National League Central 2013

[Freddy Wills]

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The NL Central Division is always up for grabs each year, but in recent years it has been the Cardinals and the Reds and sometimes the Brewers making a serious run at the NL Central title. This year I’ll break down each team along with their to win the division and season win total predictions by the oddsmakers.

Cincinnati Reds -135
The Reds are clearly the favorite to win the NL Central Division after they ran away with it a year ago with 97 wins, but Vegas is predicting them for less wins this year at 91. The Reds however lost to the eventual World Series Champion San Francisco Giants in 5 games in the best of 5. What is there to know about this team in 2013? Well for one they will likely be betting favorites for most of the year so it might be hard to find value. As far as players go they added Shin-Soo Choo as their leadoff hitter and moved Aroldis Chapman into the starting role. In addition to those changes the Reds still have one of the best defensive infields while their outfield took a hit while substituting Choo for Drew Stubbs.

Over/Under 91 Wins – I’ll say this one is tough to predict. The Reds changed just enough to give me uncertainty. There is no way to predict how Chapman will do in the rotation and how the bullpen may or may not suffer without him.

St Louis Cardinals +250
Chris Carpenter has finally retired, Lance Berkman is gone and Rafael Furcal is already lost for the season. However, this team is still predicted to finish second in the division and make a run at a wild card spot. When you think about the Cardinals they were without these players for most of last year and still put together a quality team. The Cardinals could have the best 2-5 offensive line up in the NL, featuring Carlos Beltran, Matt Holliday, David Freese, and Allen Craig. Adam Wainwright was inconsistent last year off his injury, but he’ll likely be his usual dominant self.

Over/Under 86.5 Wins – This total seems a little high because of all the question marks this team has on the pitching staff, but I’m not about to doubt the Cardinals. That’s usually how you get burned so for me there is no value in this total and I’ll stay away.