Tagged As: MLB, Yankees, Red Sox, Rays, Fenway Park, New Yankee Stadium

The sports world may be in bowl mold- the Super Bowl, the Sugar Bowl, the Rose Bowl, the Fiesta Bowl, The Orange Bowl, the Pacific Life Holiday Bowl-, but the MLB season is coming up much quicker than most fans realize. There are already grumblings of pitchers and catchers reporting for spring training. There is even a glorious global exhibition with the World Baseball Classic (WBC). Half of the top free agents are gone and teams are starting to scurry to pick up the role players that will make the difference between 80 and 90 wins with just a few more hits.

I am looking forward to watching the perfect storm brewing out east. I am not talking about the National League East. Yes the Phillies are the returning World Series champions and the Mets have been trying to upend them for the last couple of years. The baseball universe breathes with the Yankees tough.

This season in the American League East the New York Yankees, Boston Red Sox, and Tampa Bay Rays are all hoping to kick off the season with a strong start so they can weather the long 162-game season schedule.

Over in the Bronx, Brian Cashman and Hal Steinbrenner have been busy trying to make up for a let down last season before the House that Ruth Built was toppled over. This new Yankees season at the New Yankees Stadium should bring back a much more competitive team.

Yes, ARod still has the Madonna fallout to contend with. The hope is that he makes more headlines for the sports section than Page Six. He has Mark Teixeira to help with a lineup that needed a little renovating. ARod, Teixeira, a healthy Hideki Matsui, a Xavier Nady entering his prime, and a Nick Swisher with some pop in his bat bring the Bombers back to the Bronx.

This season the Yanks decided that New Yorkers should get some new pitchers to criticize. I thought Mike Mussina and Andy Pettitte had tenure, but they are gone and now they are replaced by C.C. Sabathia and A.J. Burnett. This is going to be a completely different team than last year and fans with Yankees tickets probably cannot wait for this Mike D’Antoni distraction to pass so they can obsess about the winning-est franchise in the United States.

Of course, Bostonians will remind everyone that the Red Sox have been the dominant team out east since the turn of the century. The wild card team returns much of the team that found its way after jettisoning Manny Ramirez and his poisonous tongue from the locker room. David Ortiz is still the DH and he should be content with help from Kevin Youkilis, Dustin Pedroia, Jason Bay, and Mike Lowell. There is even Jacoby Ellsbury terrorizing pitchers from his lead off first base.

This team has the pitching staff to survive the miniature dimensions of Fenway Park. Daisuke Matsuzaka is the ace ad his supporting staff of Josh Becket, Jon Lester, and recent signee Brad Penny should take the mound at least six innings most often. Jonatahn Papelbon is a sure thing in the ninth. The Rays, the team that actually won the AL East, is not such a sure thing.

Was the summer of 2008 a mirage for the Tampa Bay Rays or was it for real? Joe Maddon managed a team of role players on offense. Evan Longoria and Carlos Pena provided the power, Carl Crawford and B.J. Upton were the speed, and Akinori Iwamura and Jason Bartlett were the crunch time kings.

The real strength was the pitching. James Shields still is the ace. Scott Kazmir and Matt Garza are the blossoming young star pitchers. Andy Sonnanstine showed incredible promise. David Price is the newcomer, but with four out of five proving themselves last season, one new guy is hardly something to worry about and the hinge the season on.

I hope the Rays season goes well. If it does, then the AL East will certainly be the center of the baseball-verse again. I know people get sick of hearing about this division, but when it is going good the MLB Season seems to be much more exciting for teams across the country.