Anyone remember Joe Posnaski?

[Wise Master Buehrle]

25996.1

Reason No. 3 the Royals will win the division

 

It's good to be located centrally

 

By JOE POSNANSKI

 

Columnist

 

SURPRISE, Ariz. — The New York Yankees are annoying. They were plenty annoying five years ago, before they acquired Jason Giambi and Gary Sheffield and Alex Rodriguez and Kevin Brown and Javier Vasquez and Thor and the Wonder Twins and Achilles (out for the first three weeks because of a heel problem) and the DNA of Ted Williams and Casey Stengel's ghost and exclusive rights to the triple and so on.

 

Yes, they are more annoying now.

 

But, the truth is, in Kansas City, the Yankees are only that: An annoyance. The Yankees play in a whole different world: The American League East. When the Yankees go out and buy some new player, it's a lot like when a huge winter storm hits the Northeast. It's troubling, sure, but it doesn't really have much to do with us.

 

The Royals are competing against four teams: Minnesota, Chicago, Cleveland and Detroit. That's it. That's the American League Central. And sure, you will hear people say that if the Royals were in the East they would be picked for fourth at best, and if they were in the West they would be picked fourth at best, but that doesn't mean squat. Hey if the Royals were in the Big 12, they would be favored to win it all.

 

The Royals are in the American League Central.

 

And in this division they can win.

 

***

 

Starting pitching: 1. Minnesota; 2. Chicago; 3. Kansas City; 4. Cleveland; 5. Detroit.

 

This is undoubtedly the Royals' biggest question mark. Of course, no team in the Central has much pitching depth. Minnesota has two returning 14-game winners (Brad Radke and Kyle Lohse) and a hot young lefty in Johan Santana, and all three were terrific down the stretch last season. Chicago returns the division's best starter last season, Esteban Loaiza, though few scouts believe he will repeat his success. Mark Buehrle pitched well enough in the second half to believe he will have a rebound season. After that, it's a lot of hoping.

 

And then, it's the Royals. They need Brian Anderson and Darrell May to repeat their second-half success and for Jeremy Affeldt to stay healthy and become a dominant starter. If that happens — and phenom Zack Greinke is another wild card here — the Royals could have the best rotation in the division.

 

***

 

Bullpen: 1. Kansas City; 2. Cleveland; 3. Chicago; 4. Minnesota; 5. Detroit.

 

Much of the Twins' success the last couple of years was built around their bullpen. But now Eddie Guardado and LaTroy Hawkins are gone, and Joe Nathan, a 29-year-old righty with one career save is the closer. Chicago lost a bulk of its bullpen, too, and is now relying on Billy Koch to get his head together again.

 

That leaves Kansas City, with the division's most versatile bullpen. They have four versatile righties to set up for Mike MacDougal, who for all his second-half troubles still saved 27 games last season, which is more than anyone else left in the division (MacDougal also finished the year with eight scoreless appearances).

 

***

 

Infield and catcher: 1. Kansas City; 2. Minnesota; 3. Detroit; 4. Chicago; 5. Cleveland.

 

The Tigers, with the addition of Pudge Rodriguez and Fernando Vina, have made their infield respectable, at least. Chicago has question marks all over. Minnesota will feature typically solid defense, though there isn't much power in this infield. The Twins will hope that rookie sensation Joe Mauer can step in and be a star at catcher.

 

But the Royals have the best in this division by a pretty big margin. They have the reigning Rookie of the Year, Angel Berroa, at shortstop (and he hit a leadoff home run to kick off the Royals spring-training season Thursday), a four-time All-Star in Mike Sweeney at first base and a five-time All-Star in Benito Santiago behind the plate.

 

Throw in a very solid Joe Randa and a second-base combo of Desi Relaford and Tony Graffanino, and this isn't particularly close.

 

***

 

Outfield and DH: 1. Minnesota; 2. Chicago; 3. Kansas City; 4. Cleveland; 5. Detroit.

 

A lot depends on the health of Juan Gonzalez. If he's healthy and puts up his typical numbers, the Royals outfield of Juan Gone, Carlos Beltran and Aaron Guiel rates with the best in this division.

 

For now, though, you can't assume Gonzalez will stay healthy. The Twins' outfield of Torii Hunter, Jacque Jones and Shannon Stewart gives you everything — power, speed, defense, you name it. I personally ripped the Shannon Stewart trade last year, and I was plain wrong: The guy was the MVP of the second half last year.

 

The White Sox counter with power. Magglio Ordonez, Carlos Lee and designated hitter Frank Thomas have a combined 717 major-league home runs.

 

***

 

So there you go. Now you add up all the numbers, carry the one, add a dash of salt and then put all the data through my secret formula, and the division will finish like so:

 

1. Kansas City, 90-72.

 

2. Minnesota, 88-74.

 

3. Chicago, 83-79.

 

4. Cleveland, 68-94.

 

5. Detroit, 54-108.

 

Voila. Royals win. City goes crazy. Ticker-tape parade. Then, of course, the Royals might have to deal with the Yankees and their billion-dollar payroll. We'll work on a different formula then.

[Ishmookie]

i remember him alright and that stupid article he wrote about how the royals were 7.5 games up and they would win easily because the sox and twins suck. i loathe this guy 90-72 he's nuts! :puke Joe Posnanski

[SuperSteve]

We'll the Yankees are just so annoying. They're yucky, just like totally...

 

 

 

YOU f***ING IDIOT!!!!

[SoxAce]

:fyou Joe Posnanski. I bet that the Sox, and even the Twinkees will finish ahead of the Goyals.

[CSF]

And then, it's the Royals. They need Brian Anderson and Darrell May to repeat their second-half success and for Jeremy Affeldt to stay healthy and become a dominant starter. If that happens — and phenom Zack Greinke is another wild card here — the Royals could have the best rotation in the division.

 

 

That's alot of ifs, you schmo! The Royals can't even decide if Affeldt is better suited for the rotation or the 'pen. My goodness, he went to the Jay Mariotti school of journalism.

[HighHeat45]

im glad he didnt pick the sox to win the divison

[SuperSteve]

That's alot of ifs, you schmo!  The Royals can't even decide if Affeldt is better suited for the rotation or the 'pen.  My goodness, he went to the Jay Mariotti school of journalism.

Well you know, Buerhle is only a proven starter, and Loz is coming off an awesome season. Garland is only even with their best starters....I think the Royals do have an awesome staff.

[witesoxfan]

What the f*** is this best bullpen s***? I'll take my chances with Koch, Politte, and Shingo coming to form if you give me only Damaso Marte, but then I also get Kelly Wunsch and 1 or 2 of Mike Jackson/Jason Grilli/Dan Wright/Arnie Munoz/David Sanders on top of that. I'll also take my chances with Juan Rincon and JC Romero being my only guaranteeds if you give me Joe Nathan, Carlos Silva, Grant Balfour, and probably Pete Munro. What an assbag. Curt Leskanic, Scott Sullivan, and Mike McDougal are all quite solid, and Jason Grimsley who will have to return to form(I believe he had about a 4.75 ERA last year), and then I'm not even sure who will be their 5th and 6th relievers. Probably at the highest, I rate KC 3rd best bullpen in the Central, firmly behind Minnesota and Chicago, and I could see Cleveland jumping ahead of them with Betancourt, Riske, and Jimenez in that bullpen as well as a return of Bob Wickman.

 

Twins best starting staff? I'll take Cy Young runner-up Esteban Loaiza, a solid Mark Buehrle, a young, inconsistant Jon Garland, and then a ? mark in Schoenweis and a ? mark in whoever is the 5th starter over a good Johan Santana, an erratic Kyle Lohse, an inconsistant but sometimes very good Brad Radke, and then two huge question marks(probably Rick Helling being one of them, and maybe Carlos Silva, maybe a starter from within the system...I'm not sure exactly). And I'd probably rate KC at 3, but I would mention that there is a huge differential between #2 and #3. I mean, their ace is like Brian Anderson, is it not? It's someone who is probably not as good as Brad Radke or Mark Buehrle, who are both of the Twins' and White Sox's respective team's #2 starters.

 

What I find funny about his infield is that he says we have question marks all over, when quite frankly we do not. What he means to say is that we are not sure what kind of production we will get out of 1 spot of the infield, that spot being 2B, and I agree with that. We know who our 1Bman(in fact we have two OK 1Bman), we know who our 2Bman is(though we don't know how he will play), we know who our SS is, we know who our 3Bman is, and we know who our C's are. Anyways, I do agree somewhat with his rankings, but I think I would rate the Tigers infield and catcher higher. IIRC, the Tigers infield is IRod at C, Carlos Pena at 1B, Fernando Vina at 2B, Carlos Guillen at SS, and Dmitri Young at 3B(I am only assuming this, because they have Craig Monroe at DH, Rondell White in LF, and Bobby Higginson in RF, so from that I conclude that they have no place else to put Young but 3B). Personally, I feel that the Tigers INF+C is the best in the AL Central, however, that's the only thing they have the best of.

 

Another thing, he says that if Juan Gonzalez stays healthy, the Royals have the best OF in the AL Central. Is that question mark not as big as if Aaron Rowand comes through and produces good numbers this year? Or is it a bigger question mark than that? I think it is, so I'll also include Maggs' numbers improving on last year's and also I see Frank's average raising a little bit as well...to me, that gives the White Sox the best OF+DH in the division. It gives us power from 3(or all 4) of the positions, solid OF defense, and even some speed(Maggs has stolen 25 bases in a year before, and is usually good for atleast double-digit steals, so probably 10-15, Carlos stole 17-20 or so last year, so he's probably good for atleast that again, and Rowand could probably steal 15-20 as well. Those stolen bases cancel out whatever Guiel and Beltran will do). If Gonzo gets hurt, and Rowand does not produce good numbers(and by good I mean like .280 15-20 HR 60-70 RBI 15-20 SB .750-.800 OPS), then the Twins have the best OF+DH in the division, White Sox 2nd, Royals 3rd; Gonzo stays healthy and puts up good numbers, Rowand doesn't, I'd have to say that Minny and KC are very, very close to #1 with us being #3. If Gonzo doesn't put up good numbers, and Rowand does, I'd have to say that the Twins and the Sox are very, very close(I might give the advantage to the White Sox personally, but it's atleast up for grabs...basically, do you prefer very good offensive numbers plus solid defense or very good defense plus solid offensive numbers? Offense helps a lot, but defense is very underrated...usually, the better your defense is, the better your pitchers are, and the better your pitchers are, the more games you win, but we've seen the Yankees, Red Sox, Braves, and others, use very, very good offense to just take out opposing teams and hit the hell out of them...so it's really all up to you), with KC being a distant 3rd. If both Gonzo and Rowand put up good numbers, the OF+DH's are all about equal.

 

BTW, Posnanski's formula is this: let di = take a little bit of blue and white koolaid, psh = put on the rose-colored sunglasses, and it = sit your fatass out on the porch and rub yourself, thinking about the Royals. After multiplying, the formula is this:

 

dips*** = Posnanski

 

Go ahead, check it. I bet it works.

[DonkeyKongerko]

Wasn't he the guy that said something like team's that lead their division by 5 or more games at the All Star break always win their division? That was some good s***.

[Wise Master Buehrle]

A quote from Posnaski in a different article...

 

The Royals have a fascinating lineup. They could have three legitimate Most Valuable Player candidates in there on opening day. That's amazing.

 

The White Sox have a fascinating lineup. They have Maggs, Frank, Lee, and PK. They could have four legitimate Most Valuable Player candidates in there on opening day. That's amazing.

 

He then goes on to talk about how IF they are healthy. IF Juan Gone is healthy. IF Mike Sweeney is healthy. Then Beltran, and we all know what he does.

[Pastime]

If he didn't have s*** for brains, he'd have no brains at all.

 

Let's give him a roll of Charmin, so when he blows his nose or sneezes, he can wipe what little brains he has on something proper.

 

What a complete moron. As dumb as a bag of hair. :fyou

[greasywheels121]

If he didn't have s*** for brains, he'd have no brains at all. 

 

Let's give him a roll of Charmin, so when he blows his nose or sneezes, he can wipe what little brains he has on something proper.

 

What a complete moron.  As dumb as a bag of hair.      :fyou

That's insulting......

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

To the bag of hair.....

[southsider2k5]

The sad thing is, I'll bet Joe doesn't need to go to a KC message board to make an intelligent arguement...

[Cerbaho-WG]

If that happens — and phenom Zack Greinke is another wild card here — the Royals could have the best rotation in the division.

 

 

NONONONONONONONO!!!! The intelligence is leaving the Internet, please save me!

[upnorthsox]

Wow, the anger here's a little surprising. Forget his excessive rosiness towards KC for a sec(since almost everyone responding could have the same thing said for them) and he's not far off with the Sox.

 

Bullpen: Depending on Koch, we could be the best or third. The same could be said for KC.

 

Starters: It's pretty much a tie between the Sox and Twins with both needing young guys in the 4 and 5 spot to step up so I don't see it being a slap rating 1,2 the way he did. I'll admit he was hitting the koolaid hard when he he said "the Royals could have the best rotation in the division." but then they're no worse than the Sox rotation going into 2000 was.

 

Infield: We do have ????? at all 5 positions, after last yr how could Kong not be a ????, Harris is the epitomy of a ?????, Which Jose shows up this yr esp. on D ?????, Olivo has potential but didn't show anything last yr to make you think he was going to blossom this yr, Crede has only one full yr under his belt which begs a ???? but he's probably this least questionable of the bunch. I don't think it's outrageous to say it's a pick'em between KC and the Twinks.

 

Outfield and DH: I guess it depends on your preferences of speed and D over power or not. I personally go back and forth on this one myself.

 

He obviously takes a rosy KC view in the records but as far as the Sox go I could see us winning 83 games, I can also see us winning 73 or 93 too. I guess that's why we play the games.