MLB Spring Training: Six More Questions That Have Nothing to Do With A-Rod

Alex Rodriguez arrived at Yankees camp on Monday — two days ahead of schedule — which pissed off the Yankees, apparently, but is good news for everybody else since we can get it out of our system, regardless of what the New York tabloids drum up for the next 6-7 weeks. If we can, somehow, allow ourselves to move away from the day-to-day business of a 39-year-old part-time player what else is going on across diamonds in Florida and Arizona?

For me, the underlying story of baseball continues to be parity. For the first time since the days of Steve Sax, Roberto Kelly and Phil Rizzuto extolling the virtues of The Money Store on WPIX, the Yankees might be termed under the catch-all phrasing as “bad” and could finish under .500. Instead of breaking the bank after last year’s playoff-less season, the Yankees signed Andrew Miller, Stephen Drew, Chris Capuano, brought back Chase Headley and traded for Didi Gregorius — a far cry from Max Scherzer and Yoan Moncada. Beyond that, the pitching staff is full of question marks, Michael Pineda aside.

Apologies for the ESPN/East Coast bias, since the Yankees are simply an example here, since they’re far-removed from the days when you could pencil them in for the playoffs and 100+ wins. In 2014 nobody won 100+ and two Wild Card, sub-90 win teams reached the World Series. Last week when we looked at over/unders, half the league was within 3+ games of 81 wins. Realistically, the list of teams nobody thinks will sniff the postseason is short and probably consists of Arizona, Colorado and Philadelphia. In other words, most baseball fans don’t need any foreign substances to talk themselves into a potential playoff run, albeit a penitential one-game playoff run.

Long term parity should continue — even with three World Series wins in five seasons few people consider the Giants as dominating the sport a la the late 90s/early 2000s Yankees. How this affects baseball remains to be seen. Do casual fans gravitate toward dominant teams? Or is it better that almost everyone has a chance?

Those questions are tied to your own personal feelings of sport. More practically, teams are less dependent on a star system to carry then, instead leaning on the entire 25-man or even 40-man roster, which partly(*) explains the A-Rod media hysteria.

Anyways, why not look at six storylines, one for each division, worth keeping an eye on as Spring Training grinds into gear.

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AL East: Can the Jays end their postseason drought?

Recently we’ve seen the Pirates (viva #Buctober!) and the Royals (1985!) end their long, playoff-less droughts. If things come in threes it’s time for the Blue Jays to party like it’s 1993 all over again — quick see if Tag Team is busy. A reason to be bullish on the Jays? A lineup of Jose Reyes, Russell Martin, Jose Bautista, Edwin Encarnacion and Josh Donaldson looks fantastic on paper. The American League East is as open as its ever been under the five-team alignment — depending on your feelings of the re-tooled Red Sox. More worrisome is the potential for the Jays to become a slow-pitch softball team with R.A. Dickey and Mark Buehrle atop the rotation. These guys should eat up innings, but at what cost? Drew Hutchison fluctuated between very good and very bad almost every other start, so if he can find some consistency the Jays chances are a lot more viable.

AL Central: How good can the Cleveland pitching staff be in 2015?

Corey Kluber won the 2014 Cy Young (yeah that really happened, here’s proof) Carlos Carrasco struck out 140 batters in 134 innings en route to sub 1.00 WHIP. Trevor Bauer and Danny Salazar remain highly-regarded at 24 and 25 years old respectively. Even so, Cleveland’s rotation remains as anonymous as the fictional Indians in Major League filming an American Express commercial. Perhaps the only way their collective anonymity changes in small market Cleveland is if they start hanging out with Johnny Manziel. Wait, nevermind.

AL West: Are the Mariners ready to surpass the Athletics and Angels?

Vegas is high on Seattle, which won 87 games last year and added Nelson Cruz to the mix. Cruz likely won’t hit 40 home runs moving from Camden Yards to Safeco (even with its reconfigured outfield), but gives Robinson Cano some protection in the lineup beyond Kyle Seager. As long as you’ve got Felix Hernandez and Hisashi Iwakuma atop the rotation, you’re in good shape to contend. The best argument for Seattle is that Los Angeles didn’t make any major gains in the off-season, while Oakland’s complete re-tool makes them a massive question mark, saying nothing of Houston and Texas.

NL East: Is this “the year” for Bryce Harper?

With their pitching staff, the Nationals shouldn’t have too many other issues. So, I guess, we’ll spend time speculating on Harper becoming the phenom he was projected to be when he arrived as a 19-year-old in 2012. As we saw in the playoffs, Harper’s raw power is scary good (official SABR terminology). As usual, the biggest question for Harper remains his ability to stay healthy.

NL Central: How important is Anthony Rizzo to the Cubs?

Maybe this will be the Cubbies year, right? The success of the Cubs remains tied to a lot of potential and young players (i.e. Jorge Soler, Javier Baez, Kris Bryant Addison Russell, etc.) As of now, the one established player in the Cubs lineup, pending a bounce back from Starlin Castro, is Rizzo, who at 24 posted a .286/.386/.527 line last season. Rizzo is still only 24 himself, but if he’s consistent and doesn’t drop off too much from 2014, it allows the rest of the young Cubs players a lot more time to develop, find a third baseman and not rely on undistinguished veterans like Chris Coghlan to perform. There’s only so much Joe Maddon can do from the dugout after all.

NL West: Is Yasiel Puig a legit MVP candidate?

Earlier this week, Puig spoke to the Los Angeles Times about how he’d like to be the Kobe Bryant or LeBron James of baseball. For whatever baseball lacks in star power, Puig could fill that void since he’s shown the ability to make highlight-worthy plays in every aspect of the game. Whatever crap was written about Puig in his rookie year and all the nonsense about not respecting the game’s unwritten rules, let’s remember he’s only 24 this year and his on-field production speaks for itself. His two seasons have produced a total WAR of 10.4, which is great. His lifetime OPS+ (100 is average) is 151. The numbers (which are great) speak for themselves. Puig, along with the evergreen Vin Sully, are worth staying up late (if you’re an East Coaster) for Dodgers games on the MLB package.

Looking at the way the Dodgers have reconfigured their roster, they obviously put a lot of stock in Puig being its key cog right next to Adrian Gonzalez. If you’re a baseball fan, there’s really no downside of Puig continuing to get better, unless you’re a Giants fan. Puig’s received MVP votes his first two seasons and since the Dodgers are projected to be among baseball’s best in 2015 that shouldn’t change this year, either.

(*) Also it’s New York and easy, low-hanging tabloid fruit. Sigh.