Latest Nl East Stories
Posted: Nov 20th 2009 11:14 PM ET by Pat Lackey (RSS feed)
Filed Under: Nationals, NL East, Prospects

The
Nationals learned Friday that the knee injury suffered by
Stephen Strasburg will not require surgery to repair. It's instead been diagnosed as a dislocated knee cap. As painful as that sounds, there's no ligament damage and the Nats' phenom will only require rest and some rehab to get the knee back up to full strength, though he'll still miss Saturday's Arizona Fall League championship game.
Considering those that witnessed the injury firsthand saw Strasburg crumple while playing long toss on Thursday and reported hearing a popping sound (often a telltale sign of ligament damage), this is obviously great news for the Nats. I can't even fathom following up a 103-loss season with a serious knee injury to the highest-paid draft pick in baseball history.
Posted: Nov 20th 2009 4:02 PM ET by Pat Lackey (RSS feed)
Filed Under: Mets, NL East, MLB Rumors

In the six weeks since the
Mets' disastrous season has ended, lots of people have opined on how to fix the Mets. One person who'd like to chip in to the conversation is
Jason Marquis. The Mets need to add a starter and, well, what do you know! Marquis is a free agent starter! After adding those two together, the Staten Island native has gone ahead and
declared himself a "perfect fit" for the Mets.
Marquis had a nice enough year for the
Rockies in 2009, notching 15 wins, a 4.04 ERA, and his first career All-Star nod. He's not a
bad pitcher. He'd make a nice enough fit for a contender looking for a back-end starter to eat some innings and not embarrass himself. For a team like the Mets that trotted out
Mike Pelfrey,
John Maine,
Oliver Perez,
Tim Redding, and
Livan Hernandez after
Johan Santana, well, I dunno if I'd call him a "perfect fit."
Posted: Nov 19th 2009 10:00 AM ET by Knox Bardeen (RSS feed)
Filed Under: Phillies, NL East
Footprints in the Snow is FanHouse's look at the paths to be forged by MLB teams this winter as they look ahead to 2010. Philadelphia Phillies general manager Ruben Amaro made it a point not to bring back the exact same lineup in 2009 after winning the World Series in 2008. He succeeded in that goal by replacing the departed
Pat Burrell with
Raul Ibanez in left field. The strategy worked as the
Phillies won their division and made it all the way to the World Series, eventually losing to the
New York Yankees.
During this offseason, expect the mantra to be very similar to last winter. The one position in the lineup that likely will roll over is third base. The team declined their $5.5 million option on
Pedro Feliz and will try and find an upgrade in the free-agent pool. If they fail to do so, they can always bring Feliz back to the team.
Posted: Nov 19th 2009 9:00 AM ET by Andrew Johnson (RSS feed)
Filed Under: Nationals, NL East
Footprints in the Snow is FanHouse's look at the paths to be forged by MLB teams this winter as they look ahead to 2010.
The
Nationals bottomed out in 2009. Their season began with the ouster of general manager Jim Bowden in the beginning of March after he was implicated in a bonus-skimming scandal in the Dominican Republic that drew the attention of the FBI. And it ended with 103 losses, giving them 205 losses in the last two seasons.
In between, they fired manager Manny Acta and watched attendance fall by more than 6,000 fans a night in the second year of Nationals Park.
So no, it's not all sunshine and roses on the banks of the Anacostia River, but, then, it's not all doom and gloom either. After all, the Nats managed to lock up phenom
Stephen Strasburg in August, and with a stable front office and a permanent manager now in place, they can get to the task of building around him.
Posted: Nov 19th 2009 8:00 AM ET by Knox Bardeen (RSS feed)
Filed Under: Mets, NL East
Footprints in the Snow is FanHouse's look at the paths to be forged by MLB teams this winter as they look ahead to 2010.
At $149,373,987, the
New York Mets had the National League's highest payroll in 2009. Their fourth place finish in the NL East, 23 games back in the standings, might suggest that the cash Omar Minaya dished out wasn't money well spent. A closer look reveals a team harassed all season by injuries and a group of hitters that could never find a long-term answer to produce runs.
In the outfield,
Carlos Beltran had a potential All-Star season broken up, playing in only 81 games due to a knee injury. In fact, only
Jeff Francoeur amassed more than 500 at-bats among
Mets outfielders, and he was a mid-season import from the
Atlanta Braves.
The infield wasn't spared either as mainstays
Carlos Delgado and
Jose Reyes had their seasons cut extremely short due to injuries. Even staff ace
Johan Santana ended his season early with elbow issues.
The good news is that most of these players are expected to be healthy and ready to go for spring training.
Posted: Nov 19th 2009 7:00 AM ET by Knox Bardeen (RSS feed)
Filed Under: Marlins, NL East
Footprints in the Snow is FanHouse's look at the paths to be forged by MLB teams this winter as they look ahead to 2010.
The
Florida Marlins finished second in the NL East, six games behind the
Philadelphia Phillies and were in the thick of the wild-card race up until the final weeks of the season. When you think of the bright, young pitching staff in Florida anchored by
Josh Johnson and featuring
Ricky Nolasco and
Chris Volstad, you reason that the
Marlins finished well in 2009 because of their hurlers. That notion is actually a fallacy -- only Johnson finished with an ERA under 4.00 among the starters who compiled at least 25 starts. The Marlins stayed in the race because of their hitting, plain and simple. Three hitters --
Dan Uggla,
Hanley Ramirez and
Cody Ross -- bopped 24 or more home runs, and as a team the Marlins finished fifth in the National League in runs scored.
The landscape in Miami might change a lot this offseason. Florida has already shipped under-performing
Jeremy Hermida to Boston and many expect Uggla to be exchanged soon for a multitude of cheap, young players.
Posted: Nov 19th 2009 6:00 AM ET by Knox Bardeen (RSS feed)
Filed Under: Braves, NL East
Footprints in the Snow is FanHouse's look at the paths to be forged by MLB teams this winter as they look ahead to 2010.
The
Atlanta Braves were alive in the wild-card race late in the season due to a powerful pitching rotation that featured six viable starting candidates (at least there were six at the end of the season). The
Braves ranked third in the National League in team ERA with a 3.57 mark and had two 15-game winners in
Derek Lowe and
Javier Vazquez. They also ranked fourth in team batting average and sixth in runs scored even without a true cleanup hitter in the lineup.
If you examine their bullpen you'll also find two relievers who were in the top five in strikeouts among relief pitchers --
Mike Gonzalez with 90 and
Rafael Soriano with 102. These relievers shared the closing duties for most of the season and each had ERA's below three to finish the year.
Posted: Nov 17th 2009 10:00 AM ET by Knox Bardeen (RSS feed)
Filed Under: Phillies, NL East
Pedro Martinez couldn't find a suitable employment opportunity prior to the 2009 Major League
Baseball season, so he sat out until the
Phillies came knocking in July. The 38-year-old pitcher started nine games, posting a record of 5-1 with a 3.63 ERA and helped the Phillies make a championship run that fell just a little short.
Through his agent, Fern Cuza, who spoke to FOXSports.com, the three-time Cy Young Award-winner has made it clear that
he would like to pitch in 2010. And Martinez wants to pitch the entire season this time.
Posted: Nov 11th 2009 10:00 PM ET by Matt Snyder (RSS feed)
Filed Under: Nationals, NL East

After an abysmal 26-61 start, the
Nationals fired manager Manny Acta in the middle of 2009. Bench coach Jim Riggleman was promoted to interim manager for the club and served in that post for the remainder of the season. It appears the much-improved 33-42 record under his watch was enough to impress team officials, because
reports are surfacing that Riggleman will officially have the word "interim" dropped from his job title.
After Don Mattingly pulled himself from the job hunt, it appeared Riggleman's main competition was former
Mets skipper and current ESPN analyst Bobby Valentine. What set Riggleman apart was what he had already shown general manager Mike Rizzo on the job.
Posted: Nov 8th 2009 7:04 PM ET by Tom Fornelli (RSS feed)
Filed Under: Phillies, NL East, MLB Transactions

Considering that the
Phillies made a few changes to their lineup in 2009 after winning a World Series, it shouldn't really come as a surprise that the 2010 version of the team will look a bit different as well. It was announced by the team on Sunday that they would not be picking up the option on third baseman
Pedro Feliz, who will now become a free agent.
This does not mean that Feliz won't be back with the Phillies next season, it just means that he won't be back at the price of $5.5 million. General manager Ruben Amaro Jr. did say that he
wouldn't rule out re-signing Feliz this winter in the team's official statement regarding the Feliz option.