Brewers, Cards hoping to take it to the next level in NL Central

BY J.A. SCHWARTZ

The Cubs were the last team to represent the National League Central in the fall classic in 2016, bringing home the World Series trophy for its long-suffering fans for the first time in 108 years. In the five seasons since, no Central team has managed to win the NL pennant and the Cubs, Brewers and Cardinals will all be trying to change that in 2022. The Reds, having engaged in a resource restructuring plan, offloaded a significant amount of talent from their 2021 roster and figure to finish closer to the cellar than to the top of the division. The perennially penurious Pirates will almost certainly find themselves fighting Cincinnati to avoid an ignominious last place finish.

Milwaukee Brewers

The defending National League Central champion Brewers enter 2022 having made the playoffs four consecutive years for the first time since moving from Seattle in 1970. Manager Craig Counsell seeks to extend that streak, but aspirations in Milwaukee run to greater heights. Led by arguably the best top three starting pitchers in the game, the Brewers paced the NL in strikeouts and finished third in ERA in 2021. Corbin Burnes, 27, is the defending NL Cy Young Award winner, coming off a season that saw him go 11-5 with a league best 2.43 ERA and 234 strikeouts, and will take the ball Opening Day. He’ll be followed by righties Brandon Woodruff, 29, and Freddy Peralta, 25, each of who won ten games and finished with ERAs below 3.00. None of the top three Brewers starters allowed an average of more than a runner per inning, a claim no other starting trio in the majors can make. The stellar starters are supported by a wicked two-headed bullpen, featuring lefty Josh Hader, whose 1.23 ERA led all closers in 2021. He’ll be paired with 2020 NL Rookie of the Year Devin Williams, who is 12-3 with a 2.09 ERA in his young career, ensuring that Milwaukee has dominant end-game options every night.

The Brew Crew imported domestic upgrades in outfielders Hunter Renfroe and Andrew McCutcheon, hoping to add some pop to an offense that struggled to sustain rallies and struck out the third most times in the NL last year. Milwaukee is hoping that the massive improvement made by Willy Adames upon his trade from Tampa last season is real: he hit .197/.254/.371 for the Rays before exploding to bat .285/.366/.521 for the Brewers, establishing himself in the middle of the lineup. They’ll need to have 2018 NL MVP Christian Yelich find his stroke to push the offense beyond seventh best in the senior circuit. Yelich had back-to-back seasons with an OPS of 1000 or greater in 2018-19, but has not been above 800 the past two seasons. A return to form for the 30-year-old Yelich might just help the Brewers return to the World Series for the first time since 1982.

St. Louis Cardinals

The Cardinals will open the 2022 season with Adam Wainwright pitching to Yadier Molina. Those two franchise stalwarts have represented the Redbirds continuously since the 2005 season. No other team has a pair of such veteran teammates, and their leadership will be relied upon to help St. Louis reach the playoffs for the ninth time in the past 12 years, and the fourth year in a row. Despite a 252-199 managerial record with St. Louis and three straight postseason berths, Mike Schildt was fired by the Cardinals, who cited “philosophical differences” as the reason for his dismissal. He’ll be replaced by Oliver Marmol, 35, a coach in the organization since 2017, who will be the youngest manager in the majors when the season begins. Marmol will have plenty of veteran voices in the dugout to help augment his authority.

The Cardinals made the playoffs in 2021 based in part on their excellent defense, which topped in the NL in defensive runs saved (according to The Fielding Bible). With elite fielders around the infield in Paul Goldschmidt, Tommy Edman, Paul DeJong and Nolan Arenado, ground balls hit against St. Louis had little hope of finding the outfield grass. The pitching staff, led by 40-year-old Wainwright’s 17-7, 3.05 ERA effort, benefited from the leather wizardry. Jack Flaherty was 9-2, with a 3.22 ERA during an injury-plagued campaign that limited him to 78 innings. Those two righties will be expected to lead a rotation that will lean on the late inning work of closer Giovanny Gallegos and lefty Genesis Cabrera.

With veterans Arenado, Goldschmidt and the hulking Tyler O’Neill forming the heart of the order, St. Louis can afford to allow time for the development of top prospects Nolan Gorman and Jordan Walker, both of who could see the majors by season’s end. With franchise darling Albert Pujols returning on a one-year deal, largely to be the DH against lefties, fans should enjoy several familiar names in the daily box scores. Marmol might have a difficult time reproducing the efforts of his predecessor, but St. Louis baseball observers will have no problem recognizing the product on the field.

Cincinnati Reds

The Reds telegraphed their intentions for the 2022 season not long after the conclusion of the 2021 schedule. GM Nick Krall ominously proclaimed that Cincinnati needed to “align our payroll to our resources”, signaling that most of the team’s more expensive commodities would be on the trade block. The first domino to fall was catcher Tucker Barnhart, whose receiving and framing skills are considering among the best in the game. He was dealt to Detroit for infield prospect Nick Quintana. Soon after the lockout was lifted, the Reds swung a blockbuster with Seattle, moving Eugenio Suarez and Jesse Winker in return for a collection of young talent headlined by lefty Brandon Williamson, ranked #61 on Baseball America’s top 100 list of the best prospects in the game. Krall also unloaded Sonny Gray and his contract to Minnesota in return for 2021 first round draft pick Kyle Petty, a New Jersey prep product who already hits 100 MPH on the radar gun. Finally, the Reds sent lefty closer Amir Garrett, who struggled mightily in 2021, to Kansas City for Mike Minor and cash in another cost-cutting effort. They also allowed Nick Castellanos to depart in free agency without making a formal offer. In total, the Reds payroll will drop from $126 million in 2021 to a projected $99 million this year, 21st in the majors.

Manager David Bell will still enjoy the luxury of having Joey Votto hit in the middle of the order. Votto, 38, experienced a late-career power surge in 2021, hitting .266/.375/.563 with 36 HR’s. He’ll be supported by 2021 NL Rookie of the Year Jonathan India and outfielder Nick Senzel, both first rounds picks who have risen through the system. The rotation is certainly in a state of flux. Luis Castillo labored through an uneven 2021 season, going 8-16 with a 3.98 ERA despite striking out 192 in 188 innings. A right shoulder injury figures to sideline him through at least the first month of the season, leaving the Opening Day assignment to Tyler Mahle. Mahle, 26, was 13-6 with a 3.75 ERA last year and should continue his journey towards being the ace of the staff. Top prospect (#35 on Baseball America’s top 100) and 2017 first round selection Hunter Greene will make his major league debut this April, bringing his 103 MPH heater with him. The prognosis for a possible playoff berth is decidedly bleak following the fire sale supposedly dictated by fiscal prudence, though Cincinnati fans will have some intriguing young talent to distract them this summer.

Chicago Cubs

Cubs fans may still be basking in the glow of their 2016 championship, the franchise’s first title in over a century. The team on the field, however, will not recall those glory days of yore in 2022. Since the end of the 2020 season, the North Side faithful have watched postseason heroes Jon Lester, Kyle Schwarber, Anthony Rizzo, Javier Baez and Kris Bryant leave the friendly confines of Wrigley Field. In a trade deadline purge of potential free agents, Team President and GM Jed Hoyer sent Rizzo to the Yankees, Baez to the Mets and Bryant to San Francisco in trades that brought back little in terms of immediate impact on the roster.

At least David Ross, who backstopped that championship team, remains in the dugout to lead his new players as manager. The 2022 Cubs may not resemble the esteemed group that brought sweet relief to the long-suffering faithful six years ago, but their offseason efforts indicate that the front office does not intend to embark upon a protracted rebuilding process. The Cubs swooped in to sign free agent Marcus Stroman away from the Mets to front the rotation. Stroman went 10-13 with a 3.02 ERA in 2021 for New York, and will be tasked with the Opening Day assignment. Kyle Hendricks remains a reliable source of innings and pinpoint command, and waiver pickup Wade Miley will also feature prominently in the rotation for Chicago after a 12-7, 3.37 season with the Reds. Closing duties will likely be handled by a trio of veteran righties: David Robertson, Rowan Wick and Mychal Givens, who combined for a total of 13 saves in 2021.

The lineup will likely have two improbable breakout players from last year at the corners. Frank Schwindel, 28, was released twice in 2021, first by Kansas City and then by Oakland, but took advantage of regular playing time with the Cubs and mashed .342/.389/.613 with 13 HR’s in the last two months of the season to stake a claim to the job at first. 29-year-old Patrick Wisdom hit 28 HR’s in his first full season of action, and will be counted on to man the hot corner in 2022. The Cubs also won the bidding war to acquire Japanese league superstar outfielder Seiya Suzuki, awarding him a five-year, $85 million deal, and he’ll join Willson Contreras and Ian Happ in the middle of the lineup that aims to produce more runs than the 705 it scored last year (11th in the NL).

Pittsburgh Pirates

The Pirates had the lowest payroll in the National League in 2021, and they intend to keep it that way, trimming their commitments for the upcoming season to just below $38 million. It’s been six years since the Pirates were in the playoffs, and they haven’t finished above .500 since that 2015 team. Pittsburgh fans flocking to beautiful PNC Park are as likely to attend for the scenery around the stadium as the talent playing in it, at least for the home side. Star centerfielder Bryan Reynolds was the subject of offseason trade buzz primarily because he’s eligible for arbitration for the first time, and projects to earn $4.5 million in 2022. He was the only Pirate to hit more than 11 HR’s last year, and he and Ke’Bryan Hayes are the best players they’ve got. Their lineup was last in the NL in runs and homers last season, and is likely to repeat that. There is hope on the horizon for Bucs fans, as Baseball America ranked their farm system third in the game and tops in the NL coming into the 2022 season. Enormous shortstop prospect Oneil Cruz, who is 6’7”, is their most highly regarded prospect, checking in as the 14th best in the game on the BA Top 100 list. The #1 overall pick from the 2021 draft, catcher Henry Davis, is also on his way, giving Pittsburgh fans reason to dream that better times (and a higher payroll) may be coming soon.