Fingers crossed that the 2021 MLB season will start on time – and that we get to see live baseball on the ballpark this year.
While we wait, Buster Olney concludes his annual ranking of the top 10 players in each position heading into the upcoming season – based on input from industry evaluators – with a look at the full squads. With even more moves to make, which team is number 1 (and 2 … and 3 …) on paper?
Teams
Much of baseball’s traditional rivalry is dormant. The Red Sox are converting and the Yankees, unaffected by Boston, haven’t made any aggressive moves this winter. The Cubs cut the payroll and trade their best starter, Yu Darvish, and the Cardinals’ most important decision was to decline the option of Gold Glove, second baseman Kolten Wong. The Giants are at least a few more years away from challenging the Dodgers. The Astros and Athletics are experiencing the departure of some of their best players – Oakland appears to be losing Liam Hendriks, while George Springer certainly appears to be leaving the Astros.
In that vacuum, we now have the Dodgers and the San Diego Padres, clubs that live in the same division, play in ballparks 200 miles apart and have the best collections of talent – and here’s the bonus: when they’re on the field, at least, these two teams don’t seem to like each other that much. The Dodgers have won the National League West in eight consecutive seasons, and the Padres, who have grabbed Darvish and Blake Snell, are targeting LA San Diego wants what the Dodgers owned.
As a senior official said recently, the Dodgers are clearly the best team in baseball, but the Padres are a close second. Their games will be indispensable for the coming year.
The top 10 teams in baseball: