Guest Author - Teague Frantz
With Spring training only a few weeks away it is time to start getting ready for the crack of the bat. Many players have changed teams. Managers have been fired. Managers have been hired. If you have taken some time off or missed some of your favorite teams transactions and movements over the offseason, fear not, in the coming weeks I will profile each team in the league. One division a week until all thirty teams are covered. So without further ado lets get started with the American League East.
The New York Yankees were relatively quiet until the Free agent signing of Johnny Damon. They have also added Octavio Dotel, Kyle Farnsworth, Ron Villone, Mike Myers, and Kelly Stinnett. On the flip side their biggest loss has to be Tom Gordon. The other players lost are Kevin Brown, Ruben Sierra, John Flaherty, Alan Embree, Tino Martinez, Rey Sanchez, Matt Lawton, Tony Womack, Mark Bellhorn, and Felix Rodriguez.
The Boston Red Sox have lost a lot this year and not gained too much. On the additions side they have added J.T. Snow, John Flaherty, Rudy Seanez, and Julian Tavarez. The losses look much bigger headlined by the loss of Johnny Damon. Other players moving onto other teams include Chad Bradford, Adam Hyzdu, Matt Mantei, Bill Mueller, Mike Myers, Matt Perisho, and Mike Stanton.
The Toronto Blue Jays have made a few key additions and not lost much. The biggest addition is AJ Burnett.Other key additions include BJ Ryan, Jason Phillips, and Ben Weber. The key losses were Frank Menechino, Ken Huckaby, and Desi Relaford.
The Baltimore Orioles key additions include Jeff Conine, Corey Patterson and Ramon Hernandez. Their key losses include Sammy Sosa, BJ Ryan, Kurt Ainsworth, James Baldwin, Rick Bauer, Eric Byrnes, Bernie Castro, Jason Grimsley, Eli Marrero, Rafael Palmiero, Steve Reed, and BJ Surhoff.
The Tampa Bay Devil Rays have key additions of Sean Burroughs, Josh Paul, Shinji Mori, and Ty Wigginton. Their key losses are Roberto Alomar, Joe Borowski, Lance Carter, Alek Gonzalez, Charles Johnson, Trever Miller, Eduardo Perez, and Mike Rose.
In all these five teams made many key additions and had many key losses. Toronto and The Yankees being the biggest winners and Boston being the biggest losers. How will the Division turn out? That is why the games are played. One thing is for sure, this will be a great division to watch. It will be a tight race all the way to the end. Stay tuned as next time I will rundown the American League Central.
