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MLB finally nixes All-Star Game determining World Series home-field advantage

When looking back at Bud Selig’s legacy as commissioner of Major League Baseball, there are plenty of additions and innovations to the game for which he’ll be credited. Expanding to three divisions per league, for example. Adding wild card teams to the postseason. The wave of new ballparks being built throughout MLB. One stain on […]

End of season post-mortem: 2016 Washington Nationals

Though it was surely foolish to think that any sort of window had closed on the Washington Nationals and their chances of winning a World Series, the team had failed to fulfill championship expectations during the past three seasons. Even worse, the New York Mets appeared to have overtaken the Nats as the best team […]

End of season post-mortem: 2016 Boston Red Sox

After emerging from the pile-up at the top of the AL East, the Boston Red Sox looked like a potential World Series team with a potent lineup, a good bullpen and a starting rotation led by one of the best pitchers in baseball. The storylines practically wrote themselves. How great would a Red Sox-Cubs World […]

End of season post-mortem: 2016 Texas Rangers

The postseason wasn’t supposed to go like this for the Texas Rangers. The Houston Astros may have looked like the new hotness in the AL West, but the Rangers were defending division champions and eventually asserted themselves as the best team in the American League. Time for a return to the World Series, right? Well… […]

End of season post-mortem: 2016 New York Mets

The chances of making it to a second consecutive postseason did not look good for the New York Mets. As of Aug. 19, the team was third in the NL East behind the Washington Nationals and Miami Marlins, while also 5.5 games in the wild-card standings and two teams ahead of them. Yet despite that […]

End of season post-mortem: 2016 St. Louis Cardinals

Winning the NL Central probably wasn’t going to happen for the St. Louis Cardinals in 2016. Not with the rival Chicago Cubs assembling a juggernaut at the top of the division with eyes on a World Series championship. But the Cardinals always compete for a postseason spot and have proven that just getting into the […]

End of season post-mortem: 2016 Houston Astros

The Houston Astros certainly looked like one of MLB’s teams of the future last season, with several developing players emerging as stars. Houston made the jump from up-and-comer to contender, and aimed at further improvement in 2016. But following up on breakout success can be a difficult task for a young team. Would players continue […]

End of season post-mortem: 2016 Oakland Athletics

The Oakland Athletics weren’t expected to contend for an AL West title or wild card spot in 2016, based mostly on the competition they faced within their division. The Texas Rangers, Houston Astros and Seattle Mariners all looked like potential contenders, while the A’s were building for the future and likely to spin off veteran […]

End of season post-mortem: 2016 Cincinnati Reds

With preseason expectations to be the worst team in baseball, the Cincinnati Reds have to be at least somewhat happy with at least not being that. Unless, of course, they really wanted that No. 1 draft pick. There isn’t much to get excited about with a 62-84 season (although they’ve already won enough to avoid a […]

Getting Aroldis Chapman settles season-long question for Cubs, boosts club morale

Getting Aroldis Chapman was the trade the Chicago Cubs had to make. Had the Cubs not acquired the rocket-launching left-hander from the New York Yankees (though Andrew Miller would have certainly sufficed) or ended up settling for a lesser reliever, doubts and questions would linger around the team throughout August and September, and into October. Going back […]

Cubs at Nationals looks like mid-June NLCS preview

Monday night at Nationals Park, the two best teams in baseball match up in a three-game series. The Chicago Cubs and Washington Nationals face each other for the second time this season and have the top two records in the National League. (Over in the AL, the Texas Rangers have the same 39-24 record as […]

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