Power Ranking the AL East Race amid a Flurry of Trades, Free-Agent Signings

Major League Baseball's free-agent and trade markets have been buzzing ever since the league lifted its lockout last week. And if it feels like the American League East has recently become the epicenter of it all, it's not just you.

As such, it's as good a time as any for a proper reassessment of the only division to produce four 90-game winners in 2021.

The most recent big move happened on Wednesday when the Toronto Blue Jays struck a deal with the Oakland Athletics for All-Star and Gold Glove-winning third baseman Matt Chapman.

"It's exceptionally exciting," Toronto general manager Ross Atkins told reporters. "One of the highlights of my day was seeing some of the looks on the faces in our clubhouse, with how excited our team is to be adding someone of that caliber with his reputation. This is obviously a very good fit for us."

Like Josh Donaldson before him, the Blue Jays can hope that the move from Oakland to Toronto will coincide with Chapman's best seasons as a two-way star. The team also has a couple of new hurlers in All-Stars Kevin Gausman and Yusei Kikuchi, the latter of whom signed a three-year, $36 million contract on Monday.

Speaking of Donaldson, the 2015 American League MVP is now a member of the New York Yankees after coming over from the Minnesota Twins via trade on Sunday. The Yankees also got two other players in that trade and subsequently solidified the other side of their infield by re-signing first baseman Anthony Rizzo on a two-year, $32 million deal.

The Yankees may not be finished yet, as Robert Murray of FanSided reported that they're talking to the A's about hurlers Sean Manaea and Frankie Montas. Though the Boston Red Sox and Tampa Bay Rays have been laying low, both have been linked to MVP-winning first baseman Freddie Freeman in free agency.

For now, here's how we see the power structure within the AL East.

---

1. Toronto Blue Jays (4th in 2021)

The "1" here obviously denotes that we think highly of the Blue Jays, but even we can acknowledge the argument that this is a merely good team that's actually gotten worse.

The Blue Jays won just 91 games in 2021 and might have done worse if they'd had Chapman, Gausman and Kikuchi instead of Marcus Semien, Robbie Ray and Steven Matz. The latter three—who have all departed via free agency—were worth 16 rWAR in 2021, compared to 10.4 for the incoming trio.

Theoretically, however, the Blue Jays were actually more like a 99-win team last year based on how many runs they scored and allowed. There's also the reality that Gausman had both a better actual ERA and expected ERA than Ray, while Kikuchi at least pitched more innings than Matz.

And while Semien undeniably had a better season in 2021, Chapman has been the more productive player on the whole since 2018. 

What the 28-year-old Chapman does best is no secret, but here's a defensive highlight reel in case anyone's forgotten or just needs a few minutes of baseball goodness:

Chapman is a sizable upgrade for a position that ranked in the middle of the pack in outs above average in 2021. More broadly, the two-time Platinum Glove-winner's arrival should offset the loss of Semien, who was a Gold Glover at second base in his own right last year.

The bigger question is how much Chapman will bring to Toronto's offense. Though he's hit 37 home runs over the last two seasons, he's done so with just a 105 OPS+ after mustering a 131 OPS+ across 2018 and 2019. Running strikeout rates north of 32 percent hasn't helped.

And yet, the Blue Jays have two reasons to think big with Chapman's bat.

For one, he says he's regained the strength that he lost in his lower half as a result of the hip injury that necessitated season-ending surgery in 2020. For another, Rogers Centre is far friendlier to right-handed sluggers than RingCentral Coliseum.

The Blue Jays, therefore, stand to gain yet another dangerous 30-homer slugger in a lineup that already featured a fearsome core of Vladimir Guerrero Jr., Bo Bichette, George Springer, Teoscar Hernandez and Lourdes Gurriel Jr., plus a notable bounceback candidate in the person of Cavan Biggio. Perhaps another 262-homer outburst isn't in the cards, but it should surprise nobody if the Jays retain their American League supremacy in that department.

Pitching-wise, what was a top-heavy starting rotation in 2021 now looks strong from top to bottom with Gausman set to be followed by fellow aces Jose Berrios and Hyun-Jin Ryu, with Kikuchi and young right-hander Alek Manoah bringing up the rear.

Provided he's fully recovered from offseason knee surgery, Jordan Romano will be out to build on his under-the-radar rise as a shutdown closer in 2021. If healthy, Nate Pearson and his 102 mph fastball could also be a force in Toronto's pen.

Bottom line: There are good reasons that FanGraphs gives these Blue Jays better than a 40 percent chance of winning the AL East in 2022.

---

2. Tampa Bay Rays (1st)

It's actually the Yankees that rank immediately below the Blue Jays in FanGraphs' picture of the AL East, but the Rays have a better claim to that spot.

They are, after all, the winningest team in the American League over the last two seasons, and they're still built around a sturdy core of stars—particularly on the offensive side, where they have reigning AL Rookie of the Year Randy Arozarena, dependable sluggers Brandon Lowe and Austin Meadows and, best of all, Wander Franco.

Though he's only 21 years old, Franco must not be underestimated as an MVP candidate for 2022. He wasn't yet a finished product as a rookie in 2021, yet he still put together a historic 43-game on-base streak and then terrorized the Red Sox in the ALDS by going 7-for-19 with two doubles and two homers.

Frankly, the bigger unknown in Tampa Bay is whether they have enough pitching. 

Collin McHugh, Michael Wacha and David Robertson have departed via free agency, and key incumbents like Tyler Glasnow, Yonny Chirinos and Nick Anderson are all recovering from assorted elbow surgeries. The most notable addition the Rays have made to account for these losses is Corey Kluber, who's made all of 24 appearances since 2019.

Then again, the Rays have earned the benefit of the doubt with their run prevention. It's surely a factor that they play excellent defense, and likewise that manager Kevin Cash knows how to handle an array of buttons that never seems to run out of good options.

That array already has a wild card on it in the form of Shane Baz, who became arguably baseball's best pitching prospect amid a wildly successful 2021 season. For his next act, he could at least make like Shane McClanahan and Drew Rasmussen and serve the Rays as an ace-level starter on a five-inning basis.

For that matter, also keep an eye on fellow prospect Josh Lowe.  After dominating Triple-A to the tune of a .916 OPS, 22 home runs and 26 stolen bases in 2021, he's on the verge of supplanting Kevin Kiermaier as the Rays' everyday center fielder. After that, he could make it two Rookie of the Year winners in a row in St. Petersburg.

---

3. New York Yankees (2nd)

On name value alone, there's no arguing that the Yankees roster is anything but intimidating. 

Offensively, Aaron Judge and Giancarlo Stanton are Very Big Dudes who combined for 74 long balls in 2021. A full season of fellow Very Big Dude Joey Gallo should mean another 35-to-40 homers for the Yankees.

Donaldson, Rizzo should at least clear 20 homers, as well as Gleyber Torres—if he finds the power stroke that's been missing for two years.

Even in an up-and-down year, Gerrit Cole came just five strikeouts short of Ron Guidry's franchise record in 2021. Led by Aroldis Chapman, the Yankees bullpen did its usual thing of specializing in both high velocities and strikeouts.

If there's something different about the Yankees right now, it concerns their defense. A healthy Aaron Hicks will hopefully stabilize center field, in which even Judge had to take 21 turns last season. And in Isiah Kiner-Falefa and Ben Rortvedt, the Yankees now have a Gold Glover at shortstop and a framing specialist behind the plate.

If for no other reason than it's fun, darn it, it bears mentioning that Rortvedt is also a Very Big Dude despite only being 5'10" in height:

With all this said, it doesn't take a special pair of eyes to see how volatility could be the Yankees' undoing in 2022.

As dangerous as their offense looks on paper, it's also littered with red flags. Judge, Stanton and Gallo are strikeout magnets in the best of times, and each has more injuries in their past than they would like. That likewise goes for Donaldson, and both he and Rizzo are very much in post-prime territory as they leave the age-30 threshold further and further behind.

On the other side of the ball, the Yankees arguably don't have a proper No. 2 or even a proper No. 3 behind Cole. It's also alarming that he didn't always pitch like a No. 1 following MLB's ban on sticky stuff last June, which also seemed to affect Chapman.

To be sure, this is a good-looking team. But at least until the Yankees get the pitchers they're reportedly after, we'll hold off on calling it "great."

---

4. Boston Red Sox (3rd)

Though the Red Sox ultimately lasted the longest of last year's AL East contenders, they just don't look like the same team now.

On offense, in particular, the Red Sox have a Kyle Schwarber-sized hole at the top of their lineup and a Hunter Renfroe-sized hole in the back half. The latter was ostensibly moved for a much-needed defensive upgrade in a trade for old friend Jackie Bradley Jr., but the Red Sox might not be able to play Bradley every day if he puts up another sub-.500 OPS.

Meanwhile, on the mound, Boston's response to losing Eduardo Rodrigez to free agency was to sign Wacha, Rich Hill and James Paxton. The first two are short-stint guys and the third is recovering from Tommy John surgery, so it's doubtful that any of the three will be the solid No. 3-type starter that Rodriguez was in 2021.

If the Red Sox were hoping that Chris Sale would also be instrumental in making up for the loss of Rodriguez, well, that's already backfiring. After missing nearly two full seasons recovering from his own Tommy John operation, the 32-year-old is sidelined once again with a stress fracture in his rib cage.

With respect to newcomer lefties Jake Diekman and Matt Strahm, the bridge to ace reliever Garrett Whitlock within Boston's pen still looks shaky. The only hope of repair may lie in the hands of Matt Barnes, who was basically unusable in the second half of 2021 after he broke out as an All-Star in the first.

Granted, the Red Sox also looked destined to be an also-ran in 2021 before they ripped off 92 wins and went to the American League Championship Series. But until Chief Baseball Officer Chaim Bloom makes at least one impact move, that's not much of an excuse to be bullish on them now.

---

5. Baltimore Orioles (5th)

The Baltimore Orioles are also a professional baseball team that plays in the American League East. For a change, they hope to lose fewer than 100 games in 2022.

---

Stats courtesy of Baseball Reference, FanGraphs and Baseball Savant.