Rankings/List

Many fantasy owners feel it’s unnecessary to draft stable closers since you can always find someone either late in your draft or in free agency.  You don’t have to look further than Ryan Franklin or David Aardsma from 2009 as support. 

So, this week we’ll take a look at the National League bullpen situations and next week we’ll shift our focus to the American League, looking at each team’s closer and those who could step in if something were to happen.  Additionally, we’ll continue to update these columns as draft day moves closer.

This is now the eighth installment in my series in which I am naming who I feel are the top ten players in the history of each MLB franchise.

With the Brewers struggles throughout the 1990s and most of the 2000s, this list is dominated by players from the 1980s, and there are seven players from the 1982 World Series team on this list.

Now that I have gotten into teams with a slightly larger talent pool, I need to set some restrictions on minimum Plate Appearances/Innings Pitched for the candidates.

There is no doubt in the minds of many baseball followers that although some teams lose in style, none can quite do it like the Pittsburgh Pirates. The Pirates have set a sports record for most consecutive losing seasons. Though I am an avid Pirates fan, I must admit I know when to say we stink.

It isn't all the players fault though. The management here was awful for a really long time. We've had awful players stroll through here such as Pokey Reese and Josh Fogg. The losses are blamed on our General Managers and anyone who was involved in signing and scouting our so called "players".

Owner : David Glass

Team : Kansas City Royals

Education : BA, General Business, Missouri State (Springfield, MO)

People often forget how rare it is to find a truly great switch hitter.

In general, the switch hitter himself is not all that rare of a commodity, you see them in nearly every game. But once in a great while you will find one that is head and shoulders above the rest when it comes to utilizing this special skill.

I have compiled a list of, who I consider to be, the top ten switch hitters of all time.

Enjoy. I look forward to your feedback.

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It seems hard to believe, but we are already in the year 2010. As with any new decade, it only seems fair to look back at the best players, teams, etc. of the previous 10 years.

So with that, I present my top 10 picks from each position between the years 2000-2009. This installment will be the outfielders. (For this list, I decided to do the top 30 given the large number of outfielders in the league.)

As with any rankings, there will always be snubs.

The other day, Baseball America released their Top 10 Indians Prospects for 2010 .

This announcement is always fun, because not only does it list the best up-and-comers in the organization, but it also looks at the best tools and tries to predict a future lineup. In this case, BA looks ahead to the year 2013.

This is a response to a very interesting article by Jordan Scwartz; The 50 Greatest Baseball Players of All Time .

In his article Jordan ranked all MLB players (not all players; neither players from the Japanese leagues nor the Negro League were included) based soley on statistics, mixing pitchers and hitters. The idea was good, but I, like others, thinks the method needs to be refined a little. I have made an attempt.

I am not an A's fan. Have nothing against them but I instead cheer for the Phillies. The past few seasons I’ve done top 10 prospect lists for the Phillies and decided I would do one for the entire league to better expand my horizon on the prospects in MLB so here we go. Oakland’s top prospects from a Phillies fan:

1) Chris Carter-1B

Every season a handful of young players take the next step in their career. Something clicks, and they go from good ballplayers, to All Stars.

In 2008, it was Dustin Pedroia, Nate McLouth, and Ryan Ludwick who made that step.

Last year it was Felix Hernandez, Aaron Hill, and of course, Zack Greinke.

Who will it be on 2010? Well, I have compiled a list of the top ten most likely players to have breakout seasons, in my opinion of course.

You'll agree with some, disagree with others perhaps, but what is the fun if everybody agrees with everything?

Enjoy.