A quick look at the rest of the N.L. East
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A quick look at the rest of the N.L. East
Bob Brookover, Inquirer Baseball Columnist
DALLAS -- The Phillies are the team to beat in the National League East and the Miami Marlins appear to be the team most interested in beating them.
But what about the rest of the division?
With the Marlins' pursuit of every living, breathing free agent taking center stage at these winter meetings, you may not have noticed Tuesday night that the New York Mets got busy with a flurry of moves.
They traded center fielder Angel Pagan to the San Francisco Giants for Andres Torres and reliever Ramon Ramirez -- a good deal for the Mets -- and signed free-agent pitchers Jon Rauch and Frank Francisco. Those moves should actually strengthen the Mets, but not to the point where they can challenge the Phillies for the division title, especially after they lost star shortstop Jose Reyes to the Marlins.
It's the relative quiet of the other two teams in the division that has been interesting so far.
When last we saw the Atlanta Braves, they were completing a monumental collapse that allowed the St. Louis Cardinals to earn an unexpected playoff spot that they parlayed into the franchise's 11th World Series title.
Since then, the Braves have done little to upgrade their roster, but unless the Marlins can actually complete their negotiations with Albert Pujols, Atlanta will remain the second best team in the division going into the season.
Regardless of what they do, the Braves have remarkable pitching depth in both the starting rotation and bullpen and rank second to the Phillies in the entire National League in the pitching department. For that reason alone, the Braves should contend again for at least a wildcard spot.
Whether Atlanta can challenge for the division title will likely depend on who they can add in left field and at shortstop and whether Jason Heyward can bounce back from injuries that contributed to a disappointing sophomore season.
The Braves have allowed shortstop Alex Gonzalez to test the free-agent waters, but they have no interest in Jimmy Rollins because they have a prospect about a year away from getting to the big leagues.
At the end of last season, the Washington Nationals appeared to be the team that was ready to emerge as a playoff contender and as these meetings opened there was some thought that they'd be the team making the biggest news.
The Nationals' top priority appears to be signing free agent lefthander Mark Buerhle to be the veteran presence on a staff that includes young studs such as Stephen Strasburg and Jordan Zimmerman. That would strengthen the Nats, but they would have to do more than that to continue the steady improvement they've shown over the last few seasons.
Sounds like we have an actual Marlins fan poaching our website. There used to be a lot of Mets fans doing the same thing but they all seem to have disappeared.— PJH
Comment removed.- The only way the Phils win this year is platoon Ryan Howard. He looks horrible batting against lefthanders.— farley
- You're banking on the starters going through w/o injury..........dangerous assumption and secondly - Hamels is the 2 - not Lee.— Northcountry
- You're probably right. The Cardinals lost one of their aces for the entire season and it turned out to be disastrous for them.
- I have a feeling that by next year 125/5 year deal will pretty standard. The Howard deal everyone complains about might not look so bad 2 years down the road.— ned folk
- Comment removed.
- Typical Florida/Miami Marvins: We'll buy a team, maybe actually win a World Serious, then, when no one still bothers to show up at games we'll get rid of all the players and bottom feed for another ten years.— BEMiller
- Other than some of their starting pitching and perhaps closer, what exactly do the Phillies have that makes them the unquestioned favorite? Offensively, Pence is good, but everyone else is either an injury waiting to happen, several years removed from a good season, or a huge question mark because of he hasn't proven himself. To me, if the Marlins get another good pitcher, they will be at the head of the class. Their offense will make the Phillies look like last year's Padres.— MrPhillie
- Check out tobyjoe waxing Steinbeck. Sometimes technology isn't a good thing.
But I digress.
Tobester, we've been predicting Phillies wins and division titles for the past 5 years, and that's a track record that would make Jimmy the greek envious. if you have a criticism, its that we've predicted the WS every year.— Sackbutt
