Which of the six AL (+/- 2 games) .500 teams will end 2008 with the best overall W-L record? (And tell us why!)
| BAL (21-19) |  2 (1.20%) |
| MIN (20-20) | 7 (4.22%) |
| CHW (20-20) | 4 (2.41%) |
| TOR (21-22) | 67 (40.36%) |
| NYY (20-22) | 84 (50.60%) |
| TEX (20-22) | 1 (0.60%) |
| KCR (19-21) | 1 (0.60%) |
166 votes | 6 featured comments
Backup question: What about the five NL teams in that same situation, meaning LAD (21-19), NYM (20-19), ATL (20-20), MIL (20-21)and PIT (20-21)?
I think both New York teams, for the immensely boring reason that they have the most available talent and the most resources to give them a pennant-race boost. They are also the two teams least able to punt the season and deal away talent at the deadline; instead both are likely to spend lots to get back in the race even if they are well behind.
My top 3 are TOR, NYY and MIN. TOR because I think they've got the most talent and the offense can't be this bad all season and the pitching most certainly can be this good. NYY for reasons in another comment, they'll probably add a ton of rentals at the deadline for peanuts (a la the Abreu/Lidle deal a couple of years ago) and MIN because I think they're under-rated (solid pitching and enough offense to compete with DET/CLE).
The Yankees, sadly. 90 wins may be enough to get the AL wild card in 2008, and so it might get very, very interesting. We will have a better idea about the shape of the season after interleague play is well underway.
The Braves. Their current record is more flukey than anyone else's.
The Yanks ... they have the greatest in-house potential for greater turnarounds, such as:
- ARod's will play more than half the games the rest of the year
- 26-year old Cano's OPS+ will end the season much better than the current situation (slightly more than half his career #)
- Their pitching will get better (with Rasner, Igawa, Hughes, and Kennedy, they will not have 2 of their starting rotation with ER+ below 50