American League East

I don't think anybody expected this team to get to this point.

Entering the season, many people thought that, you know, they might finish dead last in the American League East.

They might finish well under 500 on the year, and look what they did.

They came out and exceeded all expectations, and they have a great core of players.

There were races in the AL Central and the AL West and the NL Wildcard that went all the way down to the wire.

There were races in the AL East and the NL East that captivated all summer long.

In the end, the Brewers stand tallest.

I think throughout the summer, we all looked at them as one heck of a team, an incredible team, really.

But the more interesting discussion comes when you start looking at players who might actually have something to offer, like Giovanni Moran, Tyler Samaniego, Eduardo Rivera, Alec Gamboa.

Those aren't necessarily players who are going to determine whether the Red Sox win the AL East, but they represent something valuable, and that's pitching depth.

We saw this season how quickly a team's pitching situation can change.

Injuries happen.

The Rays had played so poorly in this series' first three games that in a time in the baseball calendar when a week feels like a month, you could be forgiven for forgetting how good they actually are.

The defense, play approach, and aggressive but not reckless base running that had defined their rise to the top of the American League East and their pursuit of the AL pennant had completely vanished.

They no longer had the luxury of thinking about winning four games or even one.

In Game 4, the Rays took a 1-0 lead and lost it.

win total of 76.5, 50-1 to win the World Series.

They were a team that really was written off in that AL East.

A lot of hype behind Baltimore in their offseason.

The Yankees are the Yankees, and they're always there.

Forget about in the American League.

In the AL East, no one thought the Rays were going to win the American League East.

And they're the best team in the American League all season long.

And they slam the Yankees.

Right around 78 is when they started to flip into overdrive a little bit.

That's where I thought, once they started getting good there, the problem was they were just in the AL East to the point where it was Yankees and it was Red Sox and...

Oh, those were the heavy hitters.

You had to go through those guys.

They're pot committed.

I think they're motivated to get back to being... a contender and a contender in the AL East.

And as a result of that, expect them to go big game hunting again.

And even last year on the heels of winning the pennant, getting to game seven of the World Series, what did they do? Two weeks after the season ended, they backed up the Brinks truck and said, Dylan Cease, here you go, 200 plus million.

It was an unexpected season because they weren't predicted to do very well.

They win the American League East.

They get the best record in the American League.

They sweep the Yankees.