Here’s a question for Chicago Cubs fans: Which player hit the club’s farthest home run in 2017? You would be forgiven if you said Kyle Schwarber; after all, Scwarbs, who is built like an NFL lineman, hit five of the team’s ten deepest dingers. But you’d be wrong. On October 18, catcher Willson Contreras launched a fastball from the Dodgers’ Alex Wood that hit the left-field scoreboard; Statcast’s projected distance was 491 feet. To put that into perspective, the Yankees’ Aaron Judge’s June 11 495-footer was the deepest home run hit all year. Glenallen Hill’s legendary shot that landed on a Wrigleyville rooftop on a March day with the wind blowing out in 2000 was measured at 490 feet. (You can watch Contreras’s shot here.)
Contreras, who played in only 117 regular season games due to a month on the DL, was one of six Cubs to hit over 20 homers last season. This year will be only his second full season in the major leagues, and he is one of the reasons the Cubs should advance to the postseason for the fourth consecutive year. Contreras is the kind of elite catcher that a team needs to be among the MLB’s top competitors: not just a slugger, but a speedy runner, a good pitch caller and framer, and a fiery hustler with a rocket arm.
Contreras will be catching tosses from new faces this season, including highly sought-after starter Yu Darvish and fellow free agent and closer Brandon Morrow. (Gone are former Cy Young winner Jake Arrieta, starter John Lackey and closer Wade Davis.) Whether the revamped bullpen will be as good as or better than last year’s is the team’s biggest Yu Darvish at spring training
question mark. With the return of Jon Lester, Kyle Hendricks and José Quintana, on paper the Cubs should still have the best pitching staff in the NL Central, and one of the top eight or nine in the MLB.
No team has a deeper squad of position players than the Cubs. The club’s acknowledged leader is first-baseman Anthony Rizzo, who at 28 is also its the oldest starter (he is one day older than right fielder Jason Heyward). He leads an exciting offense that scored the most runs in baseball in the second half of the 2017 season. Rizzo also anchors one of the best infields in baseball, with former NL MVP Kris Bryant at third base and two of the game’s most exciting and athletic middle infielders, shortstop Addison Russell and second baseman Javy “El Mago” Báez. As in previous seasons, manager Joe Maddon will platoon his outfielders, with left fielder Schwarber, center fielder Albert Almora, Jr. and right fielder Jason Heyward probably seeing the most playing time, though Ian Happ (who, as a part-time rookie last season had the team’s second-highest slugging percentage) and versatile veteran Ben Zobrist (who can also play second base) will also see a lot of action.
Cubs fans are particularly curious to see how Schwarber performs after he both slimmed down and bulked up in the offseason. Schwarbs slugged 30 home runs in 129 games last year, but batted only .211 and led the team with 150 strikeouts. His struggles at the plate were undoubtedly due in part to a strange, failed experiment by Maddon that saw Schwarber batting leadoff for most of the first half of the season. Schwarber worked hard in the offseason; it seems clear that he realized that he could not be his best in left field at (a listed) 235 pounds. He’s not going to beat Báez or Contreras in a foot race, but Schwarber has already stolen two bases in spring training — one more than he stole all last season.
The NL Central will by no means be a cakewalk for any team. Both the Brewers and the Cardinals are likely to be stronger than they were last year, when the Cubs had to go all-out in September to win a three-team division race. The Reds will also be improved, though an exciting offense will not make up for a lack of good pitching. The Pirates, who won 98 games and made their third straight playoff appearance in 2015, look to finish last in the division after they traded CF Andrew McCutchen and SP Gerrit Cole.
As for the rest of baseball, look for last year’s top teams to be back. In the NL East, the Nationals have a new manager in Dave Martinez, who was previously Maddon’s bench coach in both Chicago and Tampa Bay. The team is loaded with talent, with one of the best starting rotations in baseball, and an offense that scored the third-highest run total in the NL. The Washington squad will also be a little deeper this year, with versatile outfielder Adam Eaton back (he spent almost all of 2017 on the DL); in his last full season (with the White Sox), Eaton had the second-best defensive Wins Above Replacement (WAR) among major league outfielders. Stars Bryce Harper (OF, .319 and 29 HR in ’17), Daniel Murphy (2B, .322 and 23 HR) and Gio Gonzalez (SP, 15 wins and a 2.96 ERA) will all be eligible for free agency next winter, which will give them an extra incentive to continue outperforming — and will give the team an extra incentive to win a championship before they depart. The Nats should have little competition for the division crown — but have won the East four times in the last six years and still have not won a playoff series.
In the NL West, the Dodgers should win their sixth consecutive division championship in what should be, again, the league’s best division. The team with MLB’s biggest payroll (yes, they beat the Yankees in that department) has an outstanding pitching staff, anchored by starter Clayton Kershaw and closer Kenley Jansen. Both the Rockies and Diamondbacks went to the postseason last year and there’s no reason to believe they won’t do so again this year.
It will be raining home runs in the Bronx this year, as the Yankees bring sluggers Aaron Judge (last season’s Rookie of the Year, with 52 HR) and Giancarlo Stanton (last season’s NL MVP with the Marlins) together in the same lineup. The Yanks led all of baseball in home runs last year; the addition of Stanton, who knocked out an MLB-leading 59, almost seems unfair. New York fans may be seeing a dynamic duo not unlike Yankee greats Ruth and Gehrig or Mantle and Maris. But this team is more than just offense; the NYY also had the third-best team ERA in the AL last year. Expect the Bronx Bombers to win the AL East, trading places with the Boston Red Sox, who should be a wild card team. The Sox signed slugging outfielder J.D. Martinez (45 HRs last year while playing with the Tigers and Diamondbacks), and the pitching staff, led by aces Chris Sale and Rick Porcello, had an ERA a smidgen better than the Yanks’ last year. The head-to-head matchups between these two teams should give us some of baseball’s most exciting games this season.
The Cleveland Indians should have no trouble running away with the AL Central Division title as they did last year. The Indians had the lowest team ERA in all of baseball last season, and the entire starting rotation, led by the formidable Corey Kluber, returns intact. The offense and defense are as potent as ever, and Terry Francona is widely hailed as one of the game’s best managers. The Indians took the division by a whopping 17 games last year, and another 100 or more wins should be easily in reach this year. (For Chicagoans, the White Sox are still in a rebuilding phase and are at least a couple years away from contending.)
If anything, the reigning World Series champion Houston Astros look even stronger this year, with the addition of SP Gerrit Cole (acquired from the Pirates) to a pitching rotation that already features stars Justin Verlander and Dallas Keuchel. With last year’s MVP José Altuve leading the way, the ‘Stros should handily repeat as AL West champs. Altuve is considered by many to be one of the top all-around players in baseball; in addition to his outstanding defense, last year Altuve batted .324, hit 24 home runs and 39 doubles, and stole 32 bases.
Coincidentally, the other player most often cited for his all-around performance also plays in the AL West: the Angels’ CF Mike Trout. Trout (.306, 33 HRs, 94 walks and 22 stolen bases in ’17) leads an improved squad that, while unlikely to unseat the Astros, could be a wild card team. Along with re-signing OF Justin Upton (35 HR, 109 RBI) after a successful two-month stint, they also added 2B Ian Kinsler and SS Zack Cozart to plug two glaring holes in the infield. Then, of course, there was the Angels’ surprise win in the Shohei Ohtani sweepstakes. The 23-year-old Ohtani was a star as both a pitcher (his fast ball clocks over 100 mph) and a hitter in Japan, and figures to be the Angels’ designated hitter when he’s not on the mound. He will likely be the only AL pitcher to regularly hit for himself in batting order when he is pitching. If nothing else, the Angels will be a fun team to watch in 2018.
If you’re wondering if I’m going to predict the postseason, the answer is no. The top teams are so close in terms of talent that anything can happen. Naturally I’ll be rooting for the Cubs, who open the season on March 29 in Miami against the Marlins. Let’s fly that W!
