The baseball section of FanSided has decided to come together in a collaborative project to find out what division can put together the best team.
So the lead writers for each team in the division came together discussed the topic and voted on what players we felt should represent the NL East to go against the NL Central and the NL West and here is the team we came up with
C – Brian McCann
1B – Ryan Howard
2B – Chase Utley
SS – Hanley Ramirez
3B – Ryan Zimmerman
OF – Mike Stanton
OF – Jayson Werth
OF – Jason Heyward
SP- Roy Halladay
SP- Cliff Lee
SP- Roy Oswalt
SP- Josh Johnson
SP- Tommy Hanson
Set up man: Ryan Madson
Closer: Francisco Rodriguez
In my opinion the most obvious advantage for the NL East is with their starting pitchers.
sp- Last season the NL East starting 5 had a combined era of 2.79 and pitched in a total of 1,061 innings over 156 games. The starting pitchers keep runs off the board and eat up innings often pitching late in to games which helps keep the bullpen arms from getting overworked.
- Halladay is bonafide ace and multiple time Cy Young winner including last season.
- Lee is a former Cy Young winner who led the AL in complete games last season with 7 as well as whip with a 1.003. Lee last season put up an era of 3.18 and was the prize of the free agents this off season.
- Oswalt has not won a Cy Young but he regularly pitches 200+ innings in a season and consistently puts up era’s in the high 2’s to low 3’s. Oswalt put up a 2.76 era last season
- Johnson has not won a Cy Young but his 2.30 era and era+ of 182 were tops amongst NL pitchers last season.
- Hanson will be entering his 3rd season but to this point has a career era of 3.16 over 55 starts.
Other positions that I feel the NL East definitely wins at are 2b, 3b
- 2b– Offensively Utley was the 06, 07, 08, and 09 NL Silver Slugger award winner for his position. Utley is definitely the more proven bat between himself, Johnson and Phillips. It may be a close season offensively for Utley and Johnson but where I feel Utley earns the nod is on defense. In 2010 Utley had a UZR/150 rating of 12.9, Phillips had a 9.7 and Johnson had a 7.7
- 3b- In my opinion the only 3rd baseman that can compete with Zimmerman plays in the AL and is named Evan Longoria. Zimmerman has won the last 2 NL Silver Slugger awards for third base and is a gold glove caliber fielder. Zimmerman is a better hitter than either Sandoval or McGehee and is light years ahead of them defensively.
With the pitching on lock and the NL East winning 2 of the premium defensive infield positions I really feel like there is a strong base to win the NL.
Even the positions where the NL East does not win they are still strong at
c- McCann has won the last 3 NL Silver Slugger awards at catcher and is a well proven hitter for his position. I do think Posey will probably be better than McCann but you still can’t go wrong with McCann
1b- Howard loses this battle to Pujols but there is no denying Howard is a good hitter. He is a lock for 30+ home runs and 100+ rbis each and every season
ss- Ramirez is definitely a liability defensively but with a team as talented as the NL East his defensive flaws can be easily hidden. Ramirez is a .313 lifetime hitter that will get you 20+ home runs every season. Tulowitzki wins this position but Ramirez is far from being a slouch.
Now as for the outfield and how each team matches up no team wins all three outfield positions in my opinion. So let’s just look real quick at the NL East outfielders
Stanton- at just 20 years old last season Stanton displayed above average power with 22 home runs in only 100 games and fielding wise had a uzr/150 rating of 10.6
Werth- a veteran outfielder who is used to playing around great bats having been in Philly the last couple seasons. He was a key part to the Phillies success especially last season when he finished 8th in the NL MVP voting.
Heyward- at 21 years old last season made the all star gameand finished 2nd behind Posey in the rookie of the year voting. Heyward is already an above average fielder and showed glimpses last season with his bat of what could potentially become a great player. He had 18 home runs and drew 91 walks in 142 games.
I know that some will point out the fact that the outfielders are not position specific which is true but we went with the 3 best overall options. For example Stanton played center field in the minor leagues and did so successfully so he could move from right to center. On top of that Werth and even Heyward can play center if it is asked of them.
So between those 3 outfielders in the NL East should have no problem filling left, center and right field.
For anyone interested in voting you can do so at