Spring training continues and — injuries aside — it remains a necessary and fun endeavor that kickstarts any baseball season. Even so, we will not proceed with a weekly official power ranking based on spring performances. These games don’t count and have very little meaning or impact on the regular season. Instead, we find ways to rank things, such as offenses, turns or WBC teams.
This time we won’t even be ranked teams. We will focus on each division and rank them. These don’t rank divisions by stadium (NL West out of my head maybe?) and it doesn’t matter which divisions I watch the most. No, we will be ranking how strong each division is in terms of team strength in the coming season. Top-to-bottom can be important, as can multiple World Series contenders. Above all, it’s just a feeling: In which league would you most/least want to play with your favorite team?
There is an extra crease here too. MLB has used an “unbalanced” schedule for quite some time. It’s much more balanced this season. For the full details, we’ve got you covered here. Just to scratch the surface, the in-division games for each team have dropped from 76 to 52. With more out-of-division games coming into the regular season, it matters a lot more which divisions are stronger than it has in years past, especially with three wild cards in each league.
With that in mind, let’s rank the divisions for 2023.
1. American League East
The Boston Red Sox were 52-34 last season when they didn’t have to play a team in their division. That means they played like a 98-win team when they weren’t dealing with their division mates. And yet they ended up in last place. They’re probably a little worse than last season, but they’re not bad. They’re likely to have better luck against their AL East counterparts this time around, and now they’re getting fewer of those games while coming more outside the division.
Why am I talking so much about the Red Sox? Because most people would call them the worst team in the AL East preseason, but they’re also probably a playoff contender. I personally think the Orioles are the worst team here, but they won 83 games last season and shouldn’t take a big step back.
The point is, there are no wimps here and it could be argued that there are five playoff contenders. The Yankees, Blue Jays and Rays would be reasonable predictions to win the division, meaning they wouldn’t be bad picks to win the AL or even the World Series.
This thing is loaded.
2. State League East
The NL-Ost is probably harder at the top than the AL-Ost. The Braves and Mets both won 101 games last season and once again look like two of the best teams in all of baseball. The Phillies made it to the World Series and are looking better this time, even without maybe half a season from Bryce Harper. At the end of the year, the best bet is that this division has three World Series contenders.
The marlins aren’t bad either. You can pitch and the front office did their best to find anything offensive. One could argue that the Marlins are in the ballpark of the Red Sox and/or Orioles. If you were a NL East person I could see this argument as well: Braves/Mets/Phillies > Yankees/Blue Jays/Rays. If you did that and also liked the Marlins hanging in the area of the Red Sox and Orioles, I guess you could… oh wait. We’re leaving something out, aren’t we?
Yes, the Nationals are really pulling things down here and that’s the main dividing point between AL and NL East.
As for the predictably boring “east coast bias” nonsense that will surely come from somewhere: feel free to argue against either the east being up here, but I dare you to do so on merit and not geography do. Much luck.
3. Landesliga West
This division has been pretty top-heavy for the last couple of years and it’s likely to stay that way. The Padres seem to be one of baseball’s best teams and the Dodgers are so established that it would be foolish to bet against them. There’s an argument that this division has the best 1-2 batting in baseball, but that’s not what we’re doing here.
The Rockies look like one of the worst teams in baseball.
The Giants took a major step backwards last season, falling from MLB’s best 107 wins to 81. However, if you look at their roster, it looks like they should have lost a lot more games. They just never seem to do as well as their track record says, whether they’re great, bad, or in between. Somehow they find a way to be relevant. I am sure that this will be the case again this season. At worst I have them reliably average.
That leaves the Diamondbacks. I don’t think they will be good. I’m not letting them push for a playoff spot. But they are interesting and have “upstart” potential. Once you get to the fourth team in the Central Divisions, there’s no telling. I don’t know if fourth-place D-backs are good enough for a boost — the Red Sox or Orioles would be much better picks — but they’re certainly not a disadvantage.
4. American League West
The defending champion was Astros my #1 team in my preseason power rankings and I can’t see myself moving her from that spot for a while. They dominated the AL West last year (51-25 head-to-head) but played outside of the division as a 103-win team. More succinctly: you are great and the schedule change doesn’t matter.
On the other hand, the A’s might be the worst team in baseball.
As for the other three, there’s a lot of talent with a lot of questions.
The Mariners were an amazing story last season and it’s possible they’re better. It’s just as possible that a relapse is imminent, and if we were to pit them against the NL West, they’re far less reliable than the Dodgers or Padres.
The angels are the opposite of the giants. Where we could look at the angelic star power and rejoice, the giants just seem kind of boring, you know? And yet, even last year, when the Giants just weren’t feeling so good, they won 81 games. The Angels were still in first place on May 16 and then fell apart, losing 89 games. I said the Giants are reliably average. There is nothing reliable about the angels at all. When it comes down to it, I’d much rather watch the Angels play and it’s possible they’ll end up doing better than the Giants, but if you had to bet your life on either of those teams setting a winning record this year, would you do it surely take the Giants right?
I’ve mentioned the Rangers before great advantage that their rotation has. It could be the best rotation in baseball and if everything works at the right time, they could even win the World Series! But they’re already dealing with injuries to virtually everyone in the rotation and the season hasn’t even started yet, a melancholy reminder of the lows things could plummet with this group.
In fact, Rangers kind of feels like those AL West rankings. When things go well for the Mariners, Angels and Rangers, here’s a way for this division to be in the conversation for the best in baseball. If anything goes wrong with those three, we’re talking a division that keeps the Astros from being the worst.
Between right and wrong lies a battle with the NL West for third place.
5. National League Middle
The Reds have a couple of young arms that will prove to be aces, maybe as early as the second half of this season. The Pirates have Oneil Cruz and he’s a TV must-see in almost every game. Still, I expect both teams to be among the worst in baseball this year.
This makes the Cubs the third-best team in this division. Just to compare with the top two divisions in this ranking, that would put them against the Rays and Phillies. Not close, right? I expect the Cubs to be better than last year and maybe at least a little on the fringes of playoff contention, but they’re basically mediocre.
So that’s two bad teams and one mediocre team. Let’s get to the positive!
The Brewers and Cardinals will both be good teams. The cardinals have one of the best offenses in baseball while the brewers Sport one of the best rotations.
Of course, we have to point out that the Cardinals were 20 games over .500 in the division last year and were 45-41 out of it. The Brewers were 44-42 outside the division. Things change from year to year and both teams are good, but again I think this new schedule will impact overall wins for the whole season. Beating the Pirates, Reds and to a lesser extent Cubs for a decent number of fewer games will move the needle.
6. American League Central
The Guardians were out of division 45-41 last season but thanks to dominance at AL Central they won 92 games. Four games over .500 is by no means a bad record, but they played like an 85-win team outside the division and they won that thing by 11 games. For the millionth time, it’s another year and things will change, but there hasn’t been enough movement to believe that things will change everything The much.
Looking around at the projection systems and just using my eye test/gut feeling the conclusion is that we will have a hard time seeing a 90 win team here and it is possible that a mid 80’s win total will be reached . Not only that, but there seem to be two terrible teams, and while the White Sox have a lot of potential, their lack of depth makes it seem like there’s a chance they’ll bottom out.
Since both Centrals look similar in strength, we can split it up. We can get the White Sox and Cubs together — I know all Chicagoans love to do that — while we get the bottom two teams in each of the Centrals (Tigers, Royals, Reds, Pirates) together, and even if there are little things, I think a Many people would agree that the two departments are similar there. We then remain with the Guardians and Twins against the Cardinals and Brewers. I’m very strong on the NL side. That means …
The AL Central is the worst division in baseball.