Brandon Brown
Throughout the season, CBS Sports MLB experts will bring you a weekly Batting Around roundtable breaking down just about everything. The latest news, a historical issue, thoughts on the future of baseball, all sorts of things. Last week we debated the best shortstop in baseball. This week we will face surprise teams.
Which team surprised you the most this season?
Matt Snyder: Especially given Shane Bieber’s injury, it’s the Guardians. They started 17-6, one of the greatest starts in franchise history. I expected them to now be one of the teams that people were speculating as sellers. I thought Terry Francona’s retirement would hurt them more, I didn’t think the offense would be as good, and I would have thought the rotation without a fully functional Bieber wouldn’t be very reliable. Instead, they have positioned themselves very well in a division that still appears, eventually, to be one of the smallest in baseball.
Dayn Perry: I’m going to interpret that in the negative sense of the word and say the Astros. Given that the core from last season is still in place, the reasonable expectation is that Houston will once again be in the upper tier of teams. Of course, this is the club that has reached at least the ALCS seven years in a row. In reality, the rotation was hampered by injuries and the lineup looked stale in some key spots. It won’t be surprising if the Astros find their groove at some point, but they’ve already hurt their playoff chances quite a bit thanks to their poor start.
RJ Anderson: The Astros and Guardians were my first two choices. For the sake of variety, I’ll opt for the Cardinals. If you had told me in February that they would have a league average pitching staff to this point in the season, then I would have assumed they were in first place in the National League Central. Instead, their attack completely failed, to the point where they were in the basement. (I’ll give honorable mention to the Red Sox, who pitched much, much better than I ever would have imagined, given all the injuries.)
Mike Axisa: Yes, the Guardians and Astros were the first two teams that came to mind too. I’m surprised the Red Sox are also as good as they have been, especially on the run prevention side, and I’m surprised the Diamondbacks are moving forward at 17-20. They are 5-2 with a plus-19 run differential against the Rockies and 12-18 with a minus-7 run differential against everyone else. Eduardo Rodriguez’s injury and Corbin Carroll’s poor start hurt, but I still thought the D-backs would be better than that.
