How The West Was Won: MLB Offseason Proves Interesting
As we approach the start of Spring Training and lead up to the 2012 MLB campaign, one cannot help but to think of some interesting – perhaps unpredictable – happenings that have occurred which will make for perhaps a new regime in baseball royalty. Below we take a look at some of the highlights that have transpired this offseason and predict what is to come as we tune our televisions to our favorite American pasttime.
Something Fishy…
In recent history, we could always predict the Yankees and Red Sox to open their checkbooks to foreign players and big trade deals: not this year, my friends: The Miami Marlins began with adding a hot-tempered yet previous World Series champ Ozzie Guillen to their helm, then began plucking players left and right, adding the speedy lead-off beast Jo Jo Reyes, snatching up Mark Buehrle from the retirement line, giving Hanley some more money, and added Heath Bell to close out the 9th. And if that wasn’t good enough, Guillen decided to add another firecracker to his arsenal, snatching the troubled Carlos Zambrano from the Cubbies for the 5-run-a-game Volstad. Can’t wait to see who gets knocked out first this preseason…
Angels No Longer In Waiting
The Angels have always been a competitive organization as long as I can remember: Their wait for a World Series crown may be over as adding the greatest power/average hitter in our current era is now tanning in the California suns. The addition of Albert Pujols, coupled with a young yet inning-eating CJ Wilson have instaneously launched the Angels into title contention while the Cards, who are in shambles over their lack of bargaining power, are now in the ‘rebuilding’ phase again after claiming the World Series crown. Since Texas lost some pitching yet still has Ogando and other young pitchers, look for the Angels and Rangers to dominate most of the year.
Yu Who?
Since the Hideo Nomo craze hit our Dodgers decades ago, our nation has discovered that some of the best hidden talents reside within the Japanese baseball circuit. Ichiro has put together a storied career with over a decade long run of 200+ hit seasons and now, right when baseball needed someone under 30 from another country to bolster their rotation, we have the possibility of the Texas Rangers signing a Nippon Ham Fighter named Yu Darvish, an Iranian/Japanese sensation that has put together a Roger Clemens-like career in a short time. Provided he can haggle a long-term deal with Texas, the Nippon Ham Company will instanteously become the benefactor of $50+ million dollars and the Rangers will get more fans than the Backstreet Boys in Wembley Stadium. Ham for everyone!
Overall, this offseason has been an entertaining debacle that has filled the headlines with suspense, dramatics, arrests, and the world holding their breath while the Darvish sweepstakes occurred. And now, for your divisional breakdown. Don’t set it in stone, yet I cannot conceivably see it happening any other way this year:
AL
East
1. Rays
2. Yankees
3. Red Sox
4. Jays
5. Baltimore (as always)
Central
1. Detroit
2. Twins
3. Tribe
4. Kansas City
5. White Sox
West
1. Angels
2. Texas – (Wild Card)
3. Seattle
4. Oakland
NL
East
1. Phils
2. Marlins – (Wild Card)
3. Braves
4. Mets
5. Nats
Central
1. Brewers
2. Cards
3. Astros
4. Reds
5. Pirates
6. Cubbies (sorry Theo – maybe next year)
West
1. D-Backs
2. Padres
3. Giants
4. Dodgers
5. Rockies
World Series victor: Angels over Phils in 6.
Greg Henderson, a California-based businessman with over 11 years in SEO/SEM, provided this piece based on personal endeavors and education in search engine optimization with a concentration on content optimization for the social media future. His current projects include a background checks website Easy Background Checks as well as a marriage records website Genealinks.
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