Division Updates Part 4: AL East

The American League East is generally believed to be one of he most competitive divisions in all of baseball. So far this season no one team has proven to be the team to beat in the division. The five teams that make up the AL East are separated by a mere four games, and all have areas in which they can improve. The much anticipated Red Sox have just poked their heads over .500, and the sliding Yankees have given way to the most consistent team--the Tampa Bay Rays. There is only one way to try and understand what has happened so far in the AL East, lets dissect this division by the numbers. Let's take a look:

NHL Eastern and Western Conference Catch-Up

The talk of the Eastern Conference Finals coming in was goaltending and how major its role would be in the series.  In two games already, there have been a combined 18 goals scored as the series is tied at one apiece heading to Tampa Bay.  Despite a 6-5 loss on Tuesday night, the Lightning have the Bruins right where they want them as they dominated Game 1 and now have the home-ice advantage working for them.  Tim Thomas, the likely Vezina Trophy winner, has allowed five goals in each of the first two games and has already allowed more than he did against Philadelphia in Round 2.  At age 37, Thomas is still capable of playing his very best hockey in hopes of leading the Bruins to their first Stanley Cup since 1971-72.  Dwayne Roloson had won eight straight games before faltering in Game 2, as he has the Lightning just three wins away from the Stanley Cup Finals.  Tampa Bay was a team that many people had forgotten about late in the season as they took a nosedive and lost the division lead, but they have made some noise in the post-season.

Offensively, the Lightning are still every bit as deep as they have been all season.  They have had 10 different players score their 10 goals in this series.  Their "spreading of the wealth" offensively has them in an enviable position heading home tied at one game apiece.  To their credit, the Lightning have rifled 74 shots at Thomas in just two games.  Possibly they took notes from both Philadelphia and Montreal and realize that getting the puck at Thomas, or any goalie for that matter, is half the battle. This young Tampa team tends to take on the tenacious personality of its coach Guy Boucher, and that is a good thing in terms of their grit and will.  Boucher, at age 39 and in his first NHL season has turned Tampa's fortunes back to pre-lockout.  Remember, they did win the Stanley Cup back in 2003-04, just before the lockout.  Perhaps no team was hurt more by the lockout as this is just the third time (post-lockout) that the Lightning have made the post-season.  The Lightning have shown in this series that they do not need success from Steven Stamkos, Vincent Lecavalier or Martin St. Louis alone to win hockey games.  Of their "big three," just St. Louis registered a point in their 5-2 victory in Game 1.

Boston finally was able to get something going in Game 2 as rookie Tyler Seguin took over with four points (2G, 2A).  Seguin, who had just 22 points this season, has already had six in two postseason games (both in this series).  He was nowhere to be found against Montreal or Philadelphia, but he has now stepped in for the injured Patrice Bergeron.  Although not glorified for offensive depth, Boston proves they have a bit of it with this replacement.  Keep in mind that Seguin himself is just 19-years-old.  Boston also boasts the ever-dangerous Milan Lucic (see above), Nathan Horton and Michael Ryder among others.  Defensively, Zdeno Chara, their captain, is their rock as usual.  Chara heads one of the game's best and deepest defenses.  In Tuesday night's game, the Bruins scored five goals on Roloson on just nine shots.  At long last, Boston's power play appears to be clicking as they have went 2-for-10 in the first two games.  At 20%, they are far better than in their first two series when they went an abysmal 2-for-37 with the man advantage.

Hit the jump to read about the Western Conference Finals:

NHL Eastern and Western Conference Finals Predictions

The NHL Eastern Conference Finals will be headed by two fantastic goalies drinking from the fountain of youth. Both Tim Thomas (37 years old) and Dwayne Roloson (41) have  taken long, similar paths to  get to this point in  their respective careers. Thomas
(left) has reclaimed his stake as “the guy” in  Boston’s net and could ride that to a Stanley Cup. Or, will Roloson and Tampa Bay continue their miracle run and represent the East? Goalies will be in the spotlight in this series, but will they be the only ones that will shine? These are two of the highest-scoring teams in the playoffs. Meanwhile, the Western Conference Finals pits the top two seeds head-to-head as the Vancouver Canucks and San Jose Sharks do battle. These two teams have never faced one another in the NHL playoffs, and both have struggled in recent years in the postseason despite phenomenal regular season success. San Jose won the President’s Trophy in 2008-09 with 117 points but were hastily ousted by the Anaheim Ducks in Round 1. Vancouver has been a top seed in the West in each of the past two seasons but have been eliminated in the Semis twice. This season though, they enter in as the President’s Trophy winners and the unquestioned #1 seed in the Western Conference. Common belief is that the winner of this series will win the Stanley Cup. Not so fast though as the East winner, whomever that may be, will surely have something to say about that. So how do these series shake out? Hit the jump to see:

Rotation Rankings: Week 6

Previous Rankings: Week 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5

Week six of our Rotation Rankings: the statistical ranking of every rotation in Major League Baseball. More a fan of offense? Check out our Leadoff Rankings, based on every teams' first and second batters.This week, we're bringing out something new: a normalized formula. For the last few weeks, we've been basically eyeballing the stats, using our knowledge of the teams as well as the numbers to try and place each time in a slot that made the most sense based on season performance, while keeping in mind how the last week went for each team. Now, however, we have a formula--using WHIP, ERA, and some other statistics, we've compared them all to league averages to come up with normalized scores, which we've then set to a ratio according to importance (WHIP being more important than K/9, for example), which gives us a final, weighted, relative score. The season stats get weighted towards 90% of the total, while the last week's statistics account for the last 10% (allowing some fluctuation based on recent performance, which is really what most Power Rankings do without realizing it). To see how much movement there was when we switched to the formula (as well as how your favorite team stacks up), hit the jump!

Stat Line of the Day: May 6th

D. Price (TB): 8.2 IP, 4 H, 1 R (0 ER), 0 BBs 10 Ks vs. Blue Jays

Another dominant performance from the Rays' young ace, who came one out away from a complete game, and one error away from a shutout. In fact, had second baseman Sean Rodriguez been able to make a routine throw to first base on a leadoff ground ball, Price would have notched the complete game shutout with a 1-2-3 inning. Though he was pulled after allowing a(n unearned) run in the ninth inning, Price was dominant all night in Tampa. He began the night by striking out the side in the first inning, en route to 10 strike outs without a single walk. Price also allowed only four hits, none of them for more than a single. Except when Mike McCoy stole second with two outs in the top of the 3rd inning, the Blue Jays did not get a runner into scoring position against Price until the 9th--when a throwing error turned an easy out into a runner on second. Such a dominating start must be a relief to Rays fans, as Price bounced back from a terrible start last time out. Against the Angels last Friday, he gave up five earned runs on 12 hits in 4.1 IP.  Last night, though, David Price bounced back, lowered his season ERA to 3.29, and carried his team to victory.

Honorable Mentions (Awful Pitching Division)

C. Tillman (BAL): 3.2 IP, 10 H, 8 R (8 ER), 1 BB, 3 Ks, gamescore of 11 vs. Royals

In failing to get out of the fourth inning, Chris Tillman really did a number on his ERA. He entered the game with a less-than-respectable 5.25 ERA in five starts. After yesterday's debacle, though, Tillman has a 7.16 ERA. In his short outing against the Royals, Tillman's WHIP was 3.00, and his ERA came to 19.64, not such lovely numbers for an Orioles staff that started off the season so well. Even more alarmingly, this is not the first time this year that Tillman had a complete meltdown. In his third start of the season, Tillman could not get through the second inning, as he allowed six runs on nine hits.  This kid had gotta get straightened out for the O's.

J. Lackey (BOS): 4.0 IP, 10 H, 8 R, 8 ER, 3 BB, 1 K, gamescore of 8 vs. Angels

Could John Lackey have been any worse for the Red Sox last night? After getting through the first two innings unscathed, he just imploded. And the scary thing for Sox fans is that its not like lackey just had one horrific inning--the type of thing that could be an outlier that has no bearing on his future performance. Lackey had three bad innings, giving up three earned runs in the third and fourth innings, and being credited for two more in the fifth before being mercifully pulled. His game WHIP was 2.75 and his game ERA was a lovely 18. I guess he couldn't have been much worse.

Rotation Rankings: Week 5

Previous Rankings: Week 1 | Week 2 | Week 3 | Week 4

Week five of our Rotation Rankings: the statistical ranking of every rotation in Major League Baseball. For a better explanation, check out our debut rankings. More a fan of offense? Check out our Leadoff Rankings, based on every teams' first and second batters. As we get further into the season, these rankings are based mostly on season performance, with a bias towards this week's performance when two teams are comparable. To see which teams were the real movers and shakers this week, hit the jump!

NFL Draft: Rounds 1-3 Recap

With Rounds 4-7 of the NFL Draft just underway, let's take a look at the past three rounds. With the NFL Lockout imposed, then lifed, then re-imposed the first three rounds were, to sum it up politely, chaotic. Teams traded up and down, up and down, and quarterbacks were plucked at lightning speed.

So, in all of this mess, who made the best picks and who didn't? Hit the jump to find out.

Stat Line of the Day: April 29th

B. Zobrist (TB): 7-10, 10 RBI, 5R, 2 2B, 2 HR, SB vs. Twins

Zobrist single-handedly dominated the
Twins in a doubleheader on Thursday

Well, it's Stat Line of the Day--doesn't mean it has to be just one game! Ben Zobrist had himself quite a day against the Twins in Minneapolis. First, he goes 4-for-6 with 8 RBIs, including 4-for-5 with RISP, along with one home run. That was a three-run shot that made the first game 10-1 in the sixth inning, and he added four more RBIs in the last three innings to finish out game one. In game two, Zobrist went 3-for-4 with another home run, a two-run shot that put the first runs on the board in an eventual 6-1 Rays victory. Suddenly, after the doubleheader sweep, the Rays are 13-11--just eighteen days after they were 1-9! Zobrist hadn't exactly been a part of that so far--coming into the day yesterday, the 29-year-old second baseman was hitting just .205/.272/.482. In fact, as recently as April 22nd, Zobrist was batting .183/.266/.394 with just with three home runs and seven RBIs. Now he's up to .258/.314/.602 with seven home runs and 25 RBIs--the most RBIs in the entire American League. In his last five games, Zobrist has gone 11-for-22 (.500) with four homers and 18 RBIs--a ridiculous stretch, but it balanced out his first 18 games, that's for sure. Don't expect Ben Zobrist to lead the AL in RBIs this year, but he certainly enjoyed himself yesterday.

Honorable Mention

R. Dempster (CHC): 0.1 IP, 4 H, 7 R (7 ER), 4 BB @ ARI
It's really a shame that this wasn't Ryan Dempster's first start of the year, because his ERA would have been a lovely 189.3 after his failure to get more than one out yesterday in Arizona. After starting the game giving up a double, a walk, hitting Justin Upton with a pitch and then having Stephen Drew hit a grand-slam, Dempster got Miguel Montero to ground out, and it seemed like he might settle down. Then he promptly walked the bases loaded to bring up pitcher Barry Enright...who promptly hit a single, picking up his 7th career RBI. After Chris Young got his second hit of the inning, a two-RBI single to left, that was the end of the day for Dempster--he should consider himself lucky reliever Justin Berg got the next two men out!

NFL Draft Preview: NFC South

And now the conclusion of our eight-part NFL draft preview (ESPN, 8 P.M.). With the AFC complete we've focused on the NFC the last two days. Last but certainly not least in our analysis we wrap up with the NFC South.

Once a weak and often chaotic division, the NFC South could make an argument for the toughest division in the conference or even the league. If things keep going the way they are the Saints and Falcons will be title contenders every year Drew Brees and Matt Ryan put on a uniform. The Saints are now one year removed from a Super Bowl that changed New Orleans forever and the Falcons came up one Aaron Rodgers short of their own Super Bowl berth. And now the upstart Buccaneers have forced themselves into the picture. Tampa Bay went 10-6, falling just short of a playoff berth. Josh Freeman has this team ready to compete with the Falcons and Saints for years. The lone wolf in all this are the Panthers. Carolina went 2-14 in a terribly disappointing season, fired coach John Fox, and have to rebuild. So how do the Saints and Falcons fortify their rosters and what will the Bucs do to overthrow them? And is Cam Newton really Carolina's best bet? Here's our predictions.

Rotation Rankings: Week 4

Previous Rankings: Week 1 | Week 2 | Week 3

Week four of our Rotation Rankings: the statistical ranking of every rotation in Major League Baseball. For a better explanation, check out our debut rankings. More a fan of offense? Check out our Leadoff Rankings, based on every teams' first and second batters. As we get further into the season, these rankings are based mostly on season performance, with a small bias towards this week's performance when two teams were very comparable. There were some interesting ranking quirks this week, mostly because of fantastic weeks by some of the teams that had previously been lower in the rankings--something to be expected early in the season. A few teams actually improved on their season performances but managed to fall in the rankings, due solely to the fact that the teams behind them out performed them as well. Eventually these sort of things will even out, but after four weeks it's still easy enough for one great week to pull a team up 15 slots. To see which teams were the real movers and shakers this week, hit the jump!

Stat of the Day Line: April 28th (Quick Hits Edition)

Lately, we've been pretty good about picking only one or two great/awful/interesting lines per night to include in this column, but this time we just couldn't do it.  There were too many awesome/terrible/peculiar stat lines from last night's action for us to single any few out.  So instead, we're going to give you quick nuggets on a six different stat lines (drawn from all three major sports not sorta in a lockout) that really caught our attention. To see who made today's cut, hit the jump!

Leadoff Rankings: Week 4

Previous Rankings: Week 1 | Week 2 | Week 3

The fourth weekend of the 2011 season has come and gone, and the Leadoff Rankings are starting to settle out. More a fan of pitching? Check out our Rotation Rankings, published every Thursday, where we rank each team by the performance of their starting pitchers. The rankings are based on season performance, with a small bias towards recent performance. To see how things turned out this week, hit the jump!

Stat Line of the Day: April 25th

Chris Paul (NO): 27 points, 13 rebounds, 15 assists vs. Lakers

Paul (#3) dominated the Lakers,
tying the series up in NoLa

Did Kobe Bryant hurting his ankle have something to do with the Lakers loss? Obviously it didn't help Los Angeles, but tonight was the night where CP3 took over and tied the series up in New Orleans. How good was Chris Paul last night? According to Elias Stats Bureau, the last player to get 25+ pts, 15+ assists and 10+ rebounds in the same playoff game was Oscar Robertson--way back in 1964. Paul just had an overall great night, shooting 50% from the floor and three-point range (7-for 14 and 2-for-2). In addition, Paul hit all 11 of his free-throws, which shouldn't be too surprising considering he shot 88% from the charity stripe this season and 85% for his career. If there was any time for CP3 to have his first triple-double of the season, this was a great night to do it.
  
Honorable Mention(s)

J. Shields (TB): CG, 4 H,  2 BB, 7 Ks, W @ TOR
James Shields threw a complete-game four-hitter, yet for a while it looked as if his performance might not even be the best of the day. The most impressive part of Shields' performance was his pitch count--he needed just 95 pitches to get through 32 Blue Jays--that's a hair under three pitches per plate appearance, which is a fantastic number. Shields has kept his pitch counts low of late--in his last start, a complete game win against the White Sox, he needed only 105 pitches to get through the game. In a statistical world where pitch counts have reached an incredibly high level of importance, it's nice to have a reliable starter who can get through innings without needing too many pitches.

R. Halladay (PHI): 8.2 IP, 5 H, 1 BB, 14 Ks, 1 ER, W @ SD
Until his 9th inning, Doc Halladay looked to be a surefire winner of Stat of the Day. Unfortunately, his ninth inning consisted of three hits and a run allowed, so Roy had to drop into the "Honorable Mention" category for today. Still, anybody who watched the Phillies/Padres game yesterday saw it's pretty tough to have much better "stuff" than Halladay did yesterday. At one point between the 6th and 8th innings, he struck out six consecutive batters--the first three of which were looking. He threw 130 pitches, but 94 of them were strikes--that's what you call a workhorse.

Rotation Rankings: Week 3

Previous Rankings: Week 1 | Week 2

Week three of our Rotation Rankings: the statistical ranking of every rotation in Major League Baseball. For a better explanation, check out our debut rankings. More a fan of offense? Check out our Leadoff Rankings, based on every teams' first and second batters. As we get further into the season, these rankings are based mostly on season performance, with a small bias towards this week's performance when two teams were very comparable.

G: Games; ERA: Earned Run Average; WHIP: (Walks + Hits)/Innings Pitched; GS: Game Score; K/BB: Strikeout-to-walk ratio; K/9: Strikeouts per nine innings

30. (LW: 26) New York Mets (5-13)
This Week: 1-6, 5.80 ERA, 1.74 WHIP, 41.9 GS, 1.32 K/BB, 5.58 K/9
Season Stats: 4-10, 5.68 ERA, 1.63 WHIP, 44.3 GS, 1.58 K/BB, 6.96 K/9
R.A. Dickey became the first Mets starter to make it into the eighth inning last night, but he still managed to let up four runs on eight hits to the lowly Astros.

29. (LW: 27) Arizona Diamondbacks (8-8)
This Week: 2-2, 5.22 ERA, 1.40 WHIP, 47.8 GS, 2.36 K/BB, 7.98 K/9
Season Stats: 5-7, 5.65 ERA, 1.48 WHIP, 45.8 GS, 1.87 K/BB, 6.92 K/9
Not much changed this week for the D-Backs' starting rotation. Though they are striking batters out at a higher rate (almost 8 K/9), the staff ERA is still above 5.50 and their WHIP remains in the bottom half of the league.

28. (LW: 14) Cincinnati Reds (9-9)
This Week: 1-4, 7.92 ERA, 1.76 WHIP, 38.7 GS, 2.14 K/BB, 8.80 K/9
Season Stats: 7-5, 5.35 ERA, 1.37 WHIP, 48.4 GS, 2.62 K/BB, 8.64 K/9
On four occasions in the last week, a Reds starter allowed five or more runs in a game. That includes a 3.1-inning, six-run outing from from youngster Travis Wood, who has a 5.73 ERA on the season.

(For number 27 all the way to #1, hit the jump!)

NHL Playoff Update: Eastern Conference

With all but one series (Kings-Sharks) through 3 games, the NHL Playoffs have not disappointed. With intense end-to-end action and spectacular goalie saves, these playoffs seem to live up to the hype every year. With all series' shifting to the lower seed's home-ice, we have seen two teams take commanding 3-0 leads, as well as two teams climb out of an 0-2 series hole, and temporarily avoid that fatal elimination game. Hit the jump to review this year's NHL Eastern Conference Playoffs thus far:

Spring Training Catch-Up

He'll get better. Eventually.

In the context of a 4-or-5 week spring training, 8-10 days can make a lot of difference in who's in the running for a spot and who's already played themselves out of contention. Injured veterans (see right), prospects who aren't just quite ready, and spring surprises have sorted themselves out quite a bit, at least in a few of the towns in Florida and Arizona. Pitchers are starting to go into the 5th and 6th inning when they're pitching well, batting averages are approaching something resembling normal, and sample sizes are starting to get sorta big enough that they might just actually mean something. So with all that in mind, it's time to look back at a few of the teams we spotlighted earlier this month. 

Spring Training Spotlight: Tampa Bay

When they were last teammates, in 2005, Johnny Damon and Manny Ramirez were talented outfielders with the Boston Red Sox. Damon, 31 at the time, hit .316 with 75 RBIs from the leadoff spot, a season that helped him get a nice deal with the Yankees that offseason. Manny was 33, with a few productive Boston years to go until his headline-making stints in both Los Angeles and Chicago. Now, Damon (37) and Ramirez (39 in May) are in a new phase of their careers, but back as teammates--with the Tampa Bay Rays.

Damon (left) and Ramirez both signed with the Rays 1/21/11

Ramirez now is being used solely for his bat as a DH in the American League. Early returns in Spring Training look good for the Rays after Pat Burrell (.202 average) and Willy Aybar (.230) failed to provide any pop from the offense-only position in 2010. Ramirez, through his first 12 at-bats, is batting a rather solid .500 with a double and a home run, a good sign after he hit only .261 in his 24-game stint with the White Sox last season. Ramirez is old for a ballplayer, but playing DH isn't nearly as strenuous in the field--and there is precedent. Jim Thome, just last season at 39 years of age, hit .283 with 25 home runs and 59 RBI in just 108 games--numbers Tampa would have loved to have last year. Damon, meanwhile, is off to a 2-for-9 start, as the Rays are taking it easier on the outfielder. We'll check back in periodically with these two older Rays to see how they're doing both in spring training and when the games really matter.