The American League is made up of a handful of ‘super teams’ with the division winners a seeming forgone conclusion even before Opening Day. Historically, we get a few surprises every year so it’s likely one—or more—of the divisional favorites will falter, but on paper, it’s hard to imagine.
Amongst the teams at the top of the AL, it’s hard to distinguish differences. Last year, five of the top six offenses in the American League made it to the postseason. On the pitching end, four of the five best team ERAs advanced to October, with Minnesota—the second wildcard—the lone exception.
The elite teams have it all: pitching, offense and defense, making it harder for the teams on the outside to break through and surprise as they cannot just dominant one facet of the game and find sustainable success over the marathon that is a 162-game season.
ODDS ANALYSIS
On paper, the AL is separated into three distinct classes: the division favorites, the Wild Card hopefuls and the rest; a la the rebuilding squads.
While we’ve seen teams shift classes midseason before, it seems unlikely we’ll get any new entrants into the top class this season, but that’s the fun part: you never really know.
Still, the top teams are seemingly obvious. The Boston Red Sox, Cleveland Indians and Houston Astros all won their respective divisions in 2017. Of those three, only the Red Sox are under any real threat—on paper—to lose theirs in 2018 barring serious injuries or unforeseeable events. The Indians beat out the Minnesota Twins by 17 games last year while the Astros ended 21 games up of the Los Angeles Angels.
For the Red Sox, the New York Yankees were just two games back of the division at season’s end. The midseason acquisitions made by the Yankees closed the gap. They then added Giancarlo Stanton this offseason and are favored over the Red Sox in 2018.
In fact, only the Astros have better odds to win the American League pennant than the Bronx Bombers per BookMaker. Houston’s odds are +250 while the Yankees sit at +300. The Indians at +398 and the Sox at +485 round out the top-4. That’s the top class. After that, there’s a significant drop off. Essentially, it’s the three projected division winners and Red Sox all slotted to take up four of the five postseason spots.
The Red Sox’s odds are nearly three times lower than the fifth team, the Angels. The additions of Shoehei Ohtani, Zack Cozart, Ian Kinsler and resigning of Justin Upton help the odds, but they’re still at +1300 with the Twins at +1632. Minnesota could still add a pitcher which could bump them ahead of Los Angeles, but there still a clear delineation between the Twins and the Angels and the perceived elite of the AL.
After the Angels and Twins, the Seattle Mariners and Toronto Blue Jays are next in line though Seattle is already dealing with health issues in its rotation while the Jays were the AL’s worst offensive club in 2017.
Beyond those eight teams, the rest are major longshots. While longshots are fun and the odds often tempting, they’re long shots for a reason: they’re not very good.
The Detroit Tigers, Kansas City Royals, Oakland Athletics, Chicago White Sox and Tampa Bay Rays have shed many key players from their 2017 Opening Day rosters. They’re rebuilding. Meanwhile, the Baltimore Orioles and Texas Rangers are stuck in the middle, each lacking the starting pitching to make a legitimate run.
QUICK PICK
The Astros and Yankees are the clear favorites to win the World Series let alone the American League. They’re easy picks and rather safe choices as well. They both have stacked lineups, deep rotations and while the Yankees have a much better bullpen, Houston’s is better than they showed in the postseason last year. Houston is also the reigning World Series Champs.
It was the Yankees and Astros battling it out in the ALCS, going all the way to Game 7. Neither is a bad bet to get back there.
Of course, last year, few would have predicted the Yankees to be one of the last two teams standing in the AL. They were supposed to be rebuilding so there’s always room for an unexpected team.
The Sox—hardly rebuilding—added power with J.D. Martinez. That was a weakness for the team last year. Add in a healthy David Price to partner with Chris Sale atop the rotation and Boston could be a dangerous team. They’ve been kicked out of the playoffs in the ALDS in back-to-back seasons so they should be extra motivated come October.
As for Cleveland, they’ve got the longest running World Series draught in baseball. They came within inches of a World Series title in 2016 and have plenty of motivation—and talent—to get back.
You can make an easy story for any team with the top-4 odds to win the AL pennant, but the best pick is likely the Yankees. New York made a huge push last year and they’re youngsters are a year older and year wiser. They’ve cleared out some dead weight, have a starting rotation headed by Luis Severino who broke out last year and Masahiro Tanaka who, despite a down year, rediscovered himself in October.
The lineup is as good as any in baseball. They were second last year in runs scored and first in homers and added baseball’s leading home run hitter and the NL MVP from last year to the order.
All that is plenty of reason to back the Yankees, but we haven’t even gotten to the best part of the team: the bullpen.
The Yankees’ bullpen is so deep. They go five or six deep with could-be closers and have shown already they can win a bullpen game in the postseason.
For those interested in a sleeper, look to the Twins. The Angels are a fair pick, too, but Ohtani would have to be a huge part of the success and given his limited innings last year in Japan would likely be spent by the time October rolls around.
The Twins, on the other hand, just added Logan Morrison to an already strong lineup. They’ve got the offense to compete, it’s the pitching that’s a question. They added Jake Odorizzi to the mix and are still a team heavily rumored to have interest in one of the remaining free agent arms. Jump in now before they add that arm. Their odds won’t get better than this.
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