Divisional All-Stars 2016 American League

Last week, I presented Divisional All-Stars lineups for the National League (all three divisions and one wild card team), and now I present the same for the American League! Here's how the four teams shape up in terms of total fantasy points of players on their respective 25-man rosters:

1. AL East: 40,427
2. AL Central: 37,983
3. AL West: 36, 158
4. AL Wild Card: 33,417

Even though a Central team won the AL Pennant this year, I'm going to present these teams in order of overall points, because this AL East team scored the most out of any division, beating out the NL West by a measly 77 points. Let's check out this heavily Boston-influenced roster:

Everywhere you look, there's another Red Sock: Mookie Betts scored the most fantasy points among all batters in 2016, Rick Porcello won the AL Cy Young award, Koji Uehara still has closer-worthy stuff even at age 41, they're solid up the middle with Pedroia, Bogaerts, and Bradley Jr., and David Price's "disappointing" season still landed him just outside the top five scoring starting pitchers in the league. The elephant in the room is retired DH David Ortiz, who trailed only Betts, Porcello, and the previous year's AL MVP Josh Donaldson in fantasy points last year (while finishing just ahead of his fellow Dominican DH Edwin Encarnacion, who is also making his final appearance on this division's roster... for now). If we honor Big Papi's decision to step away from the game (and assume that he wouldn't be willing to return for (at most) 11 games for this special occasion), the DH spot would be filled by Orioles third baseman Manny Machado. While it would definitely be a waste not to put someone with his defensive prowess in the field, his bat definitely plays well enough for a DH, although this change would create a ripple effect for the AL Wild Card team, but more on that later.

A quick look through this roster reveals that there are only two players who comes from a team that's not the Red Sox, Blue Jays, or Orioles: number three starter Masahiro Tanaka (flanked by two Blue Jays stars J.A. Happ and Aaron Sanchez) and bench bat Tim Beckham. Based on playing time, Yankees rookie Gary Sanchez could technically have qualified as a bench piece, but despite his short season, his role was clearly as a starter when he played. Technically there is one player who spent some time with the Atlanta Braves (reliever Jason Grilli), but he qualified with the Toronto, plus he doesn't really figure to eat into the playing time of Baltimore's three-headed-monster of arguably the league's top closer Zach Britton, All-Star Brad Brach, and 2016 rookie Mychal Givens. Speaking of three-headed monsters, neither of Yankees much heralded setup aces Andrew Miller and Dellin Betances qualified as middle relievers last year due to their time spent closing games, and not even fireballing Aroldis Chapman could compete with Britton when judged as a closer.

Despite representing their league in the World Series, the Indians only has one representative in each of the four categories in this Divisional All-Star roster: Shortstop Francisco Lindor in the starting lineup, ace pitcher Corey Kluber in the rotation, underrated workhorse Dan Otero in the bullpen, and beloved veteran Juan Uribe on the bench. If not for the ridiculous depth at second base in this division, Jason Kipnis might have had a spot here, but he couldn't compete with the prodigious power of Brian Dozier or the all around sterling production of Ian Kinsler. As it is, Kipnis will still be involved in these proceedings as part of the AL Wild Card team, joining his teammate Carlos Santana at DH. However, there are a couple of stellar pitchers in Cleveland (Carlos Carrasco and Danny Salazar come to mind) who could make this list next year if they manage to have full seasons, possibly replacing former Chicago ace Chris Sale, who traded in his White Sox for the Red variety this offseason. I could also see relief aces Cody Allen and Andrew Miller taking a couple of bullpen spots, depending on their usage: if they end up splitting time as closer, it might be difficult to make a case for either of them.

Two long time Detroit stalwarts headline the rotation and the lineup (Justin Verlander and Miguel Cabrera, respectively) and neither look to be leaving anytime soon due to their massive contracts and no-trade protection. Speaking of trades, it was somewhat controversial to plug recently shipped off Adam Eaton into the center field slot, given that he spent most of his time in right field last season for Chicago. However, the alternative was platoon specialist / speedster Rajai Davis, and Eaton is slated to play center next year with the Nationals, after playing nearly 50 games there this past year. On the topic of roster moves, Jose Quintana might have spent his final year as an AL Central Divisional All-Star, based on how much his name has been bandied about the rumor mill this offseason, while Royals ace Danny Duffy will likely be around for the foreseeable future after just inking a new deal this offseason. Speaking of Duffy (and his teammate Salvador Perez, who also appears on this roster), I'd like to offer my deepest condolences to the Royals organization after the untimely death of Yordano Ventura, another rising star who was taken from the baseball community all too soon.

As is the case with any list that includes the current AL MVP, this lineup is all about Mike Trout. Well, actually, Jose Altuve was almost as impressive as the Angels center fielder last year, forming half of perhaps the best double play combo in the majors with Astros shortstop Carlos Correa. And don't forget the tremendous home run power of Nelson Cruz. And then there's future Hall of Famers Albert Pujols and Adrian Beltre. And George Springer is a darn fine ballplayer as well. Come to think of it, this is a very strong lineup. It would look a lot less strong if I hadn't played somewhat fast and loose with positional eligibility: both Cruz and Pujols spent the majority of their 2016's at DH. And given the presence of Robinson Cano, neither of the two aforementioned sluggers would even have made the roster if I didn't make an exception - Cruz would be replaced by Ian Desmond (see the AL Wild Card team, below) and Pujols would give way to his real life teammate C.J. Cron, whose 1,258 points on the year should not put him in the conversation of division's best first basemen. I did however make the opposite decision regarding another majority DH, Evan Gattis and his 1,467 points. Even though Gattis did play 55 of his 128 games at catcher, I figured you would want a more regular option behind the plate since the catcher position is significantly more defensively challenging than first base and the outfield. Plus Stephen Vogt made his second consecutive All-Star appearance this year, and plus GO A'S!!!

Where this team lags behind the other divisions is the starting pitching. Cole Hamels had an ace caliber season in Texas and Rich Hill pitched like a number one when he was healthy enough to take the field. But the issue here is that many projected key players didn't live up to their expectations, for a number of reasons. Injuries prevented Yu Darvish, Sonny Gray, and Garret Richards from reaching their full potential, and both 2015 Cy Young Award winner Dallas Keuchel and perennial ace "King" Felix Hernandez fell completely out of relevance for some reason. Things don't get much rosier at the back end of the bullpen: a proven closer Sam Dyson ain't, but the fact that he went from minor trade deadline acquisition to unheralded setup option to ninth inning force all in the span of one year is a pretty neat story. The bullpen behind Dyson is really solid, led by baserunner strander extraordinaire Ryan Dull, long reliever / swingman Chris Devenski, and hard-throwing lefty Jake Diekman (who just underwent a scary surgical procedure on his colon - here's wishing him a speedy recovery). And the bench has a good mix of speed, defensive versatility, and upside, in the form of Billy Burns, Shawn O'Malley, and Jurickson Profar, respectively.

I've mentioned four of the top five hitters in the AL Wild Card lineup above, and at this juncture I would like to point out that in the event that Manny Machado would have to replace the retired David Ortiz in the AL East lineup, he would be replaced in the this lineup by Mariners third baseman Kyle Seager (2,123 points, with Evan Longoria and his 2,052 points waiting in the wings). This outfield is quite shaky defensively, and that's even with Hanley Ramirez moving to first base full time: Ian Desmond has less than a year's experience in center field, and both Carlos Beltran and Khris Davis are best suited for DH work. But at least they have defensively gifted reserve Jake Marisnick ready to take plenty of late innings in the outfield.

If you thought the AL West rotation was shaky, you might want to turn away before looking at these pitchers. Not one of them even reached 1,700 points on the year, and the most impressive on a points per game basis (Michael Fulmer with 60.6) had an abbreviated rookie season due to innings limitations. Chris Tillman was the top scorer on an underwhelming Orioles staff and Jake Odorizzi led the Rays in pitching fantasy points (even if Chris Archer is the de facto ace of that team), but Marco Estrada has dealt with some injury issues and Ian Kennedy is vastly overpaid. The only saving graces are 2016 Cubs bullpen teammates Aroldis Chapman and Mike Montgomery, the former of which will nail down the ninth inning, while the latter could even be used to shore up a weak rotation. Not a single one of these middle relievers are worth writing home about. Which means that if I do a video game simulation, the MLB: The Show AI will absolutely 100% make sure that this team wins it all.


So that's it for the 2016 Divisional All-Stars! Lots of fun baseball stuff coming up soon with Spring Training just weeks away and the WBC in March, and I've also been playing a lot of Batman video games, so stay tuned to this channel for some fun updates!

Divisional All-Stars 2016 National League

If I talk about Divisional All-Stars in the context of the fairly recently completed 2016 baseball season, is that a pretty self-explanatory concept? Like, for every year that I do this feature, do I really have to reiterate that these are rosters made up of the best players at each position from each of MLB's six divisions (plus one Wild Card team from each league)? Well, I've just gone and done it again, so I guess I won't have to ask this question again until after the 2017 season. This year, I took a step beyond my usual lineup/rotation/bullpen structure and included a bench section, which means that I'm presenting full 25-man rosters, of the type that might someday face off against each other in a simulation using an upcoming MLB: The Show video game...

For this hypothetical matchup, I haven't decided whether I would use traditional playoff structure (with only one Wild Card team, of course) or a round robin style, following the structure of the image at right from ErasableTournamentBrackets.com (you're welcome for the free plug), wherein each team from each division would play each other once, with the winners of each going on to face each other in a winner take all series. To determine seeding for the playoff format, I added up the fantasy points from each player on each roster, with the following results:

1. NL West: 40,350
2. NL Central: 39,796
3. NL East: 38,769
4. NL Wild Card: 32,682

But despite the point totals, let's start thing off with the division that produced this year's World Series champion Chicago Cubs, the National League Central:

It's not difficult to see that those World Series champs were the dominant force in this division: 9 of the 25 players, or 36% of the roster, played for the Cubs. That includes 4 out of 5 members of the starting rotation, which is the same amount of TOTAL players contributed by each of the Pirates and Brewers. (The Reds came in second with 5 and the Cardinals brought up the rear with 3.) NL MVP Kris Bryant is the team's overall fantasy point leader, and I left him batting second because that's where he started the majority of his games in 2016 (83 to 62 batting third). However, I separated Bryant from his usual lineup protector, Anthony Rizzo, because in these compilation-type lineups, it's fun to switch things up from how they would normally look in real life - also because Joey Votto had the superior offensive season, both in terms of fantasy points and in offensive rWAR (5.4 to 4.6). The reason why Votto has to languish in the DH spot (yes, I'm using a DH spot for both leagues, don't make me explain why again) is because he was worth a career-worst 2.4 defensive wins BELOW replacement in the field, while Rizzo just about broke even with the glove (0.2 defensive rWAR).

I did put a fair amount of thought into these batting orders, and I understand the implications of placing two left-handed hitters back-to-back, but considering that both Votto and Rizzo put up OPS's above .830 when facing same-handed pitching, I don't think it would prove much of an issue. Some of this thought process included going against fantasy points with Andrew McCutchen's spot in the batting order for mostly sentimental reasons: the Cubs and Reds already had representatives in this lineup, and McCutchen has been the face of his franchise for so long that he deserves a shot at redemption. Since any bench that includes super utility type Sean Rodriguez is automatically a plus, the one weakness of this team has to be the bullpen after closer Mark Melancon, who is eligible for the NL Central because he spent the majority of his season there before being traded to the Nationals in the NL East. Kevin Siegrist has been a solid lefty option for three out of his four years in the bigs and Raisel Iglesias pitched well as a swingman with closer potential in 2016. But the rest of the relief corps is filled with regression candidates and significant question marks. But then again with a starting rotation this stacked (which is basically World Series winning rotation plus Carlos Martinez of the Cardinals), the bullpen likely has some significant breathing room.

A big factor in why the NL West earns the top spot in the rankings is a whopping five position players who topped the National League as a whole in production at their respective positions. The complete list is: Nolan Arenado (3B), Paul Goldschmidt (1B), Charlie Blackmon (CF), Jean Segura (2B), and Buster Posey (C), although Segura probably deserves an asterisk, since he also spent a significant amount of 2016 at shortstop (where he will presumably play next year in Seattle). Even with that caveat, the West is still the clear leader: the NL Central owns Jonathan Villar at SS and Ryan Braun in RF, while the NL East has just Christian Yelich in LF (with Daniel Murphy filling in at 2B in the unlikely event that Segura is disqualified). Even though the top of this lineup is heavily skewed to Arizona and Colorado, all five teams in the division are represented, thanks to Rookie of the Year Corey Seager of the Dodgers at SS and Wil Myers from San Diego as the DH. And even if you're so backward-thinking as to leave out the DH, Matt Kemp qualified for the West because he spent the majority of his resurgent 2016 season in San Diego before being shipped to Atlanta at the trade deadline.

Even though the West doesn't have the top-scoring NL pitcher (read on to find out who that is), they do have numbers two, three, and six. These are, respectively, Madison Bumgarner and Johnny Cueto of the Giants, and Dodgers ace Clayton Kershaw, who earns the top spot in this team's starting five due to his astronomical points-per-game average, even though he missed the most significant time of his career due to injury in 2016. The last two pitchers in the rotation, Kenta Maeda and Jeff Samardzija, just reinforce how much starting pitching in the NL West was a two-horse race last year. The same can be said about relief pitching in the West, but with the Padres replacing the Giants as the other horse joining Kenley Jansen and the Dodgers, thanks to two breakout lefties from San Diego. I know that it's cheating slightly to put Jon Jay in a bench role, since he started for the Padres until his season ended due to a broken forearm, but with iron gloved Matt Kemp and Carlos Gonzalez in the outfield corners, this team needs all the defensive help it can get.

Despite MVP candidate Freddie Freeman, near-batting-champion Daniel Murphy, and once-and-future superstars Bryce Harper and Yoenis Cespedes, the NL East has the weakest offense of the three National League divisions. I mean, Christian Yelich has a lot of potential, and his possible eventual move to center field is a big plus, since I'm not that high on Odubel Herrera (despite the awesome name - and what are the odds that he's on the same Divisional All-Star team as someone named Asdrubal?). And not that this will impact any proposed simulation involving these rosters, but Wilson Ramos is due to miss some time next year after undergoing knee surgery, and his best backup option, current free agent A.J. Pierzynski, is not only uninspiring offensively, but a polarizing clubhouse figure to boot.

Speaking of players that won't make an impact in any potential simulations, a word has to be said about the tragic death of Jose Fernandez, who would have been this team's number two starter behind overall 2016 fantasy points leader Max Scherzer. I left his name in the document as a monument to his greatness, but I also provided another starter to take over for the Cuban phenom. Fernandez was a rising star who will be missed not only by his family, friends, and Marlins teammates, but by the baseball community as a whole.

On a more positive note, this pitching staff makes up for the lackluster offense with a surplus of aces to go with Scherzer. Noah Syndergaard has emerged as the clear leader of the Mets starting staff after Matt Harvey's injury troubles and Jacob deGrom's regression. Stephen Strasburg pitches behind Scherzer in real life, but he could serve as the ace for most MLB clubs. And their Nationals teammate Tanner Roark could move to the bullpen in a four-man playoff rotation scenario in favor of Julio Teheran who has started for his entire career. Like Wilson Ramos, closer Jeurys Familia will also miss the beginning of the 2017 season, albeit for more sinister reasons. But this team has his real life Mets backup, Addison Reed, ready to fill in. Also ready in the wings is the pitcher who might end up closing games for the real life Nationals if they don't get active on the free agent or trade market, Shawn Kelley.

I haven't run the numbers on this, but I'm pretty sure it's mathematically impossible for the Wild Card Divisional Roster team to finish anything but fourth place out of four in overall fantasy points. Because by design, every player on this team has at least one player at his position who outscored him (possibly more for position players because of the DH spot, many more in the case of pitchers). But despite that, this lineup looks pretty solid overall, including a batting champion (DJ LeMahieu), a home run leader (Chris Carter), and recipients of two of the winter's largest free agent contracts (Dexter Fowler and Justin Turner). Plus, when you look at the contributions on both offense and defense from cornerstones of their respective franchises Starling Marte, Yadier Molina, and Brandon Crawford, you have the makings of a scrappily underrated club. Of course, Carter still hasn't found a home and the Mets can't seem to give Jay Bruce away, but that's mostly due to quirks in the market than any deficiencies in the players themselves (excepting, of course, Bruce's struggles down the stretch last year).

This team clearly would have looked stronger with Julio Teheran atop the starting rotation instead of Dan Straily (a recent addition to the NL's All-Acquired roster), but that's obviously the least significant effect of the Jose Fernandez situation. As it stands, Straily will join fellow All-Acquired rotation mate Bartolo Colon, qualifying offer recipient Jeremy Hellickson, and Drew Pomeranz (who qualifies for the NL due to spending more time (and pitching better) with the Padres than the Red Sox last year) as the top options in a playoff rotation. Interestingly enough, lefty Travis Wood, who rounds out this team's bullpen, could potentially return to starting next year, but he would be unlikely to unseat any of the regular starters. OH also, looking at this team's bench, the presence of David Ross is obviously a historical anachronism, since the beloved backstop retired after helping his Cubs win the World Series last year, but I've already taken the screenshot (which shows that Google Docs does not recognize the abbreviations for Relief Pitcher or the Cincinnati Reds), so I'm not going to go back and fix it. He should have been replaced by Diamondbacks backup Chris Herrmann, who actually outscored Ross in terms of fantasy points (548 to 533), but who lacked the requisite 200 AB to merit official consideration on these lists.


Stay tuned for the Divisional All-Stars for the American League!

Developed World Series Teams 2016

When writing an email, have you ever MEANT to click "Save as Draft," but instead you clicked "Send?" Something very similar happened to me this past Wednesday on this very blog, when I wrote the title of this post about Developed World Series Teams 2017, then quickly clicked the wrong button before going about the rest of my day. Seeing as three people have already looked at this blank post in bewilderment over the last three days, I suppose I'd better follow through on what I was going to write.

Developed Teams are probably my second favorite of the various baseball rosters project that I do, finishing behind Astrology Teams, just ahead of Divisional All-Stars and All-Acquired Teams, and well ahead of Hometown Teams. As a refresher, players get assigned to a particular developed team if they spent their formative years in that team's minor league system. A team does not have to draft or sign a player to an amateur deal to count as that player's developed team, although I've found that that's usually the case. Nor does it matter with which team a player makes his big league debut, although I do stop each player's "developed clock," so to speak, as soon as he hits the majors for the first time.

I don't like to rehash this project too frequently, because things don't tend to change too much year over year. And while I last devoted significant time to the project after the 2015 season, where I covered roughly 1/3 of the league, I figured it might be fun to see how this year's World Series would have gone if it featured the developed versions of the participating teams. (Ignoring, of course, that if all 30 teams played a full developed SEASON, it's unlikely that the Cubs and Indians would face each other, but you get the point.) One more point: these charts were compiled at the close of the 2016 season, so any offseason transactions will not be covered.

So without further ado, on to the lists, batters first, organized not by a projected batting order, but rather by position on the diamond, from 2 thru 9 + DH (yes, each team gets a DH, deal with it), regardless of each player's primary position in 2016:

The first thing you might notice about the Developed Cubs 2016 roster is that, much like their real life 2016 counterparts, they are carrying three catchers. Well, the FIRST thing you notice is probably the sheer offensive prowess of NL MVP Kris Bryant, and the not-unimpressive performance of NL batting champ DJ LeMahieu. But if you start looking at the Position column, you'll probably notice the three catchers, which is easier to do when one such player (2016 rookie and #2 prospect in the Cubs organization Willson Contreras) is also your starting left fielder. It's also easier to do when you have a player like Marwin Gonzalez on the roster, who will likely take over first base from Justin Bour against lefties, but function as a super utility type the rest of the time. Speaking of that first base platoon, neither Bour nor Gonzalez debuted with Chicago, as evidenced by the * in their "Developed Team" column at the far left. But looking at their pre-MLB careers leaves no doubt which team they belong to: they each played more than 500 minor league games in the Cubs system, compared to just one season with the teams who acquired them and called them up for the first time.

Before moving on, a quick note on the color coding of certain columns. A Green field in the Position 1 column indicates that player had rookie eligibility in 2016, while Green in the Position 2 column denotes a new addition to my database prior to the 2016 season. If a player's Rank is highlighted Red, that means his rank in MLB's preseason player rater has been trending down over the course of the offseason. Even though there are none of the following examples in the Cubs' batters chart, a player whose rank was trending up receives a Green highlight, while a player who was added to MLB's list after it was first published gets a Purple highlight. And for the Name columns, a Yellow highlight indicates an offseason acquisition while a Cyan highlight goes with a player who was traded midseason. Color coding for the Astrology Sign and Contract Status columns should be self explanatory.

It's clear that this lineup kind of falls apart if Victor Martinez isn't able to suit up at first base every day. There's still plenty of pop without him: Francisco Lindor is a budding star, Jason Kipnis is a force either at the top or in the middle of the lineup, and Jose Ramirez had a breakout season in 2016 (while adding some defensive versatility). But Cleveland has such little depth that the next first base option on the depth chart is Jesus Aguilar, who amassed a whopping -7 points in the big leagues in 2016. It should be noted that third catcher Chris Gimenez has played a little first in the minors, but his bat barely plays behind the plate, let alone at the spot where you want your top offensive contributor. Yes, this roster also has three catchers too, but that's largely due to the aforementioned lack of depth at other positions. Plus, Tony Wolters has enough offensive potential to serve as a decent DH, while also logging some innings in the infield.

The developed Cubs rotation is a reminder of how crucial shrewd trades and timely free agent signings are to building a real life major league pitching staff: the only member of Chicago's World Series winning rotation who they technically developed (Kyle Hendricks) only made his way to the franchise via trade (from the Rangers for Ryan Dempster). Three of Hendricks's other four rotation mates pitched for the actual Cubs in some degree: Jeff Samardzija rather effectively as both a reliever and a starter, Rich Hill had about 1.5 strong seasons' worth of good innings over his first four years in the bigs, and Andrew Cashner didn't develop into a starter until he was traded to the Padres (in the deal that brought Anthony Rizzo to Chicago). Ricky Nolasco (who jumped straight from the Cubs' farm system to the Marlins' big club after his 2005 trade) wasn't really on anybody's radar prior to 2016, until he rebuilt his value after a midseason trade with 11 solid starts for the Angels.

The biggest weakness of this team by far is the bullpen. Not only do they lack a proven closer, but you could actually make a case that the pitcher who had the most successful 2016 season (Carl Edwards Jr.) actually belongs to the developed Texas Rangers. (Edwards threw more minor league innings in the Texas system, but he has more minor league appearances in Chicago, where he was converted to a full time reliever in 2015.) In fact, Edwards, Blake Parker, and swingman Chris Rusin are the only members of this relief corps who have actually suited up for the Cubs in real life. And hard throwing Tony Zych didn't even end the 2016 season on the Mariners' active roster, despite the somewhat antiquated tradition of September Call Ups. Unless some minor league reinforcements are on the way in the near future, this team could be in for some nerve wracking late leads.

Unlike the Cubs, 80% of the developed Indians rotation has played a significant role for the team's real-life equivalent. Veterans Bartolo Colon and CC Sabathia both debuted in Cleveland and combined for over 2,500 innings and four All-Star appearances for the team over more than a decade between them. Colon was with the team from 1997 to 2002, Sabathia from 2001 to 2007, and both saw their Indians tenures come to an end via a blockbuster trade.  Meanwhile, Danny Salazar and Josh Tomlin figure to make 2/5ths of the Tribe's starting rotation in 2017 after performing admirably in the 2016 postseason. And although well-heralded prospect Drew Pomeranz didn't pitch for Cleveland's big club, he was the centerpiece in the trade that netted the team Ubaldo Jimenez, who was a pitcher who pitched for the Indians for a number of years. Notably, one of these pitchers (likely Sabathia) would likely be replaced by knuckleballer Steven Wright (who spent five seasons in Cleveland's minor league system before heading to the Red Sox), were it not for Boston manager John Farrell's foolish pinch running decision late in the 2016 season. Wright's hypothetical roster spot would go to Cody Anderson, who would join Ryan Merritt in a long relief / swingman role.

This team is also pretty much the polar opposite of Chicago in terms of shutdown bullpen arms, as the developed Indians employ no fewer than three (3) relievers who closed for a significant portion of 2016. Cody Allen course serves as the team's current closer, assuming manager Terry Francona continues to utilize Andrew Miller in the multi-inning middle-relief role in which he excelled during the 2016 postseason. Jeanmar Gomez finished games for the 2016 Phillies, although no one seems to be particularly bullish on the prospects of him holding onto that privilege going forward. And Hector Rondon (a Rule 5 pick, which means by definition that he didn't spend ANY time in the minors for his new team before making his debut) was the Cubs' go-to for saves from 2014 thru the first half of 2016, when Joe Maddon suddenly lost faith in any reliever not named Aroldis Chapman. The weak link in this bullpen is clearly former Phillies minor league lefty Elvis Araujo, who is an injury replacement for the much more accomplished Zach Putnam.


So there you have it: developed rosters for the 2016 World Series participants. Who do you think would have won the Fall Classic if these were the teams that took the field last October? Sound off in the comments and stay tuned for more posts with actual words this time!