The Rest of the AL East

Lets take a look at the rest of the American league East and how they did this off-season and how they hope to fair in 2011. Every team in the division made some big moves and signing this off-season and it looks like the east could become more and more competitive as time goes on.

Baltimore Orioles: Key additions- Derrek Lee, J.J. Hardy, Mark Reynolds, Vladimir Guerrero, Kevin Gregg, Jeremy Accardo, and resigned Koji Uehar.

Key Losses- Ty Wigginton, Kevin Millwood

With the late signing of Vlad Guerrero as well as the additions of Derrek Lee and Mark Reynolds the Orioles offense has made up for their loss of Ty Wigginton and added some real pop to the middle of their lineup. They have also improved their pitching with the addition of Kevin Gregg and Justin Duchscherer. Buck Showalter has really turned the Orioles around and while at best they will be contending for third place in the AL East, Showalter has been able to maximize production from the Orioles and he could do a great job developing the team  for the next few years until they are hopefully able to contend in the division. There are some negatives for the Orioles and the main one has to be that while the team improved its pitching and offense, they are still likely the worst team in the east in every category. Also by signing Vlad they take Luke scott out the DH role and so he will be competing with Pie and Winn for the left field spot and it seems to me that it should be more important for the young orioles to get as much playing time as possible than for them to sign Vlad, because the Orioles need to build a team that will compete in the future and signing Vlad for a year doesn't really seem to help them do that.

Tampa Bay Rays: Key additions- Manny Ramirez, Johnny Damon, Kyle Farnsworth and Joel Peralta and a lot of other small pieces

Key Losses- Grant Balfour, Jason Bartlett, Randy Choate, Joaquin Benoit, Carl Crawford, Matt Garza, Dioner Navarro, Chad Qualls, Carlos Pena, Dan Wheeler, Rafael Soriano

The Rays lost a lot of players and traded away Bartlett and Garza, but this team made some good pic ups and some very surprising ones by adding old superstars Manny Ramirez and Johnny Damon to go along with their current superstars Evan Longoria and David Price. Some have said that the Rays will be able to contend this year and that remains a remote possibility, but the signing of Manny and Damon should show people what the rays are trying to do. The Rays new coming into this year that it would be very hard for them to compete this year if they did well or awful, I actually remarked to my friend (a sox fan) that the Rays would likely lose all their free agents and trade a starting pitcher no matter how they finished the year. The Rays picked up Manny and Damon in order to keep people in the stands and let their prospects develop more in the Rays fantastic farm system. The Rays have showed in the past that when everything is clicking they are one of the best teams in baseball, but when one part of their team struggles the team runs into trouble as a whole, keep in mind this team has been no hit three times since July of 09 and two of those were perfect games. The Rays don't have the payroll to keep their big time free agents and unlike the Royals they know that when they are building they need to keep their fans interested and that is what the Rays are trying to do this year as you can note with incentives in Damons deal.

Toronto Blue Jays: Key Additions- Frank Francisco, Rajai Davis, Octavio Dotal, Jon Rauch

Key Losses- Vernon Wells, John Buck, Scott Downs, Kevin Gregg, Shaun Marcum

The biggest note from the Blue Jays was their dumping of Vernon Wells massive contract that had crippled them since 06. They got Juan Rivera and Mike Napoli from the angels and they promptly traded Napoli to the rangers and are looking to trade Rivera. They also traded last years opening day starter Shaun Marcum to the brewers for infield prospect Brett Lawrie. The Jays acquired Rajai Davis to take over in Center field and the rest of their additions are to try and keep their bullpen at the same level it was last year despite not having a true closer. Unfortunately they missed on Russel Martin and as a result lack an established starting Catcher, but they do poses J. P. Arencibia who is the top Cathcing prospect for the Jays and they failed to get a Starting 3rd Baseman so that they could move Jose Bautista to Right Field. With Vernon Wells Mega contract gone the Jays now have some financial flexibility and they showed that when they signed Bautista to a 5 year $65 million deal, which if he produces like last year will prove to be very team friendly. The Jays will be unlikely to be in the playoff race this year and at the trade deadline they could be looking to buy some cheap pieces to fill the holes. The first thing that the Jays are gonna want to do is get fans to the game which despite Bautista's 54 HR the average attendance actually fell by about 3,000 from 2009. Go to the game people of Toronto at the very least the Jays will hit a lot of Home Runs and its a lot more entertaing than watching the Maple Leafs suck year after year.

Boston Red Sox: Key Additions- Carl Crawford, Bobby Jenks, Adrian Gonzalez, Dan Wheeler

Key Loses- Mike Lowell, Victor Martinez, Adrian Beltre, Bill Hall

Many Red Sox fans still think that they are underdogs to the Yankees which is laughable and all you Connecticut Yankees/non-Sox fans know especially well that Sox fans will forever operate under this delusion that they they believe themselves the constant underdogs no matter their payroll. The Red Sox failed to make the post season and their ratings dropped 36%, so ownership knew that they need to win to keep current sox fans happy. My friend the Sox fan has been trying to justify to me how the Sox are still the underdogs despite their $142 million 7 year deal for Crawford. The Sox have put a lot of faith into Crawford being able to keep his speed until his mid 30's and only time will tell if that faith is justified. The other big deal that the Sox had was their Trade for Adrian Gonzalez, the Sox have put off signing Gonzalez to an extension to avoid more luxury tax, but they will have to and they will have to hope that he comes back 100% from his shoulder surgery and if he does he will be a monster in Fenway. The Sox also appear to have accepted that Papelbon will have another shaky year and so they acquired Dan wheeler and Bobby Jenks to assist Daniel Bard (who could have been a Yankee) in moving on from him. Despite the claims that this will be the best Red Sox team ever they have to hope that a lot of things go right. Last off-season the Sox signed Lackey for 5 years $86 million and extended  Becket for 4 years $68 million. Neither of these guys pitched well, Becket due to Injury and Lackey due to being overrated and sucking, but the Sox seem to think that both these guys will bounce back and be fine, but he never looked good after his May injury last year and face it Lackey was overrated. Dice K only had 153 inning pitched and posted an ERA worse than Ivan Nova's and he also has a history of Injury problems and so the Red Sox are looking at John Lester and Clay Buckholtz to repat their great 2010 seasons. I'm not saying that the Red Sox pitching staff is bad I'm just saying that Dice-K, Beckett and Lackey will sink the Red Sox but its a lot to say that they will just miraculously be better. The Red Sox offense also has a lot riding on speculation, Yes if Gonzalez comes back 100% he will be fantastic, but their is also the concern about Dustin Pedroia, Kevin Youkilis, Ellsbury all staying healthy and Ortiz being productive and Saltalamacchia and Ellsbury hitting above .200. If the Red Sox stay healthy then they could run away with the division but 162 games is a long time and if the injury bug strikes again they could find themselves playing golf again in October.

(Update 2/24: This seems to need clarification. I am NOT saying that Red Sox fans think that they aren't the best team this year, rather that they don't view themselves as a large market team with huge money to spend just like the Yankees. Sorry for any confusion)

To top it all off not a single spring training game has been played and anything can happen during a season let alone before it even beings.

Check out this article and more on my Blog A True Yankee