2010 MLB Spring Training Preview -- AL East

The 2009 Major League Baseball season concluded with the New York Yankees being crowned the World Series champions for the 27th time in the franchise's storied history. New York will play with a target on their back for the whole season as they go for their next championship. With the additions of outfielder Curtis Granderson, starting pitcher Javier Vazquez, designated hitter Nick Johnson among others in the 2010 offseason, the Yankees have yet again raised the bar for teams hoping to compete. With pitchers and catchers set to report in a little less then a month and the free agent market starting to dwindle, it is important to take a look at Yankees as well as the 29 other teams looking to win the World Series in 2010.

A division that appears to be as deep as ever in 2010 is the World Champs' division, the American League East. As far as the Baltimore Orioles, Boston Red Sox, New York Yankees and Tampa Bay Rays are concerned, they can all sleep better at night as the Toronto Blue Jays have traded ace Roy Halladay out of the division. As always, the Yankees and Red Sox will be two of the top dogs in the division but don't count out Baltimore or Tampa Bay who both possess highly talented youth.

As mentioned before, New York has made some very high profile acquisitions as they have traded for Granderson and Vazquez, not to mention signing free agent Johnson. They will be considered the favorites to win the division for the second consecutive year and it will be difficult for any team to compete with them in all aspects of the game. While this team appears to be flawless, the Yankees will be looking for somebody to fill the void that Johnny Damon is apparently going to be leaving in left field. Brett Gardner may be the player they look at as an in-house option to fill this void, but his offense will never be enough for a full-time role. The team has stated that they are approaching their spending limit and are unlikely to sign any more big names. With this in mind, the team will once again rely on Derek Jeter, Alex Rodriguez and Mark Texeira to lead the offense and CC Sabathia, AJ Burnett and Mariano Rivera to lead the pitching staff. Reliever Phil Hughes made a name for himself as one of the top setup men in baseball last season. The Yankees are hoping that he will continue to stabalize that bullpen and bridge the gap to Rivera. Another young pitcher the Yankees will be counting on to step up is Joba Chamberlain. The team will likely look at Chamberlain to be their fifth starter but the job is far from a lock. He is going to have to work hard in Spring Training and perform well early in the season if he wants to hold onto it. With the addition of Granderson, the team has added speed to a lineup full of power. This team is going to be dangerous and should be the favorites to win the AL East and the World Series.

The Boston Red Sox and New York Yankees have been rivals for nearly a century. New York has gotten the better of Boston for a large portion of that time frame. However, in this past decade Boston has won two world series compared to the Yankees one. Ever since John Henry, Theo Epstein and company have been in control of the team, they have been a competitive 90 plus win team every year. Last year, Boston had high expectations but failed to live up to them after being swept by the Los Angeles Angels in the American League Division Series. The team has been active in the offseason, acquiring ace John Lackey, outfielder Mike Cameron, infielders Marco Scutaro and Adrian Beltre among others. The team has developed a pitching and defensive philosophy that they will carry into the 2010 season. After watching slugger Jason Bay walk to sign with the New York Mets, the Red Sox will have a lot of explaining to do to their fan base if the team struggles to hit early on. However, while power hitting may not be emphasized, David Ortiz, the league leader in home runs from June to September will be returning. Jacoby Ellsbury, Dustin Pedroia, Kevin Youkilis and Victor Martinez, who all possess high batting averages and on base percentages will keep the lineup respectable. Closer Jonathan Papelbon had a rocky 2009 and will be expected to perform better in 2010. He has been the subject of a lot of criticism from the fans and will have all eyes upon him yet again. After Jon Lester emerged as the team's ace last season after a slow start, the south paw will look to be even more consistent in 2010. With veterans Josh Beckett, newcomer Lackey and up and comer Clay Buchholz by his side this should be the strongest rotations in the division. Look for the Boston Red Sox to compete for the division and win 95 plus games.

After a World Series run in 2008 coming out of seemingly nowhere, the Tampa Bay Rays did not surprise anybody in 2009. The team got off to a slow start and ended up dealing injury riddled ace Scott Kazmir to the Angels midseason after falling out of contention. Despite not making the playoffs, Tampa Bay had a very respectable season at 84-78. The Rays have not been big spenders in the offseason and will essentially be looking at the same roster that they had last year. The team is hoping that BJ Upton will be healthy for the entire season and that they will get better, more consistent production from their pitching staff for the entire 162-game schedule. The staff showed promise at the end of 2009 but no starter emerged as the leader of the staff. The Rays would be happy with Jeff Niemann, Matt Garza or James Shields but former number one pick David Price would be the preferred candidate. He had a shaky 2009, among the league leaders in walks but his potential is through the roof. At twenty four years old, he was held back a little last year in terms of innings pitched. Coach Joe Maddon should loosen the reigns a bit on Price and give him more of a chance to work his way out of jams after he gained a full season of experience creating them. Evan Longoria has elevated himself to the upper echelant of players in all of baseball. With Longoria's bat being complimented by all-stars Carl Crawford, Carlos Pena and Ben Zobrist, the Rays should be one of the top run produers in the league yet again. Their position in the standings is going to depend on their pitching staff. If their pitching staff finds a leader and they perform as they did in 2008, this team should be playing in October.

The surprise team of the AL East could potentially be the Baltimore Orioles. This team has been mediocre for years and has not seen the postseason since Cal Ripken Jr. was a member of the team. Ripken is now a TV analyst. However, this team is poised for a run in 2010. After figuring out they were no longer going to be competitive by signing scrubs, Baltimore built up their farm system. That farm system is starting to come to frutation. It has already seen stars like Nick Markakis and Adam Jones develop. Matt Wieters, who has been called "Joe Mauer plus power" by many scouts is ready to play full season at the Major League level. He is a future star of this team. While offense is a strength of this team, their pitching is absolutely horrendous. Jeremy Guthrie was the team leader in ERA in 2009 at 5.04. If the Orioles plan on competing, they may want to trade some of their young talent for a pitcher. While their Major League pitching has not been very highly touted, their minor league pitching has. The team hopes that some of their up and coming pitchers such as Chris Tillman, Brian Matusz and Jake Arrieta will be able to have an impact in 2010. While the Orioles may not even come close to winning the division, watch out for this team in 2010. They could turn out to be a surprise and a treat like the Tampa Bay Rays were in 2008 if the pitching comes through and young players grow up fast.

The whipping boys of the division are probably the Toronto Blue Jays. They were asking for it by trading ace Roy Halladay. The move will likely benefit the team down the road in the form of Brandan Morrow but they will be terrible if you just take 2010 into consideration. Not only did they lose Halladay, they lost one of their top offensive players in Marco Scutaro via free agency to the Red Sox. In turn, they signed defensive wizard Alex Gonzalez to play shortstop. Fortunately for the Blue Jays, they still have a little bit of talent left. Second year starting pitcher Ricky Romero will be taking reigns of the staff as the ace. Romero started the 2009 season off strong as a rookie of the year candidate but tailed off near the end of the year after hitting the rookie wall. He possesses good stuff but might struggle a bit either way because of lineups such as New York, Boston and Tampa Bay that he will have to face 19 times each all season. Aaron Hill became the first Toronto 2nd basemen to hit 30 home runs last season when he hit 36. He is going to be the cornerstone this lineup builds around. The team is hoping Travis Snider will step up and play a bigger role this season as he starts the season in center field. This team's talent is lackluster and they appear to be in rebuilding mode. This season could get ugly for Toronto's front office as they started to see a decline in fan attendance at the end of last season. They  have passionate fans and want winners. The team has not won a World Series since the early 1990's and have struggled for a long time. They would be lucky to crack 75 wins.

All in all this division is probably going to be a two man race between the New York Yankees and the Boston Red Sox. The Tampa Bay Rays will put up a fight but the pitching may not be good enough to compete with the lineups Boston and New York put on the field. Baltimore could surprise people but like the Rays, their pitching is a problem but a much bigger problem. Toronto is just a mess and is clearly rebuilding after letting some of their best players go this past year. Roy Halladay's departure from the division has been the biggest news and the happiest news for the other four teams who have been victimized by him for the past decade. This division is always one of the strongest in baseball and should rank among the best in 2010 once again.