The Baseball Analysts have a roundtable discussion on the NL West up today. Chatting with them are Jon Weisman from Dodger Thoughts (booooo Dodgers! We hate you, you humorless turds!) and Russ from Purple Row (booooo Rockies! We hate you too, you pleasant bunch of friendly people who we actually like!).
Some of the consensus of the Padres would be that our pitching is overrated and that our offense is underrated. I almost, but not quite, agree with both of those statements.
I don't think anybody's really counting Randy Wolf or Mark Prior for anything, so there's potential there for awesomeness. At the same time, I think Peavy flat out earned the Cy Young and I think Chris Young was on his way to being a Cy Young contender himself, save for his fall off (from injury?) at the end of the season. I really don't see any reason why Greg Maddux can't be a better #3 pitcher than most #3 pitchers in the league. I don't think it's overstating things to say that, if Prior and Wolf play to uninjured potential, we have one of the best staffs in the league. When you have the returning Cy Young champ on the rotation, it's hard to not be considered pitching rich.
On the offensive side, I wonder about our offense. Brian has found a nice niche in leading off for us and I'm glad Kouz and K-Bot came around. I think losing Milton Bradley and Mike Cameron will hurt a lot, but I'm eager to see what Jim Edmonds has left in the tank and I'm really excited about Antonelli and Headley. Still, I think most people would agree with those sentiments, so it's tough to say that they're underrated. Cautiously optimistic is how I'd rate it.
Getting closer and closer to opening day! Go Padres! Boooo Dodgers!
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