Ping: Baseball Fans
 

Detroit Tigers...... over or under 78 1/2 wins?

This seems easy....

I like Boston under 96
Cincinnati under 78
Milwaukee over 69
'NYE' Mets over 85.5
NY (A) under 102
OAKLAND IS 79? Are you *#$&$* kidding me? I'm going at least $200 over on that.
Phillies over 83.5
SD under 86.5
Toronto over 69.5

Easily over, being in the weakest division in baseball should make it easy.

Under, although not by much. 74-75 wins.

Why? I don't see that as being unreasonable seeing as how 3/5 of their pitching staff wasn't there last year and aren't nearly as good as Mulder/
Hudson. Sure their offense looks better, but I wouldn't bet anything on them until I see that staff in action.

Hopefully more start to think like you and the -130 attached to the over comes down. That's the worst line I've seen in a long time.

OK, what's your reasoning on why it's a bad line? Billy Beane the magician? Seriously, I don't see any reason why the 79 win thing is so hard to believe. They are in a very tough division where I can see every team around .500. They don't have Hudson or Mulder. They have 2 rookies in their rotation and another starter who has 29 major league games under his belt. Zito is coming off a bad year as well. Their offense should be OK, but I can just as easily see them winning 75 games as I can 85-90.

I took the over, and I hnk they will finish within 2 of the Twins either way.

Chavez for a whole year. A bullpen that is 200% better then the start of last year; Cruz, Calero and Street are all going to be good and they get a full year of Dotel. Harden is a stud. Swisher is the ROY favorite. Crosby will hopefully show some improvement. They have improved the situation behind the plate AND at second base. I love the two rookies in the rotation. Blanton should give them innings. Guys like Duchscherer give them depth. To me their track record is good enough that if Zito is the one they kept, I expect a little bounce back from him.

The Rangers pitching is going to take a step back and Seattle didn't improve themselves that much.

They might not win the AL West, but if they can't get to 80 wins that would be the most shocking thing to me I've seen in baseball in a long time. The A's to me are easily the most interesting team in baseball going into 2005 and I can't wait to stay up too late watching them on Extra Innings.