The National League: A review

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Buc-a-roos

Unlike your run-of-the-mill, unaccountable sports blogs, I am brave enough to rehash my past defeats and idiocy.

Remember, anyone that talks sports has shit for brains.

Philadelphia Phillies -- 100-62 -- 102-60
Won a ton of games with an offense that never quite found their way. As for the pitching: Just as advertised. What was odd is seeing Cole Hamels outperform almost all of them.

Atlanta Braves -- 89-83 -- 89-83
It took an almost historic collapse for me to nail this, but I did anyway. One of my favorite baseball players is Tim Hudson. Quietly he's putting together a really quiet Hall of Fame career. He's at 181 wins and a career 3.40.

Florida Marlins -- 82-80 -- 72-90
D-I-S-A-S-T-E-R. The manager was gone. The ace starter was gone. The star shortstop is persona non grata. They demoted a guy -- probably -- because he talked too much shit on Twitter. Don't worry, Ozzie Guillen's on the way.

Washington Nationals -- 73-89 -- 80-81
Look at the lil' Nats. Winning games and shit. Good news is that they played well at home (44-36) and won games despite their big free agent signee (Jayson Werth) sucked. The reason I think this could be for real: Pitching. The Nats have good, young pitchers.

New York Mets -- 72-90 -- 77-85
The New York Mets finished behind the Washington Nationals. Let that sink in. Isn't it clear that the Mets are woefully mismanaged. How do you spend that much money and still lose.

NL West
Cincinnati Reds -- 94-68 -- 79-83
Missed. Slightly. Where did I go wrong? It's an offense that swings and misses a lot. It's an offense whose superstar (Joe Votto) had an "ordinary" season (for him). And the only pitcher that was consistently healthy was Bronson Arroyo, who had a 5.07 ERA.

Milwaukee Brewers -- 85-77 -- 96-66
To my credit, I did type: "Watch out for the Brew Crew!"




St. Louis Cardinals -- 81-81 -- 90-72
Here's what I wrote about the future World Series champs: "You don't lose your Cy-Young candidate No. 1 starter (Adam Wainwright and expect to bounce back that easily. Added two nice versatile bats in Nick Punto and Ryan Theriot, but I don't think it's enough. This is an extremely old team that's about to break the piggy bank for their star or they're going to let him go and start over. Tons of potential for injuries." I mean, who else was praising Punto before the season?

Houston Astros -- 80-82 -- 56-106
OK. So I messed up the NL Central. Sue me. The Astros are beyond awful. the worst team in the league. If they're smart, they shop any capable veterans and even some of the incapable veterans to any team for any number of prospects. Remember, Nolan Ryan could just as easily been here and not in Arlington.

Chicago Cubs -- 78-84 -- 71-91
For my money, you can lump the Cubs and Mets into the same category. They're big media, big payroll teams that are so utterly mismanaged that it's not even funny. I mean, at least the Yankees and Red Sox have won something recently. Just a franchise wrought with bad decisions. I guess that's why you pry Theo Epstein from Boston.

Pittsburgh Pirates -- 62-100 -- 72-90
For half a season, we had something going here. Remember, the Pirates were in the wild card and division hunt in July. The collapse they perpetrated in the latter half of the season was monumental. Was it a tease or is this team on the right track? Seems like fool's gold to me.

NL West

San Francisco Giants -- 90-72 -- 86-76
How sick do you feel as a Giants fan? Their top four starters won 41 games. They also lost 45 games. All despite the fact that their highest ERA (Madison Bumgarner) was 3.21. It is a crime Giants management didn't do anything beyond Carlos Beltran to get that into the playoffs.

San Diego Padres --86-76 -- 71-91
Hurts to miss that one. Have to remember that when you lose an MVP candidate that your offensive production might dip. Also, my thoughts were were dependent on the teams below being worse than they were. Once I missed on them, my other picks took a nosedive.

Los Angeles Dodgers -- 84-78 -- 82-79
No one's talking about the Dodgers. Despite all the bullshit that went on with this organization (almost beating a man and father to death, the McCourts) they had a competitive baseball club, a Cy Young and MVP candidate and you weren't completely dreadful. Let's look on the sunny side.

Colorado Rockies -- 82-80 -- 73-89
The Rockies conceded pretty early in the season and they pulled the trigger on the Ubaldo Jimenez deal so early that I assumed the guy was injured or had punched a fan in the face or something. Got a lot of kids knocking on the door. This year or the next could get interesting. Need some parts still.

Arizona Diamondbacks -- 62-100 -- 94-68
Not only did they not lose 100 games. Not only were they not awful. Not only did they make the playoffs. But they looked good doing it and surprised everyone. What a weird season.

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