Five MLB questions: Are the Dodgers inevitable?
All it takes is watching the top of their lineup one time to wonder if this L.A. team can be stopped.
There’s a nice mix of predictable and unpredictable results so far in the 2024 Major League Baseball season. Some of the big dogs sit atop the standings as expected. Other teams that seemed average, or at least hard to figure out, find themselves off too hot start.
This week’s questions take a look at some of those teams off to good starts.
Is this Dodgers lineup inevitable?
There’s a calm that accompanies the walk up to the plate for the top three batters in this lineup: Mookie Betts, Shohei Ohtani, and Freddie Freeman. There’s a confidence that goes along with the poise. When there’s traffic on the bases with their top of the lineup due up, it feels dispiriting for the other team before there are even runs on the board.
I was watching a game between the Padres and the Dodgers. Freeman came up with Betts on second, Ohtani on first, and nobody out. Even if that opportunity didn’t kick off a huge L.A. rally, it struck me that this lineup is inevitable if those guys at the top stay healthy.
Give them enough opportunities like that over the course of the season, combined with the depth they have throughout the rest of their lineup, and it’s hard to imagine them not winning the NL West. They have a weird hodgepodge of mediocre defenders in the field, they have an entire good starting rotation on the injured list.
It’s still hard to imagine any other team in that division overcoming the Dodgers at the top of the standings.
Shohei Ohtani's First Home Run as a Dodger
Is anyone really going to believe that we don’t know what’s happening with all of these pitcher injuries?
Jeff Passan wrote a book about it. As Ben Lindbergh and Meg Rowley noted on a recent episode of Effectively Wild, this isn’t a new issue. Maybe there’s something on the margins with the pitch clock that’s exacerbating the problem. But the problem has been there for years and years now.
Pitching isn’t natural. Guys are maxing out too often. Some seasons will be worse than others with injuries. It appears that 2024 is one of those especially discouraging seasons with elbow injuries. We can acknowledge that, but let’s frame it up in terms of the years long trend as opposed to pretending this is a new problem.
Can you name three Kansas City Royals batters?
It’s early and things might course correct to preseason expectations as more time passes, but the Royals are off to a roaring start thanks to an MLB-best +39 run differential. Even with Bobby Witt, Jr. starting to gain some name recognition as one of the best young players in baseball, they are doing so with a relatively anonymous lineup.
As a nerd with a keeper league fantasy baseball team, I can do it. I can name four batters, in fact: Witt, Salvador Perez, M.J. Melendez, and Vinnie Pasquantino.
It’s not an easy exercise, though.
Are the Royals for real? I think we’re still mostly in the part of the season where it’s just a gut instinct thing. We can all look for little signs here and there about whether the Royals can stick as a contender. Example: they pounded the Houston Astros, sweeping the series and winning two games by more than 10 runs.
Astros vs. Royals Game Highlights (4/11/24) | MLB Highlights
That feels like a team that might be the real deal, even if the Astros are a little beat up right now.
Is the NL Central good?
Most of us entered the season with the same assumption as we looked at the divisions across baseball: both central divisions were weak once again. There’s an interesting question that has emerged from the early returns in the NL Central.
Is this division not that bad? Might it actually be a good division?
SubscribeFour of the NL Central teams currently have records above .500. The Cardinals are in last place with an 8-9 mark so far. It’s not hard for me to see the scenario where the Cardinals actually end up winning the division by the time this is all said and done in 2024.
Let’s take a look at each team:
At 10-5, the Milwaukee Brewers are overachieving relative to preseason expectations. They lost Corbin Burnes and Craig Counsell, and there were lots of questions about their lineup. I think it’s their offense that will have to continue proving themselves over the long run if Milwaukee is going to keep this up.
The Pittsburgh Pirates are 11-6 and might be on the receiving end of the most side-eye looks. They swept the Miami Marlins, who stink, and there are still plenty of questions about the overall quality of their roster. With fun player like Oneil Cruz and Ke’Bryan Hayes, there might be some juice there, but I’m inclined to think this won’t last.
The Chicago Cubs are 10-6. Once they brought Cody Bellinger back, this felt like a team that would be in the mix. So far, so good.
The Cincinnati Reds were the buzziest team in the NL Central entering the 2024 season. Baseball fans have Elly De La Cruz fever, and rightfully so. He headlines a deep group of talented young players, including a number of exciting pitchers in the rotation. Their 9-7 start has them in a position to deliver on the excited expectations that surrounded them entering the season.
The St. Louis Cardinals are 8-9, coming off a disastrous season in 2023. I don’t know if they have earned this or not, but I just have this trust that they are still a good organization that will figure it out. If they don’t, there might be bigger changes ahead for them.
Are you ready for the season of Juan Soto?
The 25-year-old is slashing .324/.457/.516, good for a 189 wRC+. It feels like we might be on our way to his best season yet, and it will just happen to coincide with his first season getting the exposure of being in a big market as a member of the Yankees.
He has to keep it up. I see no reason that he won’t. I think we are headed for the season of Juan Soto.
Juan Soto SMASHES FIRST Bronx home run as a New York Yankee! 🗽
