The Blue Workhorse

Earlier this year, we individually previewed each and every MLB team giving you a team’s record from the 2007 season, key additions and key losses in ‘08, projected starting lineups and pitching rotations, an overall outlook, fantasy impact players, and our prediction for this season.

So were we right?

Well, we got some things right like predicting Josh Hamilton’s huge season, but we also got some things way off like saying the Florida Marlins would be the laughing stock of the league.

What did we get right? What did we get wrong? This week we’ll start in the National League with the NL East:

Mets, Phils, or Braves: NL East Preview (March 6, 2008)

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Every season there are a handful of players that come out of no where to surprise us and become instant stars. We touched on some players who jumped out to incredible starts after the first couple of weeks of the baseball season.

However, there are also a handful of players that play no where near what was expected of them. At the midway point of the season and in lieu of the recent trend of teams demoting established players (Phillies’ starter Brett Myers, Indians’ closer Joe Borowski, and young Braves’ slugger Jeff Francouer — even though Francouer has scored 40 runs, hit 8 HR, and driven in 41 RBI), we examine those players who have failed to meet expectations and would be well deserving of a demotion:

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Earlier today, Major League Baseball announced the rosters for the 79th All-Star Game being held at Yankee Stadium, which is only appropriate since this is the final season for the historic ballpark.

The starters were determined solely by the fan vote once again, unfortunately.

Nevertheless, we wanted to do what we hadn’t seen anywhere else and break down the selections team-by-team, so that you could easily see who was selected from your favorite team (starters are in bold):

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Let’s play a quick game of name those numbers. Who has produced these incredible statistics?

151.1 IP / 9 W / 2.28 ERA / 195 K / 1.13 WHIP

Jake Peavy? Johan Santana? Many of you might see the line and figure it must have been a line from Peavy, Santana, or one of the other top-flight starting pitchers 151 innings through the season.

However, these stats were the combined 2007 season statistics of Carlos Marmol and Jonathan Broxton, two of the most dominant middle relievers in the game.

In terms of fantasy baseball, middle relievers are often forgotten when they can be a huge weapon as an added bonus to your pitching staff. They can be the secret key to lower WHIP and ERA, and many of these guys also pile up the strikeouts:

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Juan Pierre was in the box hitting — the same Juan Pierre who hasn’t hit a home run since September 2006. Needless to say, I wasn’t on the edge of the rail waiting for him to hit a bomb, but I was still paying attention nonetheless. Lo and behold, Pierre hits a line drive straight toward where I was positioned. At first I thought it was going to fly over my head, and I prepped myself to make a jumping attempt, but instead, it raised my glove just a bit above eye level, and the ball traveled directly into it.

I couldn’t believe it had come right to me. I pulled down my glove, took the ball out, and immediately handed it to the second young brother, who had seen his brother get a ball and had been standing out in the outfield with his father for nearly as long as I had (despite his parents asking him a couple of times if he’d rather go play in the kids zone or go shopping in one of the souvenir shops). I never thought I would give up the first batted ball I ever caught at a major league stadium, but without thinking, I had done exactly that.

For the past two seasons, there have been concerns about a couple of the most known and dominant closers in the game. Last season, it was New York Yankees’ stopper Mariano Rivera after he got off to a rough start. This season the troubles are in the other league, on the other coast as Trevor Hoffman, the man who enters to “Hell’s Bells,” has left without the lead, or a save, already twice in the early stages this season.

After week one of the MLB season, there have been several teams, including the Padres, that have already run into bullpen issues, particularly on Opening Day, so we decided to examine each of the 30 major league teams bullpen performances thus far and see which teams should really be concerned with their bullpen.

Opening Day is one of the most glorious days in sports, despite the fact that MLB tried to ruin it by having an opening series in Japan and then by having a one game series (yea, that’s not even possible Major League Baseball - a series means multiple) in Washington.

Now that all the teams and players have each put on the uniform for the first official games of the season, and to honor the first true day of the MLB schedule, we make initial observations on every team about what we saw on Opening Day after watching some games and examining boxscores:

This year the battle could be just as highly contested as only the San Francisco Giants won’t bring a high-caliber team to the field each and every day. Arizona won the division last season but went out and made some huge trades. Colorado rode a late season hot streak all the way to the World Series. San Diego is determined to return to the playoffs after losing their last three games cost them a trip last season, and the Dodgers are looking to end one of the longest World Series droughts in the franchise’s storied history.

Here are our previews and predictions for all five NL West teams including last year’s records, key additions, key losses, projected starting lineup, projected rotation, overall outlook, fantasy impact players, and our prediction for this season: