Rankings/List

Spring training has just begun. But the suspense for the 2010 Major League Baseball season is not the same as past years. No huge free agents. No major injuries. No steroid scandals this year.

But what will stand out for many teams this season is the talent of the new generation of players.

Beyond Hanley Ramirez and the mammoth 2005 deal that sent the slugging shortstop to Florida in exchange for Josh Beckett, Mike Lowell, and Guillermo Mota, who are the best former Red Sox toeing the rubber and flashing their leather today?

You know some of these, but some may surpise you. Who else in your fantasy draft was once a Red Sox? Who should have called Fenway home, but Fenway shut the door?

Here are my top ten.

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For having the distinction as the longest standing professional sports franchise in one city spanning 128 years, it is somewhat amazing that a large concentration of the Philadelphia Phillies organization's postseason highlights have come in the most recent 30 years.

Certainly, some of this relates to Major League Baseball's format changes that first added a round of league playoffs with the initial formation of divisions and then expanded to the current four playoff participant approach in each league.

The 41-year history of the Kansas City Royals is a story of a meteoric rise to contention in the franchise's first 21 years, followed by a titanic fall to baseball's cellar in the last 20 years.

As an expansion team in 1969, the Royals became a winner after just two seasons and was a title contender for two decades. In fact, all seven of the team's playoff appearances occurred during a 10-year stretch from 1976 to 1988, making it to the World Series twice, winning it once in 1985.

110 years, nine playoff appearances, seven American League pennants, three World Series titles all wrapped into five performances.

The games are different, the stadiums are different, the uniforms are different, but the performances remain impressive.

These are the performances that, although may not have always brought a winner to the city of Chicago and, in one case, is a reminder of a black day for baseball, raised eyebrows.

It is easy to pick the stars among winners, but there are stars in those who are on the smaller end of the score as well.

The White Sox have had very limited postseason performances and really the only great ones came in 2005.

Besides for Dewayne Wise's three-run home run game against the Rays in the 2008 ALDS, which Javier Vazquez promptly gave right back, and...I can't even find a good performance in the 2000 ALDS (the White Sox batted .185), the White Sox haven't had any great performances except for 2005.

I'm not going back to the 1906 World Series winner where the White Sox batted .198 and the Chicago Cubs batted .196.

The "Aughts" have come and passed already, with plenty of great baseball played. Between reversing the curse in Beantown, the White Sox finally getting their title, Barry Bonds breaking the single-season home run record, the retirement of players like Cal Ripken Jr., Tony Gwynn, and Greg Maddux, and the demise of the careers of the steroid-era stars, there has been no shortage of headlines in the past ten years.

Pitching may be all-important to winning in baseball nowadays, especially when it comes to post seasons play, but nothing battles great pitching better than an old-fashioned, well-balanced line-up.
A balance of speed and power, lefty and righty hitters, run scorers and run producers, are essential to giving the opposing pitcher no easy outs, as well as affecting the opposing manager's strategy when the game becomes more "specialized" in the later innings.

In 2006, rookies Justin Verlander and Joel Zumaya helped the Tigers to their first World Series in 22 years.

The inexperienced tandem matured as the season progressed and led a suprising Detroit team to the playoffs after the franchise's worst ten year stretch in history.

Who has the potential to repeat this performance in 2010?

Let's look at 10 baby Tigers who may be called to task this season:

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Just a few hours remain before San Francisco Giants pitchers and catchers report to Spring Training in Scottsdale, Ariz.

The Giants enter 2010 with raised expectations after a 16-game improvement on their record. That was good enough to get GM Brian Sabean and manager Bruce Bochy sparkly two-year extensions.

Sabean stayed away from the big-name free agent hitters and instead decided to go with short-term solutions—something he has done time and time again in the past.