line-up in the North, in a couple seasons, they may have the best in BPF. New Britain has three Dave Kingman/Mark Reynolds types, the aging and fading Wascar Rosado, the somewhat robust Vitas Fields but not much else. The Philth boast an order of deeply flawed hitters that will scare no one. And in his first season in BPF, thundercat's Dirty Pussies hope to queeff out a few hits from a manky twat of a line-up. Pittsburgh can also claim the best pitching staff in the NL North. Deep with top end talent, and more in the system, the ABCs look pretty intimidating. Livan Nunez is the absolute ace, and there several arms not far behind, quality-wise. New Britain has Stephen Watson and Jacoby Guerrero, as well as some other fine pitchers, but they can't match Pitts. Philadelphia won't dominate hitters. Douglas Reynolds is good, though. Montreal lacks a dominating 200 inning guy, but the staff is a little above the bats. Pittsburgh also has the best set of gloves of the group, how did they not win the division last year?
Prediction:
Pittsburgh 94-68
New Britain 82-80
Montreal 72-90
Philadelphia 72-90
NL EAST:
Nice to see the gentlemen (or so I assume) who make up the national league's redheaded stepchild all returned. Why not, you don't even need to win half your games to make the playoffs. Take that! Norfolk was busy in the off-season and appears to have made improvements overall, though may regret trading away Pat Penny. Made several deals and signed a bunch of FAs, this team should finish above
.500. Except behind the plate, where the bat carries the load, the Tides have astounding defense, provided the SS, Johnson doesn't get hurt. Florida has some huge holes in the field and I don't mean the turf. The Boston Brewers have better glove men than Florida, but nobody really dominant. Colombus will also kick the ball around just a little less than the Sunshine State franchise. What the Crusaders of Columbus do boast is the division's best player in Gordon Maranville, who just hit the 15 day DL.
Maranville anchors a fairly dangerous looking batting line-up with some biggish bats that will use the long ball to do mass damage. Ben Grey should score a ton of runs at the top of the order. Norfolk's order would have been a lot more threatening with the aforementioned Penny. After defying my expectations for a couple of seasons, what I thought was reality finally caught up with the Brewers last season. Not sure this team has the group of hitters to carry it to the NLCS as it had in the two previous seasons to last. The 66ers line-up is complimentary to it's fielding. As does it's pitching.
While not blessed with great command overall, the Crusaders do have a staff of effective hurlers including former Cy guy Pascual Castilla. Not sure Norfolk currently has enough innings amongst it's pitchers, in fact, it doesn't. But what it does have is pretty freakin' good. Even it's most suspect pitcher, mr. Cooper Lincoln has a Nolan Ryanish walk rate with a Nolan Ryanish OAV. They just need more innings, maybe there's help on the way. Boston, on the other hand, is in trouble with it's pitching staff. This division will come down to Norfolk's pitching and fielding against Columbus' hitting and pitching. See below for who I think will win out.
Prediction:
Columbus 86-76
Norfolk: 84-78
Boston 70-92
Florida: 56-106
And now the girls...
