NL Central is MLB's Best Race
Chris Bahr - SportingNews.com
Aug 06, 2009
Sick of the Red Sox-Yankees hype? Convinced that the NL East and NL West races are all but over already? If so, look to the middle of the map. Both the AL Central and NL Central have multi-team races that figure to go down to the wire. Each division features a key head-to-head matchup this weekend, with the Tigers hosting the Twins and the Astros hosting the Brewers. But which race will be better during the next couple of months?
Not to take anything away from the AL Central, which should be thrilling, but the N.L. Central is where the real action is. With so many teams in contention, the NL Central race actually is more intriguing than the A.L. wild-card race.
The case for NL Central:
Four is a crowd. This is baseball's only division with four teams vying for the title (of course, it also is baseball's only division with six teams). The Cardinals, Cubs, Brewers and Astros are separated by only five games. And they will see plenty of one another over the next eight weeks or so. St. Louis and Chicago will meet three more times; St. Louis and Houston will meet six more times; St. Louis and Milwaukee will meet nine more times; Chicago and Houston will meet three more times; Chicago and Milwaukee will meet seven more times; Milwaukee and Houston will meet nine more times.
Parity. The beauty of the division is its ugliness. In this bunch, there isn't a team capable of pulling away and leaving the other contenders in the rearview mirror. Need proof? On May 2, the Cardinals had a four-game cushion over the second-place Pirates and Cubs. Since that time, no team has led the division by more than three games. And in that span, St. Louis, Milwaukee and Chicago all have spent time in first place, with Houston getting as close as a game back. Even the Reds got to within 1 1/2 games a couple of times before falling out of the race.
Star power. The names don't get much bigger than Cardinals first baseman Albert Pujols. And with acquisition of left fielder Matt Holliday, St. Louis has quite a 1-2 punch. That said, Milwaukee can counter it with left fielder Ryan Braun and first baseman Prince Fielder. Meanwhile, third baseman Aramis Ramirez finally is healthy and swinging a powerful bat again for the Cubs, and right fielder Carlos Lee and shortstop Miguel Tejada are having big seasons for the Astros. That doesn't even factor in the pitching. For the record, Cardinals righthander Chris Carpenter leads the majors with a 2.10 ERA.
The Cubs are back. After laboring through a first half full of injuries and disappointing play, the Cubs produced one All-Star and limped into the All-Star break at .500. Since the break, however, the team is 14-6 and has pulled into a first-place tie with St. Louis atop the division. And considering it has 12 games remaining this month against the Pirates, Padres, Nationals and Mets, Chicago shouldn't fall into another extended slump. The Cubs still are great drama, and any time they remain in the hunt for a playoff (and, thus, World Series) berth, it makes for great baseball.
Chris Bahr is a senior editor for Sporting News. E-mail him at cbahr@sportingnews.com.
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