The arms the thing in the AL East (Part 1 of 2)

Sidney Ponson, welcome home.

By signing the 27-year old righty the Baltimore Orioles finally made a move that seems to give them a chance to break the Boston-New York stranglehold in the AL East.

"Wait" you say, "the O's added Miguel Tejada, Rafael Palmerio and Javy Lopez, a definite improvement over Jeff Conine, Tony Batista and Deivi Cruz."

This is true, but it seems like the O's had forgotten what I like to call "The Texas lesson."

The lesson states that basically offense means nothing without at least average pitching.

The O's had gone out and committed umpteen millions to players who can't do thing one about improving a team ERA that ranked 10th in the American League.

The O's had allowed several serviceable arms like Jason Johnson and Damian Moss walk in the off-season. True these guys are not necessarily the key to any team's World Series, but when you don't replace them with anything -- well, to paraphrase Freud, sometimes subtraction is just subtraction.

Ponson helps, but the O's have a potentially ugly rotation and also haven't done much to improve their pen.

So, who in the AL East has made positive changes in their staff?

Sadly, for anyone outside of the Bronx, it looks like the Yankees have matched their impressive offensive improvements of this off-season on the mound as well.

However, don't despair, the Red Sox added Curt Schilling, and quietly, the Toronto Blue Jays may have done the most to improve their arms situation. With the offense that lives North of the border the Jays may finally be the team that is truly a threat to the big two.

Let's take a look at the top five starters (by starts made) for each AL East team and the five pitchers who are now likely to be in the rotation.

(All numbers are as starter only and 2003 numbers are only the numbers that player compiled on that team. 2004 numbers are also starter only numbers, but reflect all starts made, regardless of team).

New York Yankees

Pitcher '03 Starts Avg Innings Opp BA Ratio Pitcher '04 Starts Avg Innings Opp BA Ratio

Roger Clemens 33 6.4 .247 1.21 Javier Vasquez 34 6.8 .229 1.11

Andy Pettite 33 6.3 .272 1.33 Kevin Brown 32 6.6 .236 1.14

Mike Mussina 31 6.9 .238 1.08 Mike Mussina 31 6.9 .238 1.08

David Wells 30 6.9 .289 1.25 (2002) Jon Leiber 21 6.7 .266 1.17

Jeff Weaver 24 6.2 .316 1.59 Jose Contreras 9 6.4 .184 0.98

Well the first thing that comes to mind is "man, Jeff Weaver stunk."

Then, a word that I can't use on this site. Because ladies and gentlemen, if anything, the Yankees have a better staff than the year before.

Except.

Except the wild card, the "pressure of New York". With four starters more or less making their debut as full time Yankees the question has to be asked "can they deal with the unique situation that is New York?"

First off discount Kevin Brown struggling, because Brown has pitched in a major media market and in more than enough big games to prove his mental make-up. He may be getting old and he might slip a little, but no more than Mike Mussina could -- and that won't be much either.

Vasquez could be interesting. Javier has had stretches where his game goes south. In Montreal big deal, in New York could the fickle media hurt the big right hander's ability to work through his struggles? It seems to me like wishful thinking. Vasquez is for real.

What about Jon Lieber then?

He's a solid hurler and his 2002 ratio compares favourably with the 2003 Yanks rotation, but Lieber hasn't seen a pennant race with a periscope. He came to the Cubs one year after their wild-card run in 1998, and didn't have too many significant starts in Pittsburgh in June, let alone August.

Could Leiber be Jeff Weaver all over again? Maybe. Their career numbers are similar, but Lieber is older, and one would think less likely to be as emotionally self destructive as Weaver was last season. Then again Weaver wasn't coming off of Tommy John surgery.

Finally, Contreras. As a starter, and granted it was limited, this Cuban import looked great. I thought Jose was going to end up pitching some major innings for New York in the post-season, but he spit the bit.

So, can Contreras do it? I lean towards yes, if only because the Yankees have been put on this earth to tear real baseball fans' hearts out and if Contreras struggled we might have a glimmer of hope.

The real key here is that the Yanks, again, have a set of pitchers who can usually take New York to the seventh inning. Last year that wasn't good enough at times for a mediocre bullpen. This year with Tom Gordon and especially Paul Quantrill in the fold New York should be able to hold most leads.

Damn Yankees!

Boston Red Sox

Pitcher '03 Starts Avg Innings Opp BA Ratio Pitcher '04 Starts Avg Innings Opp BA Ratio

Derek Lowe 33 6.2 .272 1.42 Derek Lowe 33 6.2 .272 1.42

Tim Wakefield 33 6.2 .247 1.31 Tim Wakefield 33 6.2 .247 1.31

John Burkett 30 5.8 .279 1.37 Pedro Martinez 29 6.4 .215 1.04

Pedro Martinez 29 6.4 .215 1.04 Curt Schilling 24 7.0 .230 1.05

Casey Fossum 14 5.0 .276 1.48 Byung-Hyun Kim 12 6.0 .231 1.19

Hmmmm, with all his arm troubles Pedro still manages to go deepest into games on average of all Red Sox starters. This speaks volumes as to why the Red Sox needed that outstanding offense.

It also speaks to why the Sox are in a tenuous position -- they simply can't count on their offense to duplicate what it did the year before. Too many career years in Boston last season for that to happen. Not that Boston should struggle to score, but a few runs here and there can add up.

Thankfully for Boston Curt Schilling is a HUGE upgrade over Casey Fossum. D'uh.

I'm sort of hoping the Sox choose to put Tim Wakefield either before Pedro or Curt or right in-between. Can you imagine the damage that would do? Your timing is destroyed by Wakefield's knuckler and then you have to face two of the hardest throwers in baseball. Or Blazing speed, junk so slow it has to ride the short bus, blazing speed?

Wakefield can have a devastating effect on the Sox opponents for days after his start. I would love to see a study that shows the difference in effectiveness for hard throwing starters when they follow Wakefield in the rotation versus when they don't.

The other change is adding Byung-Hyun Kim to the rotation over John Burkett. This isn't official, but the wind is definitely blowing this way. After all the unpleasantness last year the rotation might be a better fit for Kim and the Boston fans.

If Kim is in the rotation the Sox might be in very good shape. I think Lowe is more the starter he showed this year rather than the Cy Young candidate type of 2002, and Wakefield as good as he can be might just be due for one of those ugly 5.50 ERA years he coughs up every so often.

With Burkett, the definition of "5th starter" in the rotation, Boston is vulnerable. They might be still even with Kim or Scott Williamson (10 career starts) in the rotation, but that seems less likely to me.

The Sox pen should be better if only because the addition of Keith Foulke will give everyone a defined role. However, the arms in the pen are much better now than they were to start the 2003 season. In fact, the Sox could have one of the best bullpens in baseball.

If Pedro and Schilling are healthy, and the remaining three starters can be consistent than Boston has made real improvements. Still, I can't help but think this rotation will look better on paper than in practice.

So, those are the two 900-pound Gorillas in the AL East, both made significant changes to their rotations, and both teams have potent offense. The Yankees still seem to be better than Boston both in the rotation and in the bullpen, but the gap has narrowed considerably.

The question now must be asked, can any of the Al East teams possibly challenge these two behemoths?

Read Part Two to find out.