East Division Preview

Another division that has been shaken up a bit. We have the third new owner, Matt Squirre of the Atlantic Surge, joining what was last year 3 of the better teams in the league along with the Defending Champion New Jersey Mets, now known as the Oviedo Knights. The Dallas Redbirds and Rochester Red Sox round out what is sure to be a very interesting division to watch.

Offense...

1. Dallas-Cano, Howard, Holliday highlight a very topheavy group. This group can bash with the best of them in the league.
2. Rochester-Youkilis, Braun, CarGo slide in just a touch below the Redbirds. I like the Redbirds a bit better unless they slot their two speed guys in together too much. With both in the lineup the edge probably goes to Rochester or the next team which is...
3. Oviedo-Bautista, Hart, Reyes. If it all comes together...wow. If not....wow. Balance is the word here.
4. Atlantic-An interesting group headlined by Torii Hunter....enough said.

Pitching...

1. Dallas-All four teams in this division have good pitching. There isn't a lot that seperates all of the them. For this exercise, Dallas lands on top with Price, Greinke and a stable of solid RP.
2. Rochester-Haren, Kershaw and Axford highlight another good group.
3. Atlantic-Scherzer, Hudson, Nolasco head a good group of hurlers. Some young mixed in with the vets. This group could come together nicely.
4. Oviedo-I should like this group more than I do, I just can't put my finger on it. Oswalt heads a group that if it has bounceback years (Broxton) and can find the plate a bit more often (Morrow) and continues a solid 2010 (McDonald) could shoot to the top of this list.

Bench...

1. Dallas-He has all the bases covered and some solid pitching in reserve.
2. Oviedo-Somehow ended up with 35 players on the roster. Does have some dead weight to shed but has some jewels in there. Let's see if Mike can coax Manny into the wayback machine.
3. Atlantic-It has been proposed that Matt may place a 3 yr on his KC 3B. If he does then I really picked a bad week to give up crystal meth.
4. Rochester-Someone has to be here...right? I like Barton and Westbrook but after that...yawnnnnnnn.

Preseason Division All-Star Team. Extras in a position occurred if they were too close to seperate. Five OF will be listed along with five SP and five RP.

C-Brian McCann
1B-Kevin Youkilis
2B-Robinson Cano
3B-Pedro Alvarez
SS-Jose Reyes
OF-Jacoby Ellsbury, Ryan Braun, Carlos Gonzalez, Matt Holliday, Jose Bautista
SP-David Price, Roy Oswalt, Max Scherzer, Dan Haren, Zack Greinke
RP-Chris Perez, Andrew Bailey, John Axford, David Aardsma, Jonathan Broxton

Preseason All-Stars by team

Oviedo-6
Rochester-6
Dallas-5
Atlantic-3

Predicted order of finish...

1. Dallas
2. Oviedo-these two spots could easily flip flop, especially if Dallas relies too much week in and week out on excessive speed in lineup. Like the old saying, "Speed Kills"
3. Rochester-if the top two teams beat each other to death, this team could slide in head first and take the division.
4. Atlantic-The lottery in 2012 will be amazing.