MLB 2015 Wrapup Part I

It's that special time of year, when the World Series is over but Winning the Winter is still a month away from its debut. I thought I would take a quick look at all 30 teams, tell you how wrong I was about them in March for my own amusement, and give a rough overview of what they can do to win the winter and, potentially, the 2016 season. I'll break it up into three posts, starting today with the playoff teams. In descending order of 2015 awesomeness, here's the last word on the season.

1. Kansas City Royals. I gave the 2014 AL Champs a D for their offseason work, although I did suspect Kendrys Morales was a good signing and the defense-and-bullpen team construction was still solid. I overrated two of their AL Central competitors, true, but I also underrated this team as badly as anyone. I assume I'll do it again five months from now, once the free agents have left and their places are filled by Dayton Moore acquisitions that don't make sense to those of us who aren't team building savants. Those holes- second base, left field, and number one starting pitcher- will be the focus, and unless Alex Gordon stays, they'll be taking downgrades across the board. Even so, Royals magic is real, their hitting philosophy still gives them strategic superiority, and it's going to take more than a mediocre White Sox team having an aggressive offseason to knock KC off the list of favorites this winter.

2. New York Mets. Let's take a moment to acknowledge how much weirdness went into the Mets' season. The most talented team in their division lost their season to injuries and Matt Williams buffoonery. The rest of the division was so bad it took a mere 90 wins to guarantee a Division Series appearance, while it took 97 to make the Wild Card game. A blockbuster deadline deal fell through, allowing Sandy Alderson to add his backup plan- the Cuban Babe Ruth- to the lineup for the stretch run and turning Wilmer Flores into a folk hero for one of the coolest reasons anyone has ever become a folk hero. Daniel Murphy single-handedly destroyed every Cy Young contender in a two-week stretch in October, and now a bad defensive second baseman with middling power might be looking at a qualifying offer. All this is to say I was a little wrong about the Mets, but if I wasn't so very wrong about the Nationals, it wouldn't have made a difference. The World Series exposed a need for better relief pitching, but playing against KC would do that to any team. Apart from that, I don't think anyone would blame Sandy Alderson if he sat on his hands this winter. The pieces are there to do this every year for the next five years, with or without Murphy and Cespedes. The pitching is just that good.

3. Toronto Blue Jays. Finally, we get to a team I got right. The lineup was every bit as good as I expected, and Alex Anthopoulos showed in July that his penchant for audacious trades wasn't confined to the winter. I'm fascinated by everything about Anthopoulos: His youth, his compulsion to trade for players no other team would consider available, the fact that he traded most of his best prospects for star players in late 2012 only to rebuild the farm system and deplete it again for more, better stars in 2014-15, and finally his diva turn, leaving when new team president Mark Shapiro became the primary decision maker. Every day when I hit MLBTraderumors, the headline I'm looking for is "White Sox/Marlins fire Rick Hahn/Michael Hill, hire Anthopoulos". But enough about my baseball man crushes. The Blue Jays had a magical season, but the cost was high. 60% of the starting rotation are free agents and the prospect cupboard is once again nearly bare. The future hinges on whether Shapiro wants to take a step back to start a bottom-up build, or if he and ownership recognize the rare opportunity 2015 gave them and assume their rightful place as Yankees North. That would entail some aggressive free agent spending on starting pitching, with the best possible outcome being David Price and a successful run at a mid-rotation starter, possibly keeping Marco Estrada. If that gets done without compromising the face-melting lineup, this team doesn't have to be a one-year wonder.

4. Chicago Cubs. Three teams made the leap in 2015 and I missed them all, but since I'm not a scout I don't really blame myself for not seeing Kyle Schwarber coming. Jake Arrieta and Kris Bryant, on the other hand... Maybe I should have called that. Still, 97 wins is an absurd total, one that wasn't predicted by anyone but the biggest North Side homers. Like the Mets, the Cubs don't have to do a whole lot to enter 2016 with great expectations. Unlike the Mets, the Cubs aren't afraid to throw lots of money at the best available player who fills a need- in this case, Price, Cueto, or Zimmermann. They also need a placeholder center fielder until Albert Almora is ready, and like most teams, some more bullpen depth wouldn't hurt. If they can fix Jon Lester's pickoff issues, that would also be a thing worth doing. The winter jockeying between three great teams and excellent front offices in St. Louis, Chicago, and Pittsburgh should be enough to keep the stove hot all winter. The 2016 NL Central race will be a good one, and it starts today.

5. Houston Astros. And here's the third leap-making team I missed on. Carlos Correa is real, y'all. But this wasn't just the K-happy team I thought they were in March. Led by Dallas Keuchel, they led the AL in ERA while finishing among the best teams in most relevant offensive stats. Oh yeah, and Carlos Gomez is their center fielder now. The Astros are pretty much the anti-Royals, based on the longball and strong starting pitching, but their success in 2015 shows that any strategy is a good one as long as the team sticks to it. To that end, I look for Houston to make a single big splash this winter, maybe signing Crush Davis to solve their first base controversy (If you have two first basemen, you don't have one) or adding another good starting pitcher. Whether or not they go big this winter, we should probably expect the Astros to be playoff regulars for the foreseeable future.

6. Los Angeles Dodgers. The Dodgers played to everyone's expectations in the regular season, with Kershaw and Greinke dominating the Cy Young discussion until Jake Arrieta came along and broke baseball in August and September. Andrew Friedman's winter trades with the Padres and the Marlins made him look even smarter than he already was. Another complex trade in July was supposed to bring in pitching reinforcements, but Mat Latos didn't stick and Alex Wood underwhelmed. In the end, the Dodgers' World Series hopes were dashed not by a lack of rotation depth but by the video game version of Daniel Murphy and the rise of the Mets' starting pitchers. Nothing can stop the randomness of short series baseball, but it's a foregone conclusion that ownership will fork over whatever it takes to restock the rotation and try it again next year under a new manager.

7. Texas Rangers. Of all the teams I got wrong in March, I'm most surprised and embarrassed by this one. I thought their best case scenario was selling at the trade deadline, and instead they rode some deadline pitching upgrades and a lineup full of comeback heroes to a close-fought division title. Among the many things I missed: Shin-Soo Choo and Prince Fielder are still quality bats, Yovanni Gallardo's stuff actually translated to the AL, and Arte Moreno's desperation to rid himself of Josh Hamilton was greater than any of us imagined. The sum of all this is the Rangers entering the winter in pretty good shape. Behind the veteran core of Beltre, Choo, Fielder, and Andrus, the team has a group of young, high-ceiling position players that could either be trade bait or replacements for whoever ages fastest. Rougned Odor and Delino Deshields, Jr. were the first two to crack the lineup, but Joey Gallo and the oft-injured Jurickson Profar aren't far behind. The bullpen was nails down the stretch under rookie manager Jeff Bannister, and the key guys are all returning. Adding a starting pitcher to replace the free agent Gallardo might be on the team's to-do list, but with ace Yu Darvish expected to return from Tommy John surgery, even that doesn't qualify as essential. This means Jon Daniels can play opportunist this winter, knowing he doesn't have to fill needs but is free to search for upgrades.

8. St. Louis Cardinals. While I did pick the Cardinals to win the NL Central this year, I only give myself partial credit because the division's three best teams each finished with 10-15 more wins than I expected. While the Cubs are the best story and the Pirates pace the league in wins-per-dollar-spent, I keep coming back to this fact with the Cardinals: Adam Wainwright missed the entire season and St. Louis still led MLB in ERA and wins while playing in the hardest division in baseball. I root against the Cardinals because they're always good and they're never interesting, but I have to say that's incredible. Meanwhile, the emergence of Stephen Piscotty and Randal Grichuk means they can let Jason Heyward leave for a draft pick- and live with the declining Yadier Molina and Matt Holliday for another year- without cratering the offense. They could go after a big bat in right field or first base if such a player becomes available, but I don't think they have to. I think this is another winter where the Cardinals stay quiet until the right great player becomes available for the right price, then they pounce and put another juggernaut on the field in 2016.

9. New York Yankees. This is another playoff team I had pegged for fifth place, but in my season preview I at least acknowledged the possibility that they could have a good year. In fact, the way they did it- big years from A-Rod and Mark Teixeira- was exactly the scenario I allowed for, give or take a Sabathia. The deep, dominant bullpen bailed out the rotation more often than not in 2015, so we have to assume the Yanks will make a play for at least one good starting pitcher to join Tanaka and Severino. But given that they're still paying a lot of players more than they're worth thanks to overly long free agent deals, I'm going to guess that the Yankees' plan to win the winter consists of adding a mid-tier starting pitcher or two, continuing to hoard prospects, and looking to take advantage of a weak AL East next year without sacrificing the future. If Toronto can't assemble a pitching staff, that might be just crazy enough to work.

10. Pittsburgh Pirates. In retrospect, leaving the Pirates off of my playoff predictions in March was too cute by half, and I knew it before April was over. This team keeps dumpster-diving and coming up with starting pitching gold, as they did midseason with J.A. Happ. If Cole/Arrieta goes the other way in the Wild Card game, we could easily be talking about the Pirates as World Series champions right now. Instead, it's an early exit, to an inferior team with a red-hot starting pitcher, for the second year in a row*. So what does Pittsburgh do this winter to get over the hump? Nothing. They won 98 games in 2015. The hump has been gotten over, and one-game-playoff results don't reflect anything fixable. They'll return the same roster, plus a couple terrible pitchers who miraculously become mid-rotation anchors or late-game shutdown artists, and they'll hope the Cards and Cubs stumble just a little so they can use both Cole and Liriano next October.

*:Personally, I have no problem with the current playoff setup because I think there should be a significant advantage granted to teams that win their division. But with the best three teams in baseball sharing the NL Central, teams like my preseason Wild Card picks- the Padres and Marlins- have some real thinking to do this winter. If they can't realistically catch the Dodgers/Mets/Nats, they might be left with nothing to play for, and then, what's the real difference between an 85 win Padres team and a 60 win Brewers team? A couple years' head start on rebuilding, that's what.