The Wheelhouse Preview: NL Central

With the signs of spring and baseball slowly approaching, The Wheelhouse will be unveiling its MLB division previews over the next couple of weeks leading up to Opening Day on April 5. Today, we begin with the NL West

I’ll be honest, the NL Central is one of those divisions that I can never predict prior to the season. I have no clue what these teams will do from year to year. Well OK, I know where the Pirates will be, but as for the rest of the teams who the hell knows. I could seriously pick this division based on recent history, and I think that’s pretty much what I’m going to do as I try to break down this division.

Chicago Cubs – Despite the fact that the Cubs continue to just not show up for the playoffs, they still remain the best team in the NL Central. They went 97-64 last season and didn’t really lose much besides Mark DeRosa, Jason Marquis and Kerry Wood. The starting rotation is still solid with Carlos Zambrano, Ryan Dempster, Ted Lilly and Rich Harden. If Harden actually stays healthy for a season, the Cubs will cruise for most of the summer. The departure of Wood leaves a hole at closer but waiting in the wings in Carlos Marmol and former Marlins closer Kevin Gregg will be ready should Marmol falter early this season.

The North Side’s offense will keep blasting away in the bandbox that is Wrigley Field. Milton Bradley was added in the offseason to an already potent lineup that includes Alfonso Soriano, Aramis Ramirez, Derek Lee and Geovany Soto, who is looking like one of the best young-hitting catchers in the game. Don’t overlook that Bradley pick up as he quietly led the American League in on-base percentage with a .436 clip while hitting .321 for third-best in the AL. Who cares if these guys disappear in October? The NL Central is the Cubs division to lose, which means we get another whole season of hearing back how this could finally be the Cubs year to end the curse! Ugh, this is going to be a long season. Prediction: First in the NL Central

St. Louis Cardinals – I’ve given up trying to figure the Cardinals out. Every year on paper, the Cards don’t really look that talented, but they always end up competing for the division while finishing like 10 games over .500. Like him or not, Tony LaRussa gets his teams to play…period. He does more with less than any field general in baseball without a doubt. So as usual this team will be there all season. And why wouldn’t they be with Albert Pujols doing his thing every season. Pujols will drive in 100 plus, Ryan Ludwick won’t match his breakout season, but he’ll be a force in the lineup and young guys like Skip Schumaker, Brian Barden, Brenden Ryan and Chris Duncan will fill their roles out nicely and get the job done. The pitching staff won 86 games last year and that was pretty much without Chris Carpenter. Carpenter is healthy this spring and is tearing it up. He’ll return as the ace of the rotation while Adam Wainwright, Kyle Lohse, Todd Wellemeyer and Joel Pineiro will do enough for this team. Lohse and Wellemeyer both had winning records last season with mid-3.00 ERA’s…now that’s unbelievable. With Carpenter returning to take the pressure off of those pitchers a bit, expect the Cardinals to be in the hunt all season…as usual. Prediction: 2nd Place

Cincinnati Reds – Stay with me on this one. When we look back on the 2009 season, I think one of the surprise teams in the National League will be the Reds. Trading Ken Griffey Jr. was one of the best things this could of done. They are loaded with young talent and just enough experience to be able to put that combination together and surprise some teams. Joey Votto and Jay Bruce showed what they could do last season and they are two studs that should be featured in this lineup for years to come. Then you have 2B Brandon Phillips who can do it all from hitting the deep ball to stealing 25-30 bases a season. Bruce, Votto, Phillips, Edwin Encarnacion all hit 20-plus home runs last season and should all improve. Plus, Chris Dickerson is another up and coming prospect that should see plenty of playing time in the outfield. The Reds also signed speedster Willy Taveras this offseason to ignite the Reds at the top of the order. Problem was, his on-base percentage was horrendous last year, but he still stole 68 bases. If he can get on base more in front of the young hitters in their launching pad of a ballpark, then look out for the Reds to put up some runs.

The Reds rotation is another haven for young prospects. Edinson Volquez arrived in a flurry last year, going 17-6 with a 3.21 ERA in his first full season in the Majors. The scary thing is Volquez has the chance to get even better and he’s joined on the staff by Bronson Arroyo, Aaron Harang, Johnny Cueto and former Diamondback Micah Owings. Owings might not be the greatest pitcher, but hell every fifth day he’ll add another potent bat to the lineup. And if you think I’m kidding, look up Owings hitting stats in his career. And to close out games, Cincy has a capable setup man in Dave Weathers and quietly one of the game’s most consistent closers as of late in Francisco Cordero. The bottom line is the Reds have plenty of things going right for them. I really like their chances to be a surprise team this year.Prediction: 3rd Place (but should compete for most of the season).

Milwaukee Brewers – The Brew Crew had their storybook finish to the regular season last year with the C.C. Sabathia show to clinch a wildcard and first postseason birth since they were part of the American League. It ended with a quick exit from the playoffs from the hands of eventual champions Philadelphia Phillies. The problem for the Brewers in 2009 is they lost Sabathia, Ben Sheets and Eric Gagne while Salomon Torres retired. They didn’t really add much besides Trevor Hoffman and Braden Looper. The staff features two young prospects in Yovani Gallardo and Manny Parra, who have both showed promise but I think it’s just too early for Milwaukee to rely on these guys to anchor the rotation. And if any injuries happen, which Gallardo is coming off of one, the depth is nowhere to be found. The Brewers shouldn’t have a problem hitting the ball with Ryan Braun, Prince Fielder, J.J. Hardy, Corey Hart and Mike Cameron, but other prospects Rickie Weeks and Bill Hall have struggled to hit about .230 consistently. I just see this team dropping off big time by losing an ace in Sabathia. Let’s face it, this team was not running to the wildcard spot without him last year, and I just see this team fall back toward .500 this season.Prediction: 4th Place

Houston Astros – The Astros are just like the Cardinals…every year since the retirement of Jeff Bagwell and Craig Biggio, you just have to count them out, and then they put together some incredible run and finish somewhere around 86-90 wins. This team finished 86-75 last year…I have no idea how that happened. I do not expect that to happen in 2009. When your biggest free-agent move was losing Brad Ausmus and signing Pudge Rodriguez, you know it’s been a quiet offseason. Hitting wise, the Astros are set with studs Lance Berkman and Carlos Lee with soon-to-be-stud Hunter Pence. Who knows what to expect out of Miguel Tejeda or Kazuo Matsui, but this team is a little light on talent and not just in the lineup. There’s Roy Oswalt at the top and then there’s everyone else. When Wandy Rodriguez, Mike Hampton, Brian Moehler and Brandon Backe are the rest of your rotation, you have problems. Of course, the Astros owner will once again ignore all that and make a ridiculous move in mid-July to go for it! (See last year when they picked up LaTroy Hawkins). I don’t get the Astros and therefore, I don’t like them to do very well in the NL this year.Prediction: 5th Place

Pittsburgh Pirates – Hey, someone has to end up in the basement, and it might as well be the Pirates, who have made that a habit in the majority of my lifetime. The only story in Pittsburgh this summer (if it’s not players’ wives stealing babies) is the infamous sports record they are about to set for most consecutive losing seasons. The Steelers opening training camp up in July will also be the main story of the summer, but back to the Buccos. They’ve already had 16 losing seasons. They are ready to make it a record 17 straight losing seasons. Think about that for a moment. I was 10 years old the last time the Pirates put together a winning season. We’ve had four different presidents during that time. Forget about it, don’t expect the Pirates to compete this year or even next year. I figure they just want to shatter the record to own something. The ONLY possibility that I could fathom for the Pirates to reach .500 and actually be decent is if Paul Maholm, Ian Snell, Zach Duke all put together the great seasons we’ve seen them have before, but actually all have those great seasons all together in the same season. Like I said, forget about it. The Pirates might not be in the basement, but it doesn’t matter because they are headed for another losing season at PNC Park.Prediction: It's gonna be cold, it's gonna be gray, and it's gonna last you for the rest of your life. (If you can name the movie that line's from, you win…well nothing, you’re just cool).

That’s all I have for the NL Central. See what I was saying about predicting it from recent history? You can slot in the Cubs at the top, the Pirates at the bottom and then the middle four teams are pretty much a crap shoot. Expect this division to be tight for most of the season with the Cubs pulling away down the stretch. With the Dodgers and D-backs strong out west and the stacked NL East, barring a midseason trade for a pitcher like Sabathia, I wouldn’t expect the wildcard to come out of this division.

NL EAST PREVIEW

Here’s the NL East rundown. I tried to mask my Braves bias as much as possible, but don’t be surprised if they’re as good or better than I advertise!

Florida Marlins- If ever there were a team that the Pittsburgh Pirates should model themselves after, the Florida Marlins are it. Working with a budget that makes the Pirates look like they have owners who care about winning, the Marlins are always capable of surprising the world by remaining competitive throughout a season. Featuring a lineup that is completely loaded with speed and anchored by five tool player Hanley Ramirez and led off by promising young speedster Cameron Maybin, the Marlins will look to play a lot of small ball again in 2009. On the other side of the diamond the Marlins showcase a below average rotation that largely consists of middle tier starters from top to bottom. Andrew Miller could have a breakout season after a year of experience when he came over in the trade for Dontrelle “one year fluke” Willis and Miguel Cabrera. The Marlins are an interesting team, because on paper they look downright pathetic (with the exception of Hanley Ramirez and possible prospects like Maybin and Miller), but they always seem to surprise. Unfortunately, I don’t see this being one of those years where they’re able to surprise anybody.
My Prediction: Last in a stacked NL East

Washington Nationals- Ah, the good old Washington Nationals. The Nationals GM Jim Bowden must be hanging out with Marvin Lewis and Al Davis because he seems to be willing to take in all the misfit young players that everybody else has given up on. If you don’t believe me, just check out the MLB wrap sheets of Elijah Dukes, Lastings Milledge and Austin Kearns. However, who can blame them? Nobody wants to play baseball in our Nation’s capitol. When fifty percent of the crowd is made up of lobbyists who score tickets for selling their souls to corporate America and the other half are transplants rooting for the other team, it’s difficult to want to play for a cellar dweller even if they have a new stadium. So, the Nats take whoever they can get, and the scary thing is on paper they’re not as awful as you’d expect. Dukes and Milledge still have tremendous upside if they can stay on the straight and narrow, and the addition of Adam Dunn (despite his 200 k’s) should really benefit returning cornerstone Ryan Zimmerman. Actually, the offense is pretty formidable from top to bottom, being led off by respectable speedster Christian Guzman. If teams only had to hit, I might even call the Nats a wild card sleeper. However, unfortunately for them, they have to pitch too. When Scott Olsen is your ace, you’re in some trouble. Admittedly, I’m a Braves fan who sees a lot of Nats games during the course of the season when they play the Braves and I don’t even recognize half of the names in their starting rotation. That’s ok though, because I don’t think most of the names will still be in the Majors by midseason anyways.
My Prediction: 4th in the East

Philadelphia Phillies: The Phillies brought the city of Filthadephia their first championship since Rocky knocked out Clubber Lang to avenge Mickey’s death. Unfortunately for the Phillies, shortly after Rocky knocked out Clubber Lang he lost his reliable friend Apollo Creed, and the Phillies lost their Creed when they lost Pat “the bat” Burrell which is in my opinion the biggest offseason loss that nobody is talking about. However, everything is still sunny in Filthadelphia as their lineup still includes familiar faces like Ryan Howard, J Rollins and Chase Utley. Utley’s offseason surgery is a concern but Rollins looks great in the World Baseball Classic so far. Their lineup returns ace Cole Hamels. After Hamels, I’m not sold on their rotation with the likes of the ancient Jamie Moyer being counted on. The Phillies don’t have a lot of holes, but I feel like the city of Philadephia deserves another 75 years of misery and the odds of repeating are stacked against the Phillies.
My Prediction: 3rd in the East

Atlanta Braves: The braves were the most talked about NL team of the offseason. Unfrurtunately, like their decade of the nineties, they were talked about for being second best. They got burned by Rafael Furcal and Ken Griffey Jr. They had a deal on the table for Jake Peavy until the Padres demanded the first born child of every player in the Braves organization. In the end they still managed to upgrade by bringing in aging but reliable Garrett Anderson to their offensive lineup. The rotation is completed rebuilt and arguably one of the deepest in the league with the additions of Derek Lowe and Javier Vazquez, who despite their ages are as reliable of solid inning eating starters you can find, and Japanese pitching sensation Kenshin Kawakami. Returning young star Jair Jurjjeins and Tom Glavine round out their starting rotation. Tim Hudson could return as early as late August from Tommy John surgery to further bolster the rotation. Perhaps the most exciting things for Braves fans is the next crop of minor league studs that are ready to be called up. Minor league phenom Tommy Hanson is probably the closest thing to a can’t miss pitching prospect since Felix Hernandez came up for Seattle. He was the first pitcher in history to win the MVP of his Minor League. He’s being blocked from the rotation and will likely begin the season in AAA but the first sign of struggle for either Tom Glavine or Japanese import Kawakami could give Hanson the green light into the bigs. On the offensive side of the ball the Braves should benefit from the extra year of experience to young players on the rise like Yunel Escobar, Kelly Johnson, and Jeff Francouer. Brian McCann looks like he’ll be the cleanup hitter and don’t be surprised if he’s good for 35 and 120 in that spot the way he’s killing the ball in the Classic right now. Jordan Schaeffer, a top 5 minor league prospect last year before getting suspended for HGH, looks to take over the leadoff spot and man center field. If Chipper Jones can stay healthy I think the Braves can compete for the wild card and possibly push the Mets for the division title. If he gets hurt, the Phillies will easily take over this second spot in the East. For now, I’m feeling more optimistic about the Braves than I have in recent years and think their depth will have them playing meaningful games in late September.
My Prediction: 2nd in the East

New York Mets: The Mets are the ugly step child of New York. Lost in the shuffle of the Yankees wild offseason spending spree on CC Sabathia and Mark Teixeria, the Mets solidified what should be an absolutely filthy bullpen. K-Rod and JJ Putz basically shortens each game to a 7 inning affair. Johan Santana headlines a rotation that drops a lot after him, but their offense is loaded and unfortunately for the rest of the East, Beltran and Delgado seem to have found the fountain of youth because both have just killed the ball in the Classic so far. There was talk about moving Reyes down in the order and I hope that the Mets make the move because I think it’s ridiculous. He has power but I don’t see him hitting more home runs than Beltran, Delgado or Wright so what’s the point. I think this is finally the year that the Mets pull it all together and get their money’s worth and win the NL East. However, if they want to march deep in the playoffs they’ll be shopping for another top end member of the rotation by June because a short 5 game series could be ugly for the Mets once you get past Johan and are relying on Mike Pelfrey and Oliver Perez in the clutch.
My Prediction: 1st in the East

The Wheelhouse Preview: The NL West

With the signs of spring and baseball slowly approaching, The Wheelhouse will be unveiling its MLB division previews over the next couple of weeks leading up to Opening Day on April 5. Today, we begin with the NL West.

The recent signing of Manny Ramirez has apparently handed the Dodgers the NL West title already. I, on the other hand, am operating under the belief that the Manny signing has made the NL West a two-team race and not just a one-team runaway by Arizona.

While most of the attention this season will be on the Dodgers and Manny, the Diamondbacks will be the team quietly getting the job done. And they will be toward the top of the division the entire season because of one of the top pitching staffs in the National League. The D-Backs duo of Brandon Webb and Dan Haren will keep them from any significant losing streak plus the signing of innings-eater Jon Garland will help the staff. And keep an eye out for big-time prospect Max Scherzer, who probably will be limited as the team’s fifth starter, but he’s a future ace and could give the team a boost at the bottom of the rotation. Plus with Chad Qualls, Tony Pena and Jon Rauch coming out of the bullpen in the late innings, this team won’t have to score many runs to win thanks to its solid pitching. This is a good thing for the D-Backs because last year their offense hit just .251, tied for third-worst in the NL with the Nationals and Padres. Yikes. The good news is there’s nowhere to go but up and the young hitters should improve significantly. Justin Upton is a budding star waiting to emerge while OF Chris Young, SS Stephen Drew and 3B Mark Reynolds all are young 20-home run guys that should all improve their game. Arizona tanked late in the season and ended up losing the division to Manny mania and finished 82-80. If the hitting improves even slightly this season, Arizona should easily win 90 plus games.

The Dodgers should be just as good as Arizona this season as they proved last season that they are a different, offensive team with Manny in the lineup. Though the big question mark is what to expect from Manny this year? Will he hit .396 like he did in 53 games for LA last year when he was pissed off at Boston and wanted to show what he could do? Probably not. I expect him to be the down to earth Manny and hit around .300 with 30-40 home runs, but the Dodgers will desperately welcome that. Catcher Russell Martin, outfielders Matt Kemp and Andre Ethier showed last season that they are the new crop of Dodgers baseball. They struggled in the NLCS against the Phillies, but all they did was gain great experience for a very young group of sluggers.

The loss of Derek Lowe to Atlanta will hurt as they lose a solid and consistent pitcher on the staff. But get like the D-Backs, the Dodgers feature some young pitching prospects. Chad Billingsley had a tremendous 2008 season, emerging as one of the best pitchers in the NL while Clayton Kershaw should take a step forward this year after getting a taste of the Majors at a very young age last season. Kershaw is so promising that he’s drawn comparisons to some Hall of Fame southpaw in Sandy Koufax. But after those too, Los Angeles has Hiroki Kuroda, who was pretty efficient (3.73 ERA) in sprawling Dodger Stadium and then free-agent pickups in Randy Wolf and Jason Schmidt. Wolf has always been overrated, and I don’t know what the Dodgers front office saw in Schmidt, who hasn’t pitched in more than a year due to injuries, but I doubt he will have any sort of positive impact for this team in 2009.

Does is really matter who is the next best team in this division? Does anyone care? It might be the Padres or the Giants. Speaking of the Giants, they put off of the young guys for years to keep Bonds around to hit home runs and finish in the bottom of the division and then when they finally make that move to youth, they go out and sign Edgar Renteria and Grandpa Randy Johnson. How does GM Brian Sabean still collect a paycheck from the Giants? He should have been canned years ago when he traded Liriano, Joe Nathan and Boof Bonser for AJ Pierzynski, but I digress. The Giants actually might not be a terrible team this year thanks to a decent rotation, led by reigning NL Cy Young Tim Lincecum. Matt Cain, Jonathan Sanchez and the Big “Old” Unit should put together a formidable staff. And then there’s Barry Zito, who throws a stellar game about once every two months.

The Rockies have a chance to be horrendous after losing their most prolific hitter in Matt Holliday to free agency. And to make matters worse, their top pitcher Jeff Francis probably won’t be ready for opening day from his shoulder injury from last year. I don’t really see the Rockies being around .500 much this season. The Padres won’t be much better. This is a team that went 63-99 in 2008 and I don’t really think this team improves at all. They lost two starting catchers, Khalil Greene and future Hall of Fame closer Trevor Hoffman and they added David Eckstein. Oh boy, look out for the X-factor. He’s not going to turn this team around. Mark Prior is on this roster, which is never a good sign. Jody Gerut and his one knee probably will start in center field. The only thing this team has going for them offensively is if Chase Headley can bust out and join Adrian Gonzalez in a home-run fest. The Padres and Rockies should be competing for the NL West basement all season.

This division has gained a reputation over the past five or so years of being a close, weak division (four different champions in six years) where if you were hovering around .500, you could compete for the division title. That changed last year as the Dodgers and Diamondbacks broke away from the pack down the stretch, and I think the space between them and the rest of the teams will increase this year. This division is a two-team race, and I would be absolutely stunned if Arizona or Los Angeles didn’t end up winning it. I think both of those teams will win 90 plus games and have one of the closest pennant races in the bigs, but ultimately I like the Diamondbacks rotation better and believe it will be the difference late in the season to give Arizona its fifth division title.

Round Two for Team USA

To call Team USA a disappointment in the inaugural World Baseball Classic three years ago would be a severe understatement. They weren’t just disappointing, they were an embarrassment.

The team might have slightly overlooked their opponents as Todd Jones duly noted following their exit: “We thought we’d crush everybody.” Whoops. As it turned out, they didn’t crush anyone (outside of South Africa, but who couldn’t do that?) while stumbling to a 3-3 finish that ended with a loss to Mexico to knock them out of contention of even the semifinals.

Expect Team USA to come out more prepared and focused this time around when they kick off the second WBC this Saturday against Canada in Toronto. That won’t be the problem, but I don’t believe the USA has enough on its roster to compete for the WBC title. Don’t get me wrong, their roster is loaded with hitters by featuring a 20-home run player at every position. My concern is their pitching. Just like it goes in the MLB postseason, you can’t rely on hitting to come through in a tournament as short as this one. Instead, you need your pitching to be great.

Team USA has Roy Oswalt and Jake Peavy at the top of their rotation, which doesn’t look so bad on paper until you remember Oswalt’s horrendous April-May last year before he turned his season around. Will he be shaky and revert back to the struggling pitcher he was at the beginning of last season? If that answer ends up being yes then Team USA is in trouble. But even after Peavy and Oswalt, the next best starter on the team is Ted Lilly and then its fourth starter is Orioles young pitcher Jeremy Guthrie. Lilly is actually coming off one of his seasons in recent memory, but the guy is still a middle of the road, 4.50 ERA career pitcher. The bullpen should be just fine with arms like J.J. Putz, Scot Shields, Jonathan Broxton, John Grabow, J.P. Howell, Matt Lindstrom and Brad Zeigler available in late innings.

If the hitting gets hot, it won’t matter if I’m on the mound pitching, but three years ago the hitting was MIA as they scored 2, 4, 3 and 1 runs in four of the games. Team USA will show up better prepared than three years ago, but I think it’ll be starting pitching that will eventually do them in again.

Quote of the Year?

I needed a good laugh this afternoon, and thankfully the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette and newly added Pirates outfielder Jeff Salazar were willing to oblige.

"I like what the Pirates are trying to do. It's one thing to talk about it, but there are people around baseball who see what they're doing. And being here, you can just see it in their body language: They're done with the losing." - Jeff Salazar

Oh Jeff, Jeff, Jeff...you really have not been here that long at all. I love when the Pirates sign new free agents and they say something along the lines of this. Salazar has no idea what he just got himself into...if he even makes the team. Welcome to the Pittsburgh Pirates organization...Pride, Passion and unprecedented losing. We're talking about 16 seasons and counting. Get ready for all-time sports history, Jeff. Welcome to the Pirates, where the losing never ends.

A Sad Sight for Sunday Sports

Recently, on a Sunday night in the marvelous town of New Castle, I found myself rapidly searching through my DirecTv lineup to find some good sports to watch. The NBA network had a thrilling matchup featuring the LA Clippers (yeah, LA still has another team) and the Utah Jazz. To say that I was even remotely interested would be the overstatement of the year. I mean, seriously, can't we even get a little Kobe or Lebron? Oops, that's right, ESPN owns most of their games so they can make us believe that the NBA matters before the playoffs.

At least FSN had ACC Sunday going on. Thankfully, I get to watch two teams buried in the standings so I know what to expect when they serve as sacrificial lambs to UNC and Duke in the conference tourney. Oh, and speaking of UNC, I was amazed when I recently watched an Oklahoma-Texas matchup and realized that Dicky V. had managed to drop North Carolina's on at least half a dozen occasions. While we're at it, how about everybody quits acting shocked when the #1 team in the nation falls. Face it folks, there's no dominate team in the nation and that's not a bad thing. Hell, the only thing I feel confident about in college basketball is that 50% of my friend's brackets will be killed when Pitt undoubtedly will choke again in the sweet 16.

Anyways, back to my Sunday night dilemma. My night finally took a good turn when over on ESPN Classic, I could catch replays of classic baseball games from the last decade. Well, at least what ESPN deems as classic, which is great news if you're a Yankees, Red Sox, or Cubs fan. See, here's the problem: When you live in a country where one ignorant, Connecticut based company is the predominant source for sports information and exposure, you're going to have hundreds of thousands of frat boys sporting their backwards Boston caps who will tell you how they've been a Red Sox fan since birth. Unfortunately, 80% of these tolls still think that Manny Ramirez is in Boston. My point is this: If your favorite team doesn't play in New York, Chicago, Boston, or LA then you probably should just forget about this baseball season. After all, judging by the affiliations and predictions oozing out of ESPN's "MLB Experts" (sorry if I doubt the expert knowledge of a panel that features John Kruk), these are the only teams in the league, let alone in contention for a World Series win.

But wait...what if there were 32 teams in the league?!?! What if somebody could tell you about ALL of them?

That's where Ryan and I come in to the picture. Unlike the millionaires employed by the juggernaut that is ESPN, we see things in a different light; a light that shines on the entire league, even on cities like Pittsburgh and Baltimore!

So here's how it's going to go down... Baseball begins in a little less than a month. Conveniently, there's only six divisions in MLB. For those who don't see where this is going, let me continue. For the next month you'll be getting major league division breakdowns and predictions. So mark your calendars and mute your ESPN experts because you're about to get the low down on the next seven months worth of baseball action!

Now Introducing...

The Wheelhouse is glad to welcome a new contributor to the site and the world of sports blogging in my good friend Jared. I've know Jared for many years, spending a majority of our lives as neighbors and oddly enough, we still are neighbors to this day. Jared grew up around sports and he's gained a wealth of sports knowledge over the years and can sit down with anyone to discuss many angles of the game for hours. His love for sports fuels his desire to want to write about it on a variety of topics.

I think he's similar to me in that when asked what his favorite sport is, he would quickly respond football. But, just like me, I think he knows there's no time like Opening Day in baseball and come a sunny June afternoon, there's no place he'd rather be than at the ball yard, listening to a crack of the bat or the smell of a grill sifting through the air.

Not only is The Wheelhouse bringing Jared on for his knowledge of sports in general, but he will be providing us with his expertise in the great game of baseball. With spring training in full swing and the World Baseball Classic less than a week away, things will be picking up very shortly with baseball talk on this blog.

I must warn readers out there that Jared is a Braves fan, but go easy on him and try to ignore his Atlanta Braves bias mindset at times. Jared's first post will be coming shortly as we launched our MLB preview with a breakdown of each division heading into the 2009 season and which teams to watch for throughout the summer.

Welcome to The Wheelhouse, Jared.