FanHouse DanWheeler

MLB Power Rankings: Where MLB FanHouse's editors, writers and bloggers team up to break down the who's who and the what's what in the baseball world.

We had to break the trend. Sure, the Dodgers might have a better record than everyone else -- but competition has to count for something, doesn't it? The Dodgers have mutilated the mediocre-at-best NL West to the tune of 26-9. This means they are 14-11 against everyone else. Is that a top-two team in baseball? Hardly, I'll take the heated-rivals: Yankees (who have overcome a slow start to go 19-7 since May 12) and Red Sox (18-8 against the best division in baseball) as the top two.

Fantasy baseball draft season is coming, so you best be prepared by delving through every major player on each team. Fantasy FanHouse is here to help with a quick once-over.

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Best team in baseball. Yes, they are still better than the Yankees and Red Sox. Lost in all the joy of last season were the facts that two key players were injured down the stretch and another had an absolutely dreadful offensive season. Throw in the addition of Pat Burrell, and the continued growth of the young pitching staff, and you have a team who can take on the big-spending Yankees and venerable Red Sox.

Troy Percival, the Rays' closer for much of 2008, underwent back surgery on December 3 to remove herniated discs and repair some other damage. Conventional wisdom this offseason has been that Percival won't be ready to take on his old role for a bit in the upcoming regular season. If he's ready, it won't be a gigantic blow to the Rays, because they already have Dan Wheeler, Grant Balfour, and J.P. Howell at the back-end of the bullpen.

Percival, though, is now feeling like he's going to be ready to go when the season begins. In fact, he wants to work a handful of Spring Training games just to be sure.

Due to trades and free agency, many teams will be simply promoting from within or using someone in the closer role who has never done so for an entire season before. We won't be covering Francisco Rodriguez, Kerry Wood, or Brian Fuentes here. No, instead, this is for the Jonathan Broxton types, who are embarking upon a new phase of their respective careers.

Let's do a heat check (scorching, hot, mild, cold, freezing) on each man who has never been his team's closer for a full season, but plans to do so in 2009.

In the Playoff Pulse series, our MLB editor takes on a hot October topic.

The Rays pulled out all the stops in Game 2 of the World Series to get even with the Phillies. They scratched out a victory on the offensive side, scoring three of their four runs on a pair of ground ball outs and a safety squeeze.

Much will probably be made of manager Joe Maddon's willingness to play small ball in a critical postseason game because, hey, let's face it, the mainstream media and baseball old-timers love it when the little things play a big factor in crucial postseason games.

But that might be missing the forest for the trees. The Rays are headed to Philadelphia knotted at 1-all in the World Series and ready to go on a roll similar to the one they went on in the ALCS. And the reason they look poised to reel off a few wins, and maybe just run off with the World Series trophy in the process, is because of their almost surreal pitching depth.

Look, Evan Longoria and B.J. Upton are terrific young players. Whatever is brewing in Tampa Bay -- whether it's a dynasty or an annual contender in the AL East -- both are going to be a big part of something special. But neither has done much so far in this series. Longoria is hitless, Upton grounded into two key double plays in Game 1 and their partner in the middle of the order, Carlos Pena, is also 0-for-the-Fall-Classic.

The fact that the Rays had a big advantage in starting pitchers tonight with James Shields starting against Brett Myers is academic. After losing Game 1, the Rays needed to win Game 2, regardless of circumstances. They did just that tonight, so even though they didn't get a great start from Shields and the Rays didn't play a great game, the end result was exactly what the Rays needed.

Beyond the result, I think that B.J. Upton's game at the plate might've been the most encouraging part of last night's game for the Rays. Upton spent all of Game 1 swinging for the fences and failing miserably at it. In Game 2, he did a very nice job of shortening his swing and hitting the ball all over the field, leading to a couple of key singles early in the game that helped the Rays build their 3-0 lead after two innings. Also, David Price and Dan Wheeler were very solid out of the 'pen to shore up things after Shields departed in the sixth. We're two games into the Series and the Rays bullpen, which many thought would be a weakness for them, has been very good.

The split in Tampa isn't the most ideal outcome for the Rays because it does give home field advantage to Phillies, but the Rays should have the pitching advantage in Game 3 and a chance to fix that on Saturday. With Cole Hamels pitching as well as he is in these playoffs, the Rays really should just focus on beating the Phillies other pitchers. That was just what they did last night.

With the World Series finally upon us, MLB FanHouse "sat down" for yet another roundtable discussion to discuss a few of the storylines and issues in the series, as well as predict the winner. Hint: Phillies fans won't be happy.

Matt Snyder: So we're finally to the Fall Classic. Almost no one predicted both of these teams to make it to the series, but it's not individually shocking that either one made it. The Phillies were always in the top three of NL teams throughout the season, and hit their stride in September. The only team arguably hotter than them entering the postseason was the Dodgers, of whom the Phillies dispatched quite easily. The Rays have been struggling to be taken seriously in the national media all season, and now have finally taken the spotlight after Game 7 of the ALCS ... which even prompted me to want to remind people there are two teams playing in the World Series. Who would have ever thought the Rays would be hogging baseball headlines when the word "futility" was not involved.

In the Playoff Pulse series, our MLB editor takes on a hot October topic.

Baseball is a humbling game. Walk into any major league clubhouse and talk to anyone -- a manager, a superstar or a utility infielder -- long enough and they will all preach that message. It turns out baseball can even humble writers. Two days ago, I made the (very stupid) mistake of pronouncing the Red Sox finished in the ALCS.

Boston may not win this series. James Shields at Tropicana Field is a terrifying prospect for a team that can be eliminated with just one loss.

But I (and maybe the Rays too in the latter innings of Game 5) forgot the one thing that makes baseball so much better than all the other games out there. There is no running out the clock. There is no 30-second timeout or two-minute warning. There is no place to hide. You have to get 27 outs to beat a team. There's no way around it. The Rays were reminded of that in excruciating fashion Thursday night.

In the Playoff Pulse series, our MLB editor takes on a hot October topic.

The ALCS is headed back to Boston deadlocked. That much at least, isn't a surprise. Neither is the fact that the Rays and Red Sox have played 20 innings so far and not one has been dull or meaningless. But the rest of this series has been a reminder of how little we really know about baseball when the postseason arrives.

Tampa Bay and Boston will enjoy a day off Sunday, so let's take advantage of that to reset the series:

- Joe Maddon managed Game 2 with desperation. He didn't have a choice because the series would have been essentially over if the Rays went back to Fenway Park down 0-2 and set for a date with Jon Lester. That desperation could come back to haunt him later on in the series, though, because of the way he was forced to stretch his bullpen.

The ALCS begins tonight. With the Red Sox and Rays getting ready to face off, the MLB FanHouse crew took some time to discuss the important issues of the series. Are the Rays too inexperienced? Does it matter that they don't have a closer? Do they stand a chance against the defending world champs?

Pat Lackey: This really is about as David and Goliath as baseball playoff series gets, isn't it? I know the Rays weren't intimidated by the White Sox, but I think there's more of a potential for them to be starstruck in this round. Not to use a gratuitous hockey/Pittsburgh comparison, but this match-up reminds me a lot of the Stanley Cup Finals in June where the young Penguins blew threw the Eastern Conference without serious challenge and met the experienced Red Wings in the Finals. The Pens played the Wings even for the final four games of the series, but they were starstruck and got blown off the ice in the first two and by the time they pulled it together, it was too late. There's certainly the potential for that to happen here, isn't there?