The State of the AL Central Moving Forward

The Royals are pretty clear the fourth best team in the division, at best, right now. But how does it look for the next few years?

With the schedule becoming more balanced in 2023 and beyond in order to fit games against all other 29 teams on every team’s schedule, the division matters a bit less. Every team will play 24 fewer games against their division opponents starting this season. The teams are still competing against each other for first place among the five. The possibility remains that four teams in one division could win 95+ games while a division winner from another could reach the playoffs with a pedestrian 84-78 record or something of the like.

Because of this, it’s important to know where your opponents stand, both in the near-term and long term. And while the Royals are deserving of their likely projected fourth or fifth place finish in 2023, I wonder a bit what they’re up against over the next few seasons. Let’s go team by team alphabetically.

Chicago White Sox

2022 Record: 81-81
Last Five Years Record: 343-364
BA Midseason 2022 Farm Ranking: 24
MLB Pipeline Midseason 2022 Farm Ranking: 26

It sure looked like the White Sox were on the road to being a problem for at least the near future when they followed up their 35-25 2020 with a 93-win 2021. Their offensive core coming into 2022 featured a nice combination of young and veteran talent alike and their rotation was headlined by three righties who could all be dominant and all were 27 or younger. Oh and they had Lance Lynn, who had turned into one of the better starters in baseball as well. What happened? A lot and it wasn’t pretty.

They ended up with the worst walk rate in baseball, the fifth-lowest ISO and simply didn’t score enough runs. Only three players played in more than 130 games and two left as free agents this past winter. They went out and signed Andrew Benintendi to a $75 million contract, which represented the most money they’ve ever spent on a player to shore up the lineup, but for a team looking to hit for more power, that’s a bit of a curious move. And for a team in the third-biggest market in the country, the fact that the biggest contract ever is less than the biggest contract the Royals have handed out is kind of crazy.

I appreciate what they’ve done with their coaching staff. I believe the Royals giving the managerial job to Mike Matheny over Pedro Grifol is one of the bigger mistakes they’ve made. Hopefully they corrected it fast enough with Matheny’s firing and the ultimate hiring of Matt Quatraro that it’s a footnote, but their mistake was the gain of the White Sox. I think the team will benefit quite a bit, but they need to find more health and, at this point, they’re counting a bit too much on that and on some guys bouncing back from iffy at best seasons.

Their farm system isn’t going to be much help to them in 2023 outside of Oscar Colas and maybe Lenyn Sosa, though Colson Montgomery could move and he’s pretty interesting. Their pitching staff looks solid in 2023, but I wonder how long it’ll sustain. Lance Lynn, Lucas Giolito and Mike Clevinger can all be free agents after the year, though they do hold a club option on Lynn. And their bullpen took a hit with the sad news that Liam Hendriks is fighting cancer. It’s hard to think about things like that in baseball terms, but it’s a tough break for them on the field.

It wouldn’t surprise me too much if this club went out and won 90 games in 2023, but I wonder a little how much they can sustain over the next few seasons. They do theoretically have some very real money to spend in the coming seasons with very little guaranteed money on the books beyond 2024, so if they’re willing to spend to supplement, they could remain competitive, but that remains to be seen. I think they’re a team that will likely hang around just about every year, but they can be beaten.

Cleveland Guardians

2022 Record: 92-70
Last Five Years Record: 391-317
BA Midseason 2022 Farm Ranking: 3
MLB Pipeline Midseason 2022 Farm Ranking: 3

The Guardians are young, already good and super smart. And while they don’t spend much, they have at least shown a willingness to spend on players to keep them around at times. Jose Ramirez was extended right before the season started in 2022 for seven years and $141 million. They gave Edwin Encarnacion three years and $60 million and Nick Swisher four years and $56 million at one point too. Plus, they just announced a new minority owner in the middle of the season last year who is going to ultimately become the majority owner and that could usher in a new era of spending for them as well.

They are a force to be reckoned with because they just keep churning out pitching that keeps them competitive. Their 80-82 record in 2021 was their first losing season since 2012. They responded to that by hiring Terry Francona and their 80-82 record coincided with him missing a lot of the season for health reasons. So it at least makes the question reasonable of how much of their success is because of his managing prowess? I think the answer is certainly some and it wouldn’t be too terribly surprising to see him move on in the near future, which provides some hope for the rest of the division. But I also question just how much impact Francona has on getting stellar performances from guys like Cal Quantrill. That’s on the pitching development side, which doesn’t appear to be going anywhere.

And even when Shane Bieber leaves for greener pastures, they’ll be able to fill in with Triston McKenzie, who is already a big leaguer, as well as Daniel Espino and Gavin Williams, two of their top prospects who both look like they can find the big leagues in 2023. They showed some signs of being more than pitching in 2022 as well. While they were merely middle of the pack in runs scored, that’s enough with their pitching. They were the hardest team in baseball to strike out, which helped them a bit to make up for their lack of power. I’m not entirely sure where the power is going to come from in 2023 with their big acquisition being Josh Bell, who had a .156 ISO in 2022, but their top position player prospect, George Valera appears to be just about ready and he can mash.

The Guardians may not be the team everyone is chasing every single year, but in the long-term, they appear to be the class of the division and don’t look like they’ll be slowing down any time soon. That said, if they don’t spend and run into some bad luck with their prospect development and/or injuries, it could open up a window sort of like we saw in 2013-2015 that allowed the Royals to slip around them for a couple of years. If I had to guess, I’d say Cleveland wins three of the next five division titles.

Detroit Tigers

2022 Record: 66-96
Last Five Years Record: 277-328
BA Midseason 2022 Farm Ranking: 27
MLB Pipeline Midseason 2022 Farm Ranking: 22

The Tigers thought they were ready to take a big step. They won 77 games in 2021, but did that with a 68-61 finish to the season. They had young pitching, an improving offense and they believed they had the manager in place in AJ Hinch. So they spent some big money before 2022. They signed Javy Baez to a six-year, $140 million contract. He had a 90 wRC+. They gave Eduardo Rodriguez five years and $77 million. He was fair and only made 17 starts and threw 91 innings. They traded for Austin Meadows. He played 36 games. They gave Jonathan Schoop a two-year extension toward the end of 2021. He hit .202/.239/.322.

And all that young pitching? Casey Mize had Tommy John in June. Tarik Skubal went down with a flexor tendon injury in August. Spencer Turnbull just got back from Tommy John. Matt Manning dealt with shoulder issues and wasn’t especially good. So they signed Matthew Boyd back to a $10 million deal for one year and signed Michael Lorenzen for $8.5 million. They did not expect to be supplementing their rotation like that, I don’t think. But I don’t think it’s all bad news.

Their farm system ranks poorly, but part of that is similar to the Royals, because of graduations. Riley Greene is in the big leagues and showed flashes. Spencer Torkelson was largely terrible, but I talked to a scout toward the end of last season who still thinks he’ll hit plenty. They have some other arms like Wilmer Flores and Ty Madden who are relatively close and Ryan Kreidler showed he could maybe big a big league regular with some flashes in 2022. Plus, Baez finished the year much better, hitting .268/.310/.413 after the break and .290/.326/.481 in his last 34 games. Meadows had a brutal year in every sense of the word last year, but he was an above-average hitter in 2021 and was a borderline star-level hitter in 2019. He could bounce back in a big way too.

The tough 2022 led to a big change in leadership for them as they let Al Avila go and brought in Scott Harris. I’m not sure if that’s a great move or just a middling one, to be honest. He came in with some fanfare after he served as the Giants’ GM and oversaw their 107-win season in 2021, but he also oversaw their 29-31 2020 season and most of their 81-81 2022 season. Plus, it’s fair to wonder how much credit/blame goes to Farhan Zaidi and how much goes to him. I like what Harris has done this winter with some smart trades of relievers that appear to have brought back some pretty solid value. He’s well-regarded, so I tend to believe it’s a smart hire that isn’t great news for the Royals, but we’ll see on that.

I think what would worry me about the Tigers if I’m another AL Central team is that they have the leadership in place in the dugout and there’s a pretty good chance they have it in the front office. Add to it that they’ve shown a willingness to spend some money and you can see how they could be a problem if they can just get over that hump. Even though things have been sour for them lately, it wouldn’t be a shock at all if they’re contending more often than not over the next five seasons.

Minnesota Twins

2022 Record: 78-84
Last Five Years Record: 366-342
BA Midseason 2022 Farm Ranking: 25
MLB Pipeline Midseason 2022 Farm Ranking: 23

I just don’t know about the Twins. They won a bunch of games in 2019 and 2020 and looked like they were going to be good in 2021, but just…weren’t. The ball was less juiced and so was their offense, but the real issue in 2021 was their pitching because the offense was still fine. When they fell out of the race, they traded Jose Berrios, who I kept predicting would win a Cy Young and he kept being a perfectly solid starter. Kenta Maeda got hurt and JA Happ was terrible before they traded him. They did get back Joe Ryan for Nelson Cruz and got a chance to see Bailey Ober in the big leagues, but it just wasn’t good enough.

To their credit, they went out before last season and addressed the rotation a bit. They acquired Sonny Gray, which was good, but also signed Dylan Bundy and Chris Archer which netted about as much excitement as watching mall walkers. They pitched better, but the results were basically the same, even after signing Carlos Correa. And that’s an interesting name to bring up here because they got him again as he tried a third time to sign a long-term deal this offseason. So they’ve shown they’re willing to spend money with a big deal for him and one for Buxton last winter. My question is where do they go from here?

Brooks Lee is a heck of a prospect and Royce Lewis, if he can ever stay healthy, at least looks the part. But who else? I know they like Simeon Woods Richardson and Louie Varland and Matt Canterino, but the system isn’t terribly impressive to me. I look at their roster and I like their lineup, I think their rotation looks perfectly fine and their bullpen should be solid enough. But they won 78 games last year and 73 the year before. I’m not sure I see a 90-win team without some things happening that just don’t seem likely to happen for them.

And I’m also not sure I see that moving forward. I think Derek Falvey and Thad Levine are creative and I like Rocco Baldelli more than many Twins fans, it seems, but this doesn’t feel like an organization with a ton of upside. If they went out and got a big-time starting pitcher, I’d feel a lot better about their chances because I think their offense is good enough, but they haven’t shown a real willingness to do that, instead banking on guys like Gray and Tyler Mahle to do what Berrios could never do for them. The Twins feel like a team that will always have a shot, but will rarely capitalize on it over the next few seasons.

So what about the Royals?

2022 Record: 65-97
Last Five Years Record: 282-426
BA Midseason 2022 Farm Ranking: 30
MLB Pipeline Midseason 2022 Farm Ranking: 21

I guess we’ll see. The Royals and the Tigers are very similar, only the Royals haven’t had the young pitcher injuries. They’ve had plenty of ineffectiveness, which I’m not sure if that’s better or worse than injuries. I think the 2023 season and subsequent winter will tell us a lot about the future of the Royals. Looking at the lineup, I see a lot of young hitters who could be a group of impact bats in the near future. Maybe Brian Sweeney is exactly what guys like Daniel Lynch and Kris Bubic and Jonathan Heasley and all the other young pitchers need. We just don’t know.

If you told me today that the Royals and Tigers would be battling the Guardians for the 2025 AL Central title, I’d believe you. If you told me that they’d be battling to avoid the basement in 2025, I’d believe you. I want to see improvement in 2023 and then I want to see a willingness to supplement the roster when they have a better idea of what they have and what they need. I feel comfortable with the offensive development plan in the minors, but both need to see more at the big league level to be 100 percent bought in and need to see results on the pitching side. I know they’ve made changes in their approach based on things I’ve heard from people both in and out of the organization but with so few names changing, I’ll need to really see it to believe it.

I believe the Royals absolutely can compete in the division over the next five years. The Guardians are the class and will be tough to catch but not impossible. The rest feel like they could go either way and that gives the Royals (and the other three teams) every opportunity to seize some postseason chances.

There are financial behemoths in the AL East alongside development behemoths. In the AL West, there’s the Astros juggernaut plus what the Mariners are building along with the Rangers and Angels willing to spend tons of money and the A’s finding their way to being good for a few years at a time. In the NL East, there are multiple monsters. In the NL West, the Dodgers rule, but it’s hard to argue with the Giants ability to spend or the Padres willingness.

The AL Central (and the NL Central as well, to some extent if the Cubs aren’t spending big) is the division that can be won. If I had to guess, I’d say that the Guardians will have the most wins from 2024 to 2028, but after that, it’s really kind of a hodge-podge to me. I’d probably go White Sox, Twins, Royals, Tigers after that, but no order would truly surprise me.

That’s kind of why I’m okay with the Royals taking stock in 2023 and why I’ve said so many times that if they do this again next winter, I will not be happy with their choices. I truly believe the Royals have the offensive pieces in place to compete if they can figure out their pitching. Whether that’s Brady Singer, Daniel Lynch and Alec Marsh (or whoever) at the top or they find out this year they have to go out and get Lucas Giolito or Aaron Nola or Luis Severino or whoever it might be to fill it out, they need to do it. Because this division can be won with a core of Bobby Witt Jr., Vinnie Pasquantino, MJ Melendez, Singer and others. The future isn’t that bright in the division and every team should be looking to pounce on that.