Record as of Monday: 58-36
Last Power Ranking: 2
Grade for the first half: Now, this is a funny team to grade. And it’s not ha-ha funny. Quirky. Unusual. Difficult. You know, funny. The
Dodgers are roughly on a 100-win pace. They’re in the top spot in the power rankings. For as much winning as the franchise has enjoyed over the last decade, that would be their third-highest win total in that stretch, and it would be only the third time they’ve won 100 games since 1974.
Seems like an easy A. Except it’s been a season filled with injuries, from
Cody Bellinger to Corey Seager and now to Mookie Betts. Clayton Kershaw
should be back soon. (And on a much more serious note, starter Trevor Bauer will be out until at least July 27 as the police and
Major League Baseball investigate assault allegations.)
This is not the 100-win pace they were expecting before the season. Adding to the confusion is the fact that they just caught the
Giants. The Giants! They weren’t supposed to be a part of the problem this year.
Still: 100-win pace! Teams usually don’t win that many games! They’re literally atop the power rankings, as voted on by dozens of professional baseball writers! I’ll give them a solid
B+, then. They’ve had calamity shoveled in their path, but they’ve had the depth and talent to keep chugging along.
Only the Dodgers could win this much and get graded on such an unfair curve. But it feels like they could be on a 110-win pace with slightly improved fortunes.
Bold prediction for the second half: Welcome back,
Kenta Maeda. The Dodgers would love an additional starter/swingman/what-have-you, and Maeda knows where the bathrooms are. His season has been trending upward, and the cost shouldn’t be that prohibitive.
Record as of Monday: 58-34
Last Power Ranking: 1
Grade for the first half: Ah, look at all the lookie-loos, who’ve come to see the Giants fall from the top spot of these rankings. They lost their first series of the second half, after all. Is this when the other shoe drops and hits the Giants right in the face?
Perhaps. But the Giants lost only seven of their 29 first-half series, and they outscored their opponents by a whole bunch along the way. It would be one thing if they did it with an outlandish record in one-run games, or if they had
the same kind of good health that the Red Sox have enjoyed, but that’s not what went on. They’re
on pace to set a franchise record for home runs, despite not having Barry Bonds, Willie Mays or Willie McCovey, and they’ve had to scramble to cover for injuries to key players, just like most teams in the league.
It would also be another thing if they had first place in a weak division. Instead, they’ve been tangling with the Dodgers and
Padres. Remembering that these grades are relative to preseason expectations, the Giants are an
A. Nobody expected them to be here, and everyone is expecting them to stumble. Just getting here, though, was a remarkable feat.
Bold prediction for the second half: As of right now, the Giants have four prospects on Baseball America’s midseason top-100 list, and they have one starting pitcher under contract for 2022 (
Logan Webb).
On Aug. 1, they’ll have three prospects on that top-100 list and two starting pitchers under contract for 2022.
Record as of Monday: 56-38
Last Power Ranking: 3
Grade for the first half: Love ’em or hate ’em, these Astros have been a formidable team this year and are well situated to not just be an AL contender, but perhaps the team to beat.
This group straight-up mashes the baseball. They have a plus-129 run differential and their .773 OPS trails only the Toronto Blue Jays for best in the majors. Their starters have been solid and if they can upgrade their one weakness,
the bullpen, at the deadline, especially with a big get like Craig Kimbrel or Taylor Rogers, the AL crown could be theirs for the taking.
The Astros may keep getting booed everywhere they go, but likeability wasn’t factored into their grade. These Astros have earned an
A.
Bold prediction for the second half: Remember Justin Verlander? He’s recovering from Tommy John surgery, but if the Astros go deep into the postseason, we’ll see him back on a mound this year.
Record as of Monday: 56-36
Last Power Ranking: 5
Grade for the first half: The White Sox are a very good team playing in a division that has turned out to be even weaker than originally predicted. To their credit, they haven’t played down to their competition, compiling a 38-11 against clubs who are below .500, but,
as Jon Greenberg wrote, their record against winning clubs — 18-25 — is suspect and needs to improve in the second half.
Still, despite major injury woes and
Tony La Russa’s blunders, the White Sox have largely lived up to expectations, with the starting pitching a particular strength. They’re in a good place to run away with the AL Central crown, especially considering Eloy Jiménez
is expected back soon and Luis Robert should follow him not long after that.
Those two shouldn’t be the only second-half additions, as the club could still use some trade deadline upgrades, especially a bat who can fill in at second base or the outfield and/or a backup catcher to account for Yasmani Grandal’s absence. But through the first half, the White Sox were resilient and entertaining. They get an
A-.
Bold prediction for the second half: With
Jiménez and Robert back in the lineup, the
White Sox close out the regular season with the best record in the AL.
Record as of Monday: 56-38
Last Power Ranking: 4
Grade for the first half: There is probably some sort of baseball equilibrium law that says if the New York Yankees are underperforming, the Red Sox must overperform. And halfway through the season, the Red Sox are neck-and-neck with the Giants as the biggest overachievers of the season so far.
Coming into this year,
FiveThirtyEight predicted a losing season for the Red Sox and gave them a 23 percent chance of making the postseason. Instead, Boston has a half-game lead for first in the AL East. They have a top-five offence in the AL, their pitching has been good enough and they’re primed to get a second-half boost with the return of ace Chris Sale.
Look, [spoiler alert] if you scroll down, you’ll see we gave the Yankees a D, so to avoid disturbing the natural forces that hold together the baseball universe, we have to give the Red Sox an
A.
Bold prediction for the second half: Sale returns in August and is every bit the ace he was before, while Jarren Duran makes an impact in the second half. The Red Sox win the division, and Xander Bogaerts and Rafael Devers finish in the top five in AL MVP voting.
Record as of Monday: 55-41
Last Power Ranking: 7
Grade for the first half: It’s easy to say the words “third-place Padres” and conjure images of
Jedd Gyorko and
Everth Cabrera leading the Padres to a 77-85 record as
Bud Black glowers in the dugout, but third place doesn’t mean the same thing in 2021. The Padres had their fourth-best first half
in franchise history, and in two of those previous seasons, they won the pennant. By almost every measure, the 2021 Padres have been a rousing success.
Except, well, they’re in the NL West, and a 53-40 first half was good only for third place. While it feels exceptionally rude and unfair to consider their first half to be a disappointment – they bulked up in the offseason baseball arms race because they knew this could be a possibility – there’s only so much grace we can offer.
The Padres get a
B+, then. It would be an A if they had finished the first half with this same record, but the Dodgers and Giants weren’t around to steal their glory. That means the grade has more to do with the particulars of the NL West than it does with the overall talent level of these Padres, which to be clear, is very, very good.
Bold prediction for the second half: Blake Snell starts rolling. While
Joe Musgrove has been sensational and
Yu Darvish has been Yu Darvish, the Padres could really use a third starter to bust out.
Chris Paddack would fit here, but the prediction is that Snell is the guy, and helps the Padres coast to an easy postseason berth.
Is it a bold prediction to write “The former Cy Young isn’t bad anymore”? Probably not. But Snell has been brutal enough to make it seem bold.
Record as of Monday: 55-38
Last Power Ranking: 6
Grade for the first half: Grading the Rays’ season isn’t so easy. They’re the defending American League champions, but they’re not a flashy club with big-name stars, and expectations for them seem permanently muted.
The most recognizable player on their roster might be
Tyler Glasnow, and that’s only because he looks like
that guy who was in that movie/TV show. Their two All-Stars were a catcher (
Mike Zunino) and a utility guy (
Joey Wendle). Every year, we forget the Rays are actually good even though every single one of their relievers throws 100 mph with nasty movement and has a name like Chaz Fairweather. And every year we only remember they’re good because we look up at the end of the season and they’ve won 97 games. Rinse and repeat.
So, were expectations high this season for the defending AL champions? Or low for the team that traded away its Cy Young pitcher in the offseason? Somewhere in the middle. but we’ll give the Rays a
B+. They’ve weathered a ton of injuries and held their own in a competitive AL East. They could have earned an A-, but after overtaking the
Red Sox for the division lead in May after an 11-game win streak, they gave it right back after a lousy 12-14 month of June. That just means there is room for the Rays to improve. They’ll thank us later for the tough love.
Bold prediction for the second half: Glasnow returns in September and helps the Rays clinch a wild-card spot.
Record as of Monday: 56-39
Last Power Ranking: 8
Grade for the first half: The
Brewers made the postseason last season, sure, but they also didn’t spend a single day over .500. That made it hard to be super-duper bullish on them coming into this season.
But the Brewers absolutely rolled through the first half, albeit in a very streaky way, and they currently have a healthy seven-game lead in the Central. This, despite a team-adjusted OPS that has them down at the bottom of the National League with the
Pirates, Diamondbacks and
Marlins.
There are a couple ways to look at this. The first is that holy heck has the pitching been good. The second is that this is a problem with a trade-deadline solution.
Trevor Story seems like a dandy, obvious fit, but
they also might want to double down on their embarrassment of pitching riches. The team has played well to justify that kind of reinforcement, and the Brewers get an easy
A relative to preseason expectations.
Bold prediction for the second half: Jackie Bradley Jr. figures it out. Not saying that he’ll return to the .814 OPS-form that he had last season for the Red Sox, but he’ll have a second half closer to his career .233/.315/.401 line than whatever is happening right now.
Record as of Monday: 53-42
Last Power Ranking: 9
Grade for the first half: The A’s have had one of the wilder starts to the season, losing their first six games by a combined total of 37 runs, only to then string together a 13-game win streak to put themselves back into contention in the AL West. They’ve remained there ever since and are now hanging onto the second AL wild-card spot.
The A’s are officially the most unsurprising surprise contender. Were they supposed to be this good this year? Probably not. Are you surprised they’re in a playoff spot? No way. They are doing what they typically do, plucking along while hanging within striking distance of the Astros. Matt Olsen and Tony Kemp are having great seasons, Chris Bassitt and Sean Manaea are leading the rotation and despite some injury blows to the bullpen, the group has been fairly steady.
The A’s have put themselves in a good spot already,
and they’re traditionally a strong second-half club. Given their record and plus run differential, the club deserves a
B+ — but if
they can add reinforcements at the deadline, and hang onto that playoff spot for good, we might just be able to bump their final grade to an … A [Hold for applause].
Bold prediction for the second half: Billy Beane and David Frost
listen to our writers and trade for Nelson Cruz.
Record as of Monday: 48-42
Last Power Ranking: 11
Grade for the first half: If we were only taking into consideration
Vladimir Guerrero Jr.’s performance, the Blue Jays would get an A +++. It’s not a real-world grade,
but how Guerrero is hitting the baseball this year is out of this world anyway.
But the Blue Jays are more than just Vlad, and despite a scary-good offence that overtook the
Astros for best in the majors, per OPS, with a collective .784 on-base plus slugging percentage, they are in third place in their division with a record (48-42) that is decidedly worse than their Pythagorean win-loss record of 53-36 says they should be.
The Blue Jays had a big bullpen problem, and it reared its head more than a few times in May and June. Some patchwork trades have helped stop the leak, but Toronto still looks like a team in need of
more upgrades to the pitching staff and elsewhere.
The team has also had to manage more injuries than any other team in the AL, including losing
George Springer for most of the first half. They’ve earned a
B for their performance, but if they can stay healthier while keeping up their offensive pace, this looks like it could be a better second-half team. Another x-factor in all this is that, in 11 days, the
Blue Jays will be returning to Toronto to play
the first real home game in 670 days. Talk about the potential for an in-season energy boost.
Bold prediction for the second half: Guerrero breaks
Jose Bautista’s franchise record for most home runs in a season (54) when he hits No. 55 on the last day of the regular season at the Rogers Centre.
ondering:
