First half of 2015 teaches us to expect the unexpected
We have reached the unofficial halfway mark of the 2015 Major League Baseball season, and it’s hard to complain about much of anything. Games are faster. Pitching is dominant, but any number of hitters are providing fans with breathtaking offense.
But perhaps the best part of 2015 has been the unpredictable nature of it all. That is, unless you somehow had Logan Forsythe as the most valuable offensive player on the Tampa Bay Rays, the Minnesota Twins in the playoffs and Dallas Keuchel as the clubhouse leader for the American League Cy Young Award.
Only a fool would march boldly into the breach and tell you how the second half of such a crazy season in the world’s most unpredictable game will go. But Sports Weekly didn’t hire me to sit back timidly. I present to you ... the future, in five fearless predictions for the second half:
Alex Rodriguez will lead the New York Yankees to the playoffs.
There have been few more heartwarming stories than the reconciliation between Alex Rodriguez and the New York Yankees this spring and summer, right? Monolith of a baseball team tries to avoid paying contracted bonuses to disgraced slugger, only to find said slugger helping an unlikely pennant contender to the top of the American League East. The two banding together to resolve a dispute over the ball Rodriguez hit out of the park to earn his 3,000th hit, and Yankees ownership slowly moving toward speaking positively about the most marketable of the team’s players.
A bottomless pit of money somehow getting even more bottomless. A fan base without any shortage of championship parades perhaps readying itself for another one.
Right, so Hollywood might not be preparing scripts for this one, but it is an absolutely riveting baseball story. Rodriguez turns 40 this month. He missed a full season in 2014. Those who want to deny him credit for a comeback season cite this as if it’s a luxury, but very few players ever miss a full year and return close to previous levels of production, let alone do so at this advanced age.
Just to compare: Derek Jeter, age 38, put up an on-base-plus-slugging percentage of .791. He missed nearly all of his age-39 season recovering from a broken ankle. His age 40 season? .617
Rodriguez, age 37, put up a .771 OPS. He missed 2014 because of his performance-enhancing-drugrelated suspension. 2015? .898 OPS.
So it’s pretty remarkable, and Rodriguez has help from a similarly vintage season by Mark Teixeira, part of the Yankees’ 75-year tradition of getting players beyond age 35 to come close to replicating their peaks, from Enos Slaughter and Johnny Mize right through Jorge Posada and Mariano Rivera. But Rodriguez as the centerpiece on another Yankees championship team is new ground, even for them. He didn’t make the All-Star team, which is a bit hard to understand: The best offensive player on a division leader probably ought to be in the mix. And any excuse to keep him from winning the comeback player of the year award will suffice, so Ubaldo Jimenez, prepare to be honored.
But Rodriguez is one of the great players in the history of the game, and I’m prepared to say he will not break down as so many have predicted. Instead, he’ll end the season among Yankees leaders, and there will be October
baseball at Yankee Stadium.
The Houston Astros will win the American League pennant.
Last summer, Sports Illustrated was ridiculed in some circles for a cover predicting the Astros would win the World Series in 2017. But it looks like SI now might be forced to issue a correction — and move that date up in time.
These Astros enter the break a half-game out in the AL West, just behind the streaking Los Angeles Angels. But the 49-42 mark isn’t a mirage and stands to actually improve in the second half. The Astros played 32 of their first 91 games with Carlos Correa at shortstop but should have him for the entire second half.
Players with offensive talent that exceeds their production can be found throughout the roster, from Jason Castro and Jon Singleton to Jake Marisnick and even Jose Altuve, whose numbers are below his career norms. Starting pitcher Lance McCullers is for real, as is Keuchel, and Collin McHugh is due for a rebound. The Astros also are more capable than most other MLB teams of figuring out precisely how to leverage what they have. (Will Harris, anybody?) But don’t count them out for a big move between now and the trade deadline.
The Cleveland Indians will make the playoffs.
Cleveland is 51⁄2 games out of a wildcard spot and would have to pass six teams to reach October. But an underperforming offense is due to normalize, and there might not be a team in the AL with deeper starting pitching than the Indians. It looks like Danny Salazar is figuring it out, and he’s the team’s fourth starter. Look for the Indians to make a run ... unless you believe the Twins and Los Angeles Angels are this good.
A St. Louis Cardinals-Pittsburgh Pirates NL Championship Series.
No one could have watched this past weekend’s four-game series at PNC Park, which included two extra-inning affairs, and come away thinking about anything other than October. The results put the Pirates 21⁄2 games behind the Cardinals, but the larger picture revealed that the two best NL teams happen to play in the Central. Whatever hopes there are for a Chicago Cubs-Cardinals rivalry down the road, Pirates-Cardinals is here. And the tradeoff baseball made by adding wild cards to the playoff mix is that the division race is somewhat anticlimactic, but these two were built to battle in a seven-game series with a trip to the World Series at stake.
Game 7 will be won by the Cardinals, at Busch Stadium, thanks to NL Cy Young Award winner ... Carlos Martinez.
The 23-year-old has put it all together, earning an All-Star invitation on the strength of a first-half 2.52 ERA. But he has been even better than that since two early May starts, with a 1.37 ERA over his past 11 outings. This is a pitcher capable of reaching Pedro Martinez heights, and we’re in the process of seeing him do so. And, yes, this means a Cardinals-Astros World Series. Also known as the World Series Jeff Luhnow Built.