NL West: Best to Worst

Last season, the NL West was the best and most exciting division in baseball. The Diamondbacks had the best record in the NL, and the Padres and Rockies were only 1 game out. Two NL West teams had a one-game playoff to get the wild card, and the Rockies were the hottest team in baseball, on an incredible streak to end the year. The Rockies represented the NL West in the World Series after an all-NL West Championship series. No other division had four teams over .500, nor 3 teams at .549 or better. What a difference a year makes...

This season, the NL West is unquestionably the worst division in MLB. The D'Backs have the worst record of any division leader at 39-37, and no other division has 4 teams under .500. The division has 4 teams in the bottom 8 of MLB in runs scored, making their losses boring as well. The Dodgers (2nd place) are already 8 games out of the NL Wild Card race, while 5 NL teams have a better record than the D'Backs. What happened?

Lincecum is awesome, too bad the Giants suck. Upper Deck should have gotten a different angle for this picture...

SF Giants (32-44) - The least surprising of the group, the Giants are in a long-term rebuilding phase. The young starting pitching shows signs of brilliance, but the offense lacks slugging. Rowand, Winn, and a Molina can't carry your lineup. The team's batting average is surprisingly respectable, but the lack of slugging results in a lot of singles and not enough runs. Tim Lincecum has been outstanding, and Cain and Sanchez have held their own. But Zito and the other starters have a combined record of 5-20, with ERA's over 5.00. The disappointing aspect of the Giants is that the young pitching should be complemented by young hitters, so that the team will mature together and be good in a couple years. Instead, the team will have to get rid of Rich Aurilia, Omar Vizquel, Bengie Molina, Randy Winn, and Ray Durham, all of whom are 33 or older.

Colorado Rockies (32-44) - When you play at Coors Field and rank in the bottom 10 of MLB in runs, you know you have problems. Tulowitzski has only played 28 games due to injury, and hit .159 during that time. The injury bug has also gotten Holliday and Hawpe already. The worst part though is the pitching. Jeff Francis was their ace last year, but has a 5.22 ERA this year. Jimenez and Francis have a combined 5-13 record. Corpas and Fuentes, who were almost unhittable late last year out of the pen, have already blown 8 saves, and Corpas has an ERA of 6.19. The Rockies were optimistic that last year's success wasn't a fluke, especially with so many good young players. Looks like it was a fluke.

Adrian Gonzalez is the only decent hitter for the Padres.

San Diego Padres (32-45) - The Padres never expected to score a ton of runs this year, and the plan was to pitch their way to victory. Unfortunately, Peavy and Young have both spent time on the DL this year, missing 5+ starts each. Maddux and Wolf have been solid, but the Padres have needed too many starts from other people. In addition, the hitting has been even worse than expected. Only two regular position players are hitting over .265, and only Adrian Gonzalez has over 35 RBI's. If the pitching gets healthy, things might improve, but the Padres really need some bats in the worst way.

The best leadoff man in the game this year, the Dodgers need Furcal healthy, and soon.

LA Dodgers (35-40) - Everybody had high hopes when Joe Torre rolled into town and took over a team with a talented pitching staff and a high payroll. Unfortunately, none of the top 4 starters has a winning record, and Brad Penny has an ERA of 5.88. The staff ERA is good (under 4.00), but the hitting has not helped the pitchers at all. Furcal was having a great year as the leadoff man, but has already missed 40 games to injury. Andruw Jones has continued the decline he started in Atlanta, hitting a meager .165 this year and now on the DL as well. No Dodger has more than 8 HR, and without Furcal, manufacturing runs has been hard. This one stat tells it all: Furcal scored 34 runs in 32 games. The team leader is now Russell Martin, with 38 runs in 73 games. This team has the talent to compete, but just needs to get healthy. They have done a good job of staying close enough for now.

Byrnes looks pretty, but hasn't helped his team much this year.

Arizona D'Backs (39-37) - Arizona got off to a good start, but have faded back to the pack in a hurry once they started playing teams from other divisions. The young hitters are entering their sophomore slumps, with Drew (.268), Reynolds(.252), Upton(.241), and Young(.233) all struggling. Eric Byrnes was a spark for them last year, but only hit .219 before getting hurt. Webb and Haren are the dominant top two as expected, but the Big Unit and Owings have struggled, with ERA's over 5. The return of Doug Davis has helped, but the drop in run support has cost them lately. The D'Backs have not scored over 4 runs in a loss since April (29 losses), also managing 8 wins since April with 4 runs or less. The D'Backs were 20-8 at the end of April. Since then, they're 19-29, and 8-29 when scoring 4 or fewer. If they can sneak into the playoffs, they will be a formidable matchup because of the strength of their starting pitching. They could never have hoped to be in 1st after such a bad stretch, and will only expect to improve and run away with this terrible division.

Most of the talent which created last year's success is still in the NL West. However, injuries and struggles by younger players have really crippled the teams' chances at success through the first half of the season.