Who's Who?

So, since I'm delaying this week's power rankings until later in the week, let's take a different approach to looking at the teams this weekend. Instead of listing them one through thirty, I'vesplit them up into thirteen different categories to show where the teams currently stand.

Legit Contenders: Boston Red Sox, Philadelphia Phillies, Chicago Cubs

These three teams have everything it takes to win the World Series: highly dangerous offenses, at least one legit ace, solid arms rounding out the rotation, stable bullpens and lights-out closers. Each has suffered a significant injury at some point this season -- Boston is currently dealing with the lack of David Ortiz's bat, the Cubs are without Alfonso Soriano's bat for the second time and the Phillies have seen Jimmy Rollins, Jayson Werth and Shane Victorino all suffer through a stint on the disabled list. But through it all, these teams haven't skipped a beat, having beaten all the teams that matter -- those within their own division. Barring some sort of catastrophic collapse, you would be very safe putting your money down on any of these three teams winning the Series.

Darkhorse: Los Angeles Angels

The Angels are a mystery team at this point. The depth their offense has, specifically in the outfield is absolutely filthy; and the addition of Jon Garland has been enough to cover the loss of Kelvim Escobar for the season. The surprising thing has been their offense is on pace to score less than 700 runs in a division that isn't exactly lighting up the league with pitching dominance. Garret Anderson and Gary Matthews struggles haven't helped matters any, but with Casey Kotchman, Howie Kendrick and Chone Figgins all carrying their weight, they could become a very dangerous team if they can get everyone clicking on all cylinders.

Too Young?: Tampa Bay Rays, Arizona Diamondbacks

I'm not saying these two teams are too young to go the distance, just they may still be a season away from entering the upper echelon. Sure, the D'backs unfortunately ran into the juggernaut that was last season's Rockies in the playoffs, but they still posted a pythagorean record under .500 for the season. The good news is this year's offense has gelled much better than last season's, even with the struggles of Eric Byrnes and their bench. Their true strength lies in the pitching staff, however, which is as strong top-to-bottom as any in baseball. The Rays are at a point this season where Arizona was last year. They are very young, just starting to get the feel for playing with each other every day, and are probably at least a year or two away from being able to be legit contenders to Boston and the AL East crown. If James Shields, Scott Kazmir and Matt Garza can stay healthy and Dan Wheeler can emerge into the closer everyone expects him to be, it may not matter how long it takes their offense come together, however.

Waiting to Make Their Move: Los Angeles Dodgers, Cleveland Indians

Both the Indians and Dodgers have been slow out of the gate, but there's no reason to doubt they will be able to put it all together and get on a role that propels them into the top of their division. Even with injuries to Rafael Furcal, Nomar Garciaparra and Andruw Jones, LA has the depth to at least tread water until everyone is healthy and on the same page. Not only that, but should the time come for a deal to be made, they have a number of veterans who can be moved -- Juan Pierre, Garciaparra and Mark Sweeney to name a few. Cleveland just has to wake their bats up, because their pitching depth is just absurd. With the power output from Victor Martinez, Travis Hafner, Ryan Garko and Franklin Gutierrez all well below their expectations, it's only a matter of time before those bats explode and they are able to make their move in the very weak AL Central.

Waiting to Fade: St. Louis Cardinals, Chicago White Sox

The White Sox and Cardinals are two prime examples of teams who have been playing well over their heads and are destined to fall off the table completely. Sure, Chicago has some really good pitching, but their lineup is aging, their bench is borderline pathetic and any team lead by Ozzie Guillen is always one step away from self-destruction. The Cardinals are a team that could have one of those catastrophic 25-50 runs down the stretch where the wheels just completely fall off. There is no true justification for how they are playing right now, and their hodge-podge approach to their pitching staff is just laughable. I truly feel for any team which has to rely on Todd Wellemeyer, Braden Looper and Joel Pineiro combining for over half of the club's starts.

No Surprises: Florida Marlins, Minnesota Twins, Oakland Athletics

Year-in and year-out, these three franchises just keep on with the same lather-rinse-repeat process... Build-up talent, trade for twice the depth, develop, win baseball games. It doesn't matter who they lose, they somehow manager to at least stay competitive and make life hell for their division-mates. The Marlins lose Dontrelle Willis and Miguel Cabrera, and are still a force in the NL East. The Twins lose Johan Santana and Torii Hunter, and remain right on the edge of contention in the AL Central. And the Athletics lose Dan Haren, Nick Swisher and Shannon Stewart, and keep winning ballgames. It just defies the odds. Every season they restock their farm system without an abundance of ML-ready talent and are still better than almost half the league. The truly scary thing is, we all know the Willis/Cabrera deal with Detroit almost did more to guarantee Florida a World Series in the next five years than the Tigers.

Right in the Middle: Toronto Blue Jays, Milwaukee Brewers

They aren't horrible. They aren't great. They aren't likely to win a division title or wild card. They won't be buying or selling at the trade deadline. There really isn't anything that jumps out about their future, but there present isn't so bad to completely write them off. The bottom line is, they are just sorta there. If Major League baseball were an album, they wouldn't be the radio-friendly singles, nor would they be the staples of the live show the diehard fans demand. They would be the filler tracks that just get lost in the middle of the album, probably never cracking a live setlist.

Not Enough Pitching: Texas Rangers, Houston Astros

Vicente Padilla. Shawn Chacon. Brian Moehler. Brandon Backe. Sidney Ponson. Jason Jennings. These are the pitchers who aren't Roy Oswalt and Kevin Millwood. It doesn't matter if you have prolific offensive firepower lead by Lance Berkman and Josh Hamilton, if you are trotting out those pitchers every other day, you are not going to win games. It's been a problem that has plagued the Rangers for almost a decade, and the Astros since the dynamic duo of Andy Pettite and Roger Clemens left town.

Tough Luck: Detroit Tigers, Atlanta Braves

One team was an almost unanimous selection to run the table (Detroit) and the other was everyone's darkhorse favorite to win the Series in late March (Atlanta). And here we are, mid-June, and neither team has so much as caught a whiff of first place. Injuries have absolutely decimated both of these clubs. Just look at some of the names which have lost time because of injuries: (DET) Zumaya, Rodney, Willis, Granderson, Sheffield, Bonderman; (ATL) Hampton, Smoltz, Gonzalez, Soriano, Moylan, Glavine, Diaz, Kotsay. Put those fourteen players together on one team, and you've got a World Series contender. Instead, you've got two teams who are doing everything they can to stay afloat and try to make something happen before their season goes up in flames. This was a widely predicted WS matchup as camp broke in late March, but now it's looking more and more like two teams who are going to fight just to make the .500 mark before the season's end.

No Direction: New York Yankees, San Francisco Giants, New York Mets

I've talked endlessly about how the Yankees are a club that completely lacks direction, but the Giants and Mets are almost equally as bad. All three of these clubs have essentially seen their farm systems implode over the past few seasons; be it through one-sided trades or just bad scouting; don't quite know what to do with all the over-the-hill players they are still paying a significant amount of money to; and are generally lost as to what they should do at this point. The Mets have the core of David Wright, Carlos Beltran and Jose Reyes to piece together with John Maine and Santana, but little to nothing else. Everything else they have is skeletons of former elite players, veteran fringe players and the leftover remains of their wrecked minor league system. Sounds a lot like the Yanks. They've got a great core of early-thirties superstars (A-Rod, Jeter, Matsui and Abreu) to go along with some youngsters who are loaded with potential (Wang, Cano, Chamberlain) but are crippled at this point by the likes of Giambi, Damon, Posada, Mussina and Pettite. As for the Giants, it is going to take them probably at least a decade to recover from the hangover of the Barroid-era. There isn't a team in the Majors who wouldn't give up every prospect they have for Tim Lincecum, Matt Cain and Brian Wilson, but with Omar Vizquel, Randy Winn, Rich Aurillia, Ray Durham and the crippling contracts of Aaron Rowand and Barry Zito, those three young guns aren't going to be much help.

Youthful Experience: Washington Nationals, Cincinnati Reds

The Nationals and Reds both fall under this category for different reasons. Outside of Tampa, the Reds have the best core group of young talent in baseball. With Joey Votto, Brandon Phillips, Jay Bruce, Johnny Cueto and Edinson Volquez pieced together with Adam Dunn, Aaron Harang and Bronson Arroyo, there isn't any reason why the Reds shouldn't be a perennial contender for years to come. This years is just going to have to be a throwaway season why the youngsters cut their teeth at the bigs and everyone gets comfortable playing for the managerial incompetent known as Dusty Baker. In Washington, it's just a case of getting a group of young talent comfortable with each other and their own abilities. Almost all of them -- from Ryan Zimmerman to Elijah Dukes to Lastings Milledge to Austin Kearns -- have shown what they can do, it's just a matter of bringing all these personalities together and getting them to mesh. There is also an abundance of fine young arms in the nation's capital, which includes Shawn Hill, John Lannan, Jay Bergmann, Matt Chico and Joel Hanrahan who are all ready to contribute.

The Usual Suspects: Kansas City Royals, Baltimore Orioles, Pittsburgh Pirates

Does anything really need to be said here? These three are the anti-everything that Minnesota, Florida and Oakland have become. They are all completely incompetent and incapable of putting a winning product on the field. Even with an outfield of Nick Markakis, Luke Scott and Adam Jones, the Orioles are still going nowhere in the AL East. The Royals and Pirates are the perfect models for why contraction still may not be the worst idea.

Scraping the Botton: San Diego Padres, Seattle Mariners, Colorado Rockies

And here we are, the worst of the worst. Why these three at the end instead of the ones directly above? Well, it is completely expected of Kansas City, Baltimore and Pittsburgh to take a fat crap in the middle of the diamond every night. Not exactly so with the Padres, Mariners and Rockies. I heavily criticized Seattle and Colorado during the off-season, but the Padres have no reason to be where they currently are. Sure, they play in a park the land mass equivalent of the Sahara Desert, but with a rotation of Jake Peavy, Chris Young, Greg Maddux and Randy Wolf -- all injuries aside -- if you are capable of putting three runs per game on the board, you should be contending. As for Seattle, why they continue to put stock into Richie Sexson and Adrian Beltre is anyone's guess. Like I said after the deal was made, Adam Jones meant a hell of a lot more to their offense than Erik Bedard does their pitching staff. At this rate, they'll be lucky to score sixty games, and while their rotation has still crapped the bed, an offense that averages more than four runs per game could still keep them competitive. And then there's Colorado... They weren't that good last season. It's true. They were barely a .500 team in a very weak league last season, but they got hot at the right time. They were ten games under at one point, but as we've all learned, it's just about timing. And getting a botched call at the plate to go your way in game #163 doesn't hurt either. And this year they get absolutely decimated by injuries to every key contributor for that stretch run. Hope you enjoyed it, Colorado, it's gonna be a while before you feel Rocktober again.