The Crushing Loss Of Giancarlo Stanton To Baseball

For as much as the retiring MLB Commissioner Bud Selig loves to remind us that baseball attendance is at an all-time high and that the game has "never been more popular" than it is across the country today, there is really no refuting that the MLB is not nearly as widely followed or prominent as it once was in the American sporting world. Of course, the beginning of baseball in the spring and the excitement of a new season with new players in different cities - whether it be a Tanaka in New York or a Abreu in Chicago - and new possibilities - unless you are a Mets fan where the only possibility is more misery and looking like a little league team - always brings a certain sense of intrigue for a while, but from late May to early September over the past decade, there has been a sort of lull amongst fans about the game and interest in the sport in the dog days of the year. Baseball may be our national pastime as was coined in the 1800's, but to many it is just that, a great historic relic that has lost a lot of its luster from the golden days. It is a game that so many people have castigated for its slow pace and ridiculous rule changes such as the transfer rule and the confounding blocking home-plate regulation to prevent those phantom collisions from happening.

In contrast, despite some of its ludicrous policies and fundamentally flawed hierarchy of decision-makers from the NFL office, which has rightfully been exploited in the news over the past week with the Ray Rice and Greg Hardy domestic violence incidents and the NFL's really poor handling of the cases thanks to the always incompetent Roger Goodell, people are still craving their football every week because the sport has never been more popular amongst its fans (they play games now on Thursdays, Sundays, and Mondays because people can't get enough). Fantasy football is such a big draw for the borderline league watchers because they are now dialed in on every game to see how their players are performing. Furthermore, as painful as it is to sometimes watch games where every time a defensive player touches a wide receiver it is a flag, people love to see offense and points. The fact that the league average per team for points per game last year was 23.4, the highest ever in a single-season, only draws more people into each and every back-and-forth contest. With the NFL rules constituted in such a way that the offensive side of the ball is so heavily favored with holding, pass interference, and personal foul penalties, no lead in a game is truly safe because of just how quickly offensives can rack up points (Andrew Luck led 8 fourth quarter comebacks in just his first two years in the league alone).

Even basketball, a sport many people honestly maintained was saved from the depths of the sporting world just 35 years ago by the enthralling rivalry between Magic Johnson and his Lakers and Larry Bird and his Celtics (one of which was in the NBA Finals every year in the 1980's) has caught up to baseball, and possibly surpassed the game, in terms of its popularity and truly devoted fan-base. Additionally, the NBA has more global ties than any other American sport even despite the fact that their game in Mexico City got cancelled last season because of a fire in the generator room (there are technological issues at places outside of the Superdome too folks), as basketball has substantial roots in China and throughout a very prosperous Asian market. It also helps your game when you can boast a lineup of LeBron James, arguably the greatest player in the game that we have ever seen aside from Jordan, Kevin Durant, who is with guys like Jordan, Kobe, and Wiklins as the best pure scorer in NBA history, the emerging Anthony Davis and possibly Andre Drummond, the deadly three-point shooting combination of Stephen Curry and Klay Thompson in Golden State, the equally lethal combinations in LA of Blake Griffin and Chris Paul, Portland with Lillard and Aldridge, and Houston with Dwight and Harden (and their role players who Harden doesn't really recognize), and hopefully a resurgent Derrick Rose and Paul George when they can both return from serious knee injuries (Rose this year and George next season).

Aside from the obvious issue of baseball games just taking way too much time in between pitches when batters are adjusting their gloves, stepping out of the box, and calling time, and pitchers like Matt Garza and Clay Buchholz aimlessly standing on the mound for 20 to 30 seconds, not everybody can be Mark Buehrle I guess, the MLB just doesn't have the star power that it once did in the game. (I'm not sure baseball games take too long because football games are now going on for 4 hours, but there is just way too much dead time where nothing is happening on the field. I don't mean to be a contrarian, but soccer games have 80 minutes of constant, fast-paced action along with 10 minutes of players rolling around in deep pain over a touch of their body, guys arguing with the referees and other coaches if its Diego Simeone, and having wild over-the-top goal celebrations while baseball games are just much too slow moving after each and every pitch). In decades past, a majority of the sporting world's biggest stars and attractions came from baseball rather than football, basketball, major college sports, or hockey and while these are all obviously team sports, they do rely on star power to captivate many interested fans.

After the dead ball era, the 1920's, 1930's, and 1940's had baseball icons and legends like Ruth, Gehrig, Jimmie Foxx, Mel Ott, Lefty Grove, Ted Williams, Stan Musial, Joe DiMaggio, and Bob Feller, who seem so amazing with their above .400 batting averages and 60 home run seasons in a time when everybody else was hitting in the 20's or 30's, that they are almost mystical or made up. The 1950's, 1960's, and 1970's brought to the world the likes of bigger than life personalities and stars from Mickey Mantle, Willie Mays, Warren Spahn, Hank Aaron, Sandy Koufax, Frank Robinson, and Bob Gibson to Juan Marichal, Roberto Clemente, Johnny Bench, Tom Seaver, Joe Morgan, Pete Rose, Reggie Jackson, and Jim Palmer. If you were walking down the street, you would instantly know if you saw Hank Aaron or Pete Rose, but nowadays, if you were sitting right next to some of the games top players like Josh Donaldson, Corey Kluber, or Chris Sale, it may not strike you right away that they are biggest names in baseball because the sport just doesn't have that same familiarity and big star presence that it once did. In the 1980's and 1990's, if George Brett, Ken Griffey Jr., or Mike Schmidt came to the plate or Nolan Ryan or Greg Maddux came to the mound, you would stop what you were doing and watch them at work. In baseball today, Edwin Encarnacion and Adam Jones are two of the best hitters in the game, but nobody is going to completely forget everything around them and take in their at-bat. In the past, the best athletes and the biggest names all came from the baseball diamond, but that is just no longer the case.

Baseball has been in this waiting period/limbo over the past several years about some of the guys that would step up and be their biggest stars to infatuate fans to the point where they needed to come to the ballpark to see them play or keep a chuck of their day open to watching them on television. Derek Jeter has been the face of baseball for such a long time, but with his impending retirement, the game is in need of some fresh superstars across the sport. Some pitchers have filled that void like Clayton Kershaw, based off the pure fact that his 1.67 ERA through September is just plain scary, especially after he posted a seemingly absurd but now less ridiculous 1.83 ERA last season, as well as Felix Hernandez with his King's Court in Seattle, but guys who only throw once out of every five days are hard to promote your entire sport around (come to the ballpark once every week to catch Kershaw is not exactly what you are looking for despite the amount of pull that has on an exclusive day when they are on the mound). We thought that Jason Hayward, Hanley Ramirez, a young Alex Gordon, Mike Moustakas, Eric Hosmer, Domonic Brown, Jesus Montero, or Justin Upton may be the next group of young stars, but they have all struggled much more than expected with all their collective talent. Clearly, there has been some more clarity over the past two years around the guys baseball fans would gravitate towards with star players emerging like Mike Trout, Andrew McCutchen, Buster Posey, and Yasiel Puig. However, there was still some disconnect in the game, and that was the big-time power guy that everybody was missing out on and so desperate to see back in the sport.

In the interim, there is no way of disputing that the steroid era was good for the overall landscape of baseball. Following some rough times in the early 1990's with the MLB strike-shortened season in 1994, the first year that didn't feature a World Series in America since 1904 - they played the World Series in the middle of World War I and II, so that shows you how disconcerting that strike must have been to the game - baseball needed a quick restoration and revival, and performance-enhancing drugs, as much as I am against players using them to gain an unfair competitive advantage and changing the entire dynamic of the sport, provided that for baseball. Offense was at a never before seen level with runs, hits, on-base percentage, and slugging percentage going at all-time high rates, and the home run battles between Sammy Sosa and Mark McGwire in 1998 and 1999 were unlike anything that baseball had ever seen before in terms of following and interest amongst fans. However, the short-term gains of the steroid era came at the peril of the long-term growth of the sport, and not just in terms of every story over the last ten years involving baseball being about A-Rod or Ryan Braun getting caught for using performance-enhancing drugs. Actually, more precisely in the case of Braun, getting caught, lying about not using the drugs, getting off on a minuscule technicality while ruining the reputation of another person, and then getting caught again, which is basically the Lance Armstrong in a nutshell. However, what the steroid era also did is that it inflated run scoring and home run numbers to a ridiculous degree, where teams and players now have a nearly impossible task of matching or even coming near the offensive numbers of a generation in which so many players were juicing. People became so accustomed to seeing a lot of runs scored and multiple long balls every game that they are disappointed that today's baseball has so little of that going on with pitchers being much more dominant than ever before. For example, in 2000 when Jason Giambi was knocking out 43 home runs like it was nothing, there were 1.172 home runs per game and 10.280 runs per contest, and in 2011 those number were all the way down to 0.937 home runs per contest and 8.567 runs per game, the lowest for a single-season since all the way back in 1993 and 1992 for those two categories respectively, which were both before the steroid era really kicked off. In an era of baseball when the Richie Sexson's of the world are no longer hitting 45 homers in a season, the MLB was looking for somebody to take up the reins of the game's next best power hitter and real big slugger.

Insert the monster that baseball has so desperately needed in Giancarlo Stanton. If you just look at the 6-6, 240 pound frame of the jacked Stanton, he is about as intimidating and striking as any baseball player you will ever see because he doesn't even need a wooden bat to look imposing. Some questions in life are very difficult to answer such as should we cut government spending, does nature or nurture determine our make-up, or is the NFL a corrupt business just looking to cover their own backs all the time (that one is actually easy to answer), but there is no question who is the most powerful hitter in baseball because that title goes easily to Giancarlo Stanton. Nothing against guys like Nelson Cruz, Miguel Cabrera, Jose Abreu, Jose Bautista, David Ortiz, Paul Goldschmidt, and Jay Bruce, but Giancarlo's swing has the most pure power since a younger Albert Pujols or Mike Schmidt. Watching the 2014 Home Run Derby, I have never been more impressed with a guy that would go on to not hit a single home run in one of his later rounds because some of Stanton's bombs in the first round just came off his bat like a missile. His natural power is one of those things where you just can't help but stare and watch because the ball just cannons off his bat anytime he gets a hold of a pitch in or even out of the strike zone. You just have to watch some of his home runs that Stanton has roped this season off pitchers, many of which are just line drive bullets that leave the ball park in mere seconds before you can think about anything, to truly comprehend the raw power that this guy possess in his bat. Here is Giancarlo's 484-foot shot against poor Eric Stults of the San Diego Padres, the longest ever in the three years of Marlins Park. Here is another Stanton mash, this time against Jonathan Pettibone of the Philadelphia Phillies, which went 470-feet and made Sergio Ramos's penalty kick look like it didn't go that far. Here is Giancarlo just reaching out to right field and knocking a pitch out of the ball park like he was just trying to tap it into fair territory off of Jason Hammel when he was still with the Cubs. At this point, I'm so enamored by Stanton's unreal and almost superhuman power that I'm just going to link all his home runs from 2012, 2013, and the first half of this year with some Fall Out Boy music in the background to satisfy everybody. His ability to just shoot through the ball and power through anything on the inner or outer half with his quick hip turn and torque is just incredible and unmatched right now in the baseball world.

Some of the power numbers that Stanton has put up over the past five years, at just the current age of 24, is staggering to say the least, especially considering that he still has time to mature as he enters his prime major league years in his late 20's and early 30's. Since 2010, Stanton's 154 home runs are the most in the National League and only behind Jose Bautista and Miguel Cabrera among all batters in baseball over that time span (Stanton was not called up until mid-June of his rookie season, so he could be averaging even more than his 30 home run per season rate over the past 5 years if he came up from triple-A New Orleans Zephyrs, one of the best minor league baseball team names along with the Lehigh Valley IronPigs, Toledo Mud Hens, and the Albuquerque Isotopes, a little earlier). His isolated power of .269 since 2010 is once again the best in the NL and only behind Joey Bats over the last five seasons in the majors (Stanton's .318 isolated power in 2012 was the 3rd best in a single-season in the MLB over the past seven years behind only Bautista in 2010 and Pujols in 2009 with a minimum of 500 plate appearances). Giancarlo's .549 slugging percentage since 2011 is only bettered by Ryan Braun and Troy Tulowitzki in the NL, who has 548 less plate appearances than Stanton over that span, and David Ortiz and Miguel Cabrera in the AL. Stanton is also on his way to leading the National League in slugging for the second time in three seasons, which only Johnny Mize (1938-1940), Stan Musial (1943-1944, 1946, 1948, 1950, 1952), Ralph Kiner (1947, 1949, 1951), Willie Mays (1954-1955, 1957; 1964-1965), Frank Robinson (1960-1962), Willie McCovey (1968-1970), Mike Schmidt (1980-1982), Dale Murphy (1983-1984), Barry Bonds (1990, 1992-1993; 2001-2004), Larry Walker (1997, 1999), and Albert Pujols (2008-2009) have done in the league in the last 80 years. Stanton's 25.0 home run to fly ball ratio is also the best in the majors since his debut in 2010, displaying the power and unprecedented strength that he has to get a quarter of his fly balls out of the ball park. After hitting 34 home runs in 2011 and popping 37 this season for Miami, Stanton joins just Mel Ott (1929, 1932), Eddie Mathews (1953-1956), Willie Mays (1954-1955), Frank Robinson (1956, 1959), Orlando Cepeda (1961-1962), Johnny Bench (1970, 1972), Vladimir Guerrero (1998-1999), Andruw Jones (2000-2001), Albert Pujols (2001-2004), Prince Fielder (2007-2008) as the only players to have two seasons with at least 34 home runs before the age of 25.

The first thing with Stanton that jumps out to you is undoubtedly his conspicuous power. He has that kind of truly remarkable and unrivaled force through the ball that it makes fans look upon him with awe, and opposing pitchers look upon him only with delight when they get to give him the free pass down to first base (his 24 intentional walks are the most in the NL), because of his unfair physical tools. Stanton, though, has evolved into a much more well rounded player than you would normally assume about a big, power-hitting slugger in the middle of a lineup that is there for power but not much else like a Jay Bruce, or a Chris Davis, or an Adam Dunn, who is on his way to becoming the worst ever 500-home hitter by a mile and a half and is going to awkwardly stand out more in that group than a father that doesn't know how to use twitter or an unknown Billy Campbell amongst the cast of The Rocketeer. While Stanton has his most power when he is pulling through the ball with his hips and driving the ball out to left field, his developing ability to hit the ball the other way has allowed him to get on base much more often than a typical slugger that hits a lot of home runs. The only players in the MLB this season with a batting average of .285 or above and at least 25 home runs are Victor Martinez (.333 batting average and 30 home runs), Jose Abreu (.317 batting average and 33 home runs), Jose Bautista (.286 batting average and 32 home runs), Adam Jones (.286 batting average and 25 home runs), Mike Trout (.285 batting average and 32 home runs), and of course Giancarlo (.288 batting average and 37 home runs). Even more impressive is the fact that Stanton has become much more patient at the plate and is really looking to zero in on pitches high in the strike zone and not chase off-speed stuff in the dirt, which has allowed him to go from an above average .350 to .360 on-base percentage guy to a .395 OBP batter this season, which is the 5th highest in the majors behind only Victor Martinez, Andrew McCutchen, Jose Bautista, and Paul Goldschmidt. It is also very helpful when you are so strong that you can hit righties, lefties, with runners in scoring position (.316 batting average with RISP in 2014), and just casually poke a ball out over the fence with ease. Stanton's defense could still improve out there in right field, but he does have an above average arm, and no team is going to complain about a solid defensive right fielder who just so happens to be having a year with an OPS of .950, 299 total bases, 105 runs batted in, and is leading the National League in virtually every offensive statistical category.

Despite all of his outstanding tools on the field, which are readily apparent to anybody that watches a single Marlins game, the real moment in which Stanton resonated with me and so many other fans were his comments about his Miami organization earlier this summer. Stanton said, "Five months [of good baseball with the Marlins playoff push this year] doesn't change five years [of losing season]... The way I felt last year, with the whole situation of losing and not play my best [he was still 4th in the NL in at-bats per home run], that was one of the worst feelings I ever had. I put it as a waste of time. I spent all that time in the offseason. To lose 100 games and to not do my best? It was like, 'What I do all that in the offseason for?'" At the same time, we're still not where we need to be to keep playing beyond the designed schedule... I want to be the only game on TV at the end of the day... That's still a long ways to go to be in the same conversation with the best of the best. I'm hungry for that." I don't think a fan or a front-office looking to build around a guy that will do anything to win could craft a much more perfect quote than that one from Stanton. So often in sports nowadays, we feel like the athletes are just going through the motions and making their money (Robinson Cano, for example, fielding a ground ball at second or running to first base looks like he is taking a leisurely stroll in the park and he is making 240 million dollars over the next 10 years in Seattle). Sports, after all, are a business, as so many people love to point out, and it is the way these athletes make a living, so I have no problem with them trying to make as much cash as they can attempt to do in their very short careers. With that being said, it just seems like in the sporting world today, some athletes do not live and die with the result on the field and it isn't a 'if I don't win this game, I'm going to have nightmares for the rest of my life about it and it will stick with me forever, so I'm going to do absolutely after I can to win this game' kind of proposition (remember when Gronk was partying just hours after the Pats lost in the Super Bowl to the Giants in 2011-2012). Obviously, life is bigger than sports, but it is sometimes refreshing to hear an athlete that is fed up with losing, showing everybody that he deeply cares about the results on the field and will do anything to change them. The Marlins have not made the playoffs since they beat the Yankees in the World Series in 2003 and they have finished under .500 for four straight seasons. In light of that, to hear their franchise player want to be around people who want to win as badly as he does, is exactly the type of desire that you can only dream a guy with the physical tools of Stanton would have about his team.

However, so much changed for the worse on Thursday night for the entire baseball world in the middle of Stanton's unparalleled season for a player at just the age of 24, heck, for any player regardless of age or league. It was the top of the 5th inning between the Milwaukee Brewers and the Miami Marlins from Miller Park with the Brew Crew up 4-0 and Mike Fiers on the mound for Milwaukee. Fiers threw a strike that Stanton took on the first pitch and the count moved to 0-1 (don't worry, though, because Stanton has a .364 career batting average on pitches coming from a 0-1 count, so he was still really looking to hit). The next pitch then resulted in something so devastating that only a few players in baseball history like Tony Conigliaro, Kirby Puckett, and Dickie Thon can truly relate to the feeling of the guy at the plate. Jonathan Lucroy was setting up over the middle part of the plate when Fiers completely missed the spot and his pitch went wildly sailing inside right towards Stanton in the batters box. Giancarlo, who was totally unsuspecting anything on the inner half of the plate, squared around like he was about to swing and saw the ball flying right at his helmet and he went tumbling down to the ground real hard after the fastball nailed right off the center of his face around his mouth area. Giancarlo was down in a heap, and blood was pouring everywhere onto the field from the slugger's face. I'm not sure which of these were the most horrifying sight about that hit-by-pitch: Stanton's legs swarming on the ground in miserable pain after getting plunked and needing to be taken off by a stretcher, seeing all the blood just dripping from his face and the grounds crew actually needing to delay the game to clean all the blood from the plate area, or the terrible sound that the ball made when it struck Stanton's face, which was just so painfully loud that you knew right away that Stanton caught one really badly.

Stanton's scary hit-by-pitch video

Let's get this out of the way first: Fiers in absolutely no way, shape, or form was trying to intentionally hit Stanton. He had been pitching a very nice game up until the 5th inning with just spreading out 3 hits and striking-out 7 Marlins batters (Miami has struck out more than any other team aside from the Cubs this season), so there would be no reason for him to go after a guy and ruin one of the best starts he had put together all season long in Milwaukee. The Brewers were also absolutely desperate for a win after losing 16 of their last 20 games and going from a 2.5 lead over the Cardinals and a 7 game advantage over the Pirates in the NL Central to trailing the Cards by 4 games and even falling behind Pittsburgh by 1.5 games in the division. In other words, Fiers would not be foolish enough to recklessly put guys on base in such an important game for a slumping team in September that needs to gain back the significant ground that it lost with its huge losing streak in August. You can just see on the replay that Lucroy was setting up over the middle of the plate with his mitt low in the zone, so it is plain and simple that Fiers just missed his location and lost total control of the pitch, and it was hard for Stanton to see the ball with his unique over the top delivery. Furthermore, it is not like the Brewers or Marlins, two teams in different divisions that have not exactly both been competing for the NL playoff spots over the years (they have made the postseason a combined 6 times out of the last 67 opportunities), have some bad blood that Fiers was trying to heat up or resolve in baseball's odd unwritten rules (that being said, everybody in the league does have some sort of bad blood with the always fiery Carlos Gomez). As if all of that wasn't enough, Fiers was so distraught over nailing Stanton and causing him a bad looking injury, that he plunked the next Marlins batter on the first pitch of his at-bat, clearly still shaken up and in complete shock over what had just transpired with Stanton. He seemed very remorseful after the game as well, profusely apologizing to Stanton and the Marlins in his interviews with the media and over twitter (speaking of remorse, do you know who isn't remorseful or contrite, Roger Goodell). However, none of that takes away from the unfortunate fact that for anybody that enjoys watching the game of baseball, Stanton is likely going to be out for the duration of the season with some serious facial fractures and month injuries.

The frightening injury to Stanton could also not have come at a worse time for a team like the Marlins, a club that has been trending upwards and has gotten itself back into the National League playoff race against all the odds and their 47 million dollar opening day payroll, the second lowest in the MLB (quite ironically, the Phillies, who are in dead last in the NL East, are paying more money to Ryan Howard and Cliff Lee alone than the entire Marlins roster). Despite the Nationals running away with the division, mainly due to their stretch of 10 consecutive victories in August that included 5 walk-off wins, unlike the Rangers, Twins, Red Sox, Astros, White Sox, Rays, Rockies, Diamondbacks, Cubs, Phillies, Padres, Reds, and Mets, Miami was still on the periphery of the hunt for October. Going into last night's contest at 71-73, Miami was 4.5 games behind the Pittsburgh Pirates for the second wild card spot in the NL, which is certainly not an insurmountable margin with a little less than a month still to play in the season if the right things go your way and you start to get really hot with 9 games left against the abysmal Phillies and Mets (trust me, as a Red Sox fan I know about teams coming back from big deficits in the wild card). In large part because of Stanton's hitting, the Marlins were able to climb their way back from a 44-52 start to the season with a very solid stretch of 27-21 baseball since July 20th to put them in striking distance of a playoff spot. They did all that with a pitching staff of five guys that nobody has ever heard of after the season-ending injury to stud Jose Fernandez, who was coming off one of the best seasons ever for a rookie pitcher with a 2.19 ERA, 2.73 FIP, and 0.979 WHIP, and actually having to play Jarrod Saltalamacchia and Garrrett Jones everyday and watch them strike out over and over again. Stanton was one of just two players on Miami with at least 15 home runs and an offensive WAR of at least 3.0 along with center fielder Marcell Ozuna, so I don't think it's a stretch to say Miami's season is all about over with at this point.

We are entering a new age of baseball right now in a post-steriod era with pitchers dominating the game at their best rate since the 1970's when the MLB likely had their best ever iteration of hurlers with several all-time greats like Bob Gibson, Gaylord Perry, Fergie Jenkins, Jim Palmer, Tom Seaver, Vida Blue, Bert Blyleven, Don Sutton, Steve Carlton, Nolan Ryan, Luis Tiant, Phil Nierko, Goose Gossage, and Dennis Eckersley (the league average ERA of 3.26 in 1972 is the second lowest behind only 1968 in the last 95 years of the category). Not too far behind, however, is 2014, where the 3.75 league average ERA to this point in the season is the lowest the MLB has seen in 22 years since 1992, the year that seven pitchers all had ERA's under 2.50 including Greg Maddux (2.18), Curt Schilling (2.35), and Roger Clemens (2.41). As if that wasn't enough, the K% (20.3%) along with the K/9 (7.72) and K/BB (2.65) rates are all respectively the highest they have ever been for a single-season in baseball history, the 3.76 FIP mark is the second lowest the majors has seen over the past 25 years, and hitters .247 batting average and pitchers 1.28 WHIP are the lowest they have been in 42 years since 1972. If those statistics didn't make it clear enough, the MLB needs guys like to Stanton to entertain everybody with their hitting prowess and big time power ability, which is becoming few and far between in this age of baseball.

All of those factors prompted Mike Redmond to say, "It was very scary. We're hoping he is going to be all right... It's devastating for us. Devastating. For his season to end like that, I mean, that's not good." But Redmond was wrong about that, however, because it is not just a devastating blow for the Miami Marlins, but it is a terrible loss for the entire sport of baseball, which was reliant on a guy like Stanton to take the reins as one of the MLB's next great stars. Now, Giancarlo is out for an extended period of time, and baseball loses one of its biggest names and driving forces behind getting people really invested in the game again. Without Stanton playing every day, it is like the NBA losing Durant or the NHL losing Crosby. As unfortunate as it is for the Marlins to lose their MVP star and likely fall out of the playoff picture, it is even worse for a sport like baseball that has been yearning for years for a transcendent power hitting star like Stanton to take shape. In echoing the words of Mike Redmond, 'It's devastating for the entire game' is what baseball leaders are probably saying right about now.

2014-2015 AFC East Predictions

AFC East:

The New England Patriots have dominated the AFC East unlike any other team in a single division in all of sports (basically, they have been the Microsoft of the AFC East). The Pats have won the division 11 of the past 13 years with the only exceptions being in 2002 when they went 9-7 with a second year Tom Brady - the last time they didn't have double-digit wins in a season - and in 2008 when they joined the 1985 Denver Broncos as the only teams to not make the playoffs despite winning at least 11 games in a season (the Seahawks won the NFC West with 7 wins in 2010 for perspective) after they went 11-5 with a Belichick is the true genius inspired Matt Cassel replacing an injured Tom Brady at quarterback for the entire season (ironically, the next year in 1986 the Broncos and John Elway had the same record in the AFC West and were actually the 2 seed in the conference, the same season they beat the Browns in "The Drive"). The Patriots have had an unprecedented run of success since Belichick ditched the Jets for New England in 2000 in a move somebody with true integrity like Jason Kidd would never do, as a 158-50 record over the past 11 years with 8 AFC Championship Game appearances, 5 Super Bowl appearances, and 3 Super Bowls is something that Browns and Lions fans wouldn't even be able to dream about because it seems so distant and fanciful to their doormat franchises. Tom Brady is one of the top 4 quarterbacks of all-time along with Johnny Unitas, Joe Montana, and Peyton Manning (apologizes to Otto Graham, John Elway, and Dan Marino) and Belichick is one of the top 8 greatest coaches ever along with legends Vince Lombardi, Paul Brown, George Halas, Tom Landry, Bill Walsh, Chuck Noll, and Don Shula (sorry Joe Gibbs, Curly Lambeau, and Bill Parcells).

However, it is a lot easier to be the class of your division when everybody around you is about as incompetent as Mark Wahlberg and Will Ferrell in The Other Guys. The Bills have not made the playoffs since they fatally lost the Music City Miracle to Frank Wycheck, Kevin Dyson, and Tennessee Titans all the way back in the 1999-2000 season. Over the past 14 years, the Bills have been 88-136 with 8 seasons of double-digit losses, have trotted out the likes of Alex Van Pely, Rob Johnson, J.P. Losman, Kelly Holcomb, Trent Edwards, Ryan Fitzpatrick, Brian Brohm, Jeff Tuel, Thad Lewis, and now EJ Manuel to play quarterback, seen a variety of their top picks excel on other teams whether it be Willis McGahee in Baltimore, Donte Whitner in San Francisco, Marshawn Lynch in Seattle, or Paul Posluszny in Jacksonville, and had Donald Trump and Bon Jovi make runs at buying the team (the only thing worse that could happen to the Bills is if they moved to Toronto and had Rob Ford replace Doug Marrone as head coach and Doug Whaley as general manager. On second thought, no longer having Doug Marrone patrolling the sidelines wouldn't be the worst of things for Buffalo). It has not been much better in Miami despite their owner Stephen Ross spending huge chucks of money on big name free agents to try and make the team relevant down in South Beach, as they have brought in guys like wide receiver Mike Wallace, left tackle Branden Albert, cornerbacks Brent Grimes and Cortland Finnegan, and defensive tackles Randy Starks and Earl Mitchell over the past two free agencies. The Fins have not won a playoff game since they beat the Colts in the 2000 Wild Card round with Jay Fiedler playing QB - their defense with Trace Armstrong, Jason Taylor, Zach Thomas, Larry Izzo, Sam Madison, and Brock Marion was ferocious - and unlike the Packers, who went from Brett Favre to Aaron Rodgers, the Colts who went from Peyton Manning to Andrew Luck, or the Oilers/Titans who went from Warren Moon to Steve McNair, they have still not found a reliable starter since Dan Marino retired in 1999, playing everybody from Sage Rosenfels to Tyler Thigpen over that time span. Finally, outside of the two seasons in which they somehow made back-to-back AFC Championship Game appearances in 2009 and 2010, the Jets have been full of drama and juicy story lines whether it be Tebow or Sanchez or Revis, but have not done all that much to challenge the Pats in the East. New York has not had a winning season in each of the past three years, the only other teams with that unfortunate mark are the Dolphins, Bills, Jaguars, Raiders, Bucs, and Rams, and Rex Ryan's time at MetLife Stadium may be running on thin ice.

New England Patriots:

Before any sentence can even be muttered about the Patriots offense in 2013-2014, it has come as a prerequisite to say, "Tom Brady had limited pass catching weapons," or "Tom Brady had a depleted receiving core," or "the Patriots lacked the options on the exterior to exploit a defense down the field," and that may be fair to say about the team (they did have the second most drops and second worst drops percentage in the NFL last season, only behind the Detroit Lions). Rob Gronkowski had two different surgeries on his forearm and then back surgery in the off-season, which caused him to miss the team's first 6 games, and then tore his ACL and MCL, which caused him to miss the club's last 3 games and the postseason. Aaron Hernandez went from 910 yards and 7 touchdowns in 2011 to being indicted for murder by 2013 and became the biggest criminal the country has seen since Phil Spector or Paul Kelly. Brady was left with a receiving core of rookies Aaron Dobson and Kenbrell Thompkins, who both dropped so many passes that they made Stevie Johnson look like he has sure hands (they were two of three NFL players along with Browns running back Chris Ogbonnaya with at least 7 drops and less than 40 catches in 2013-2014), and Danny Amendola, who was a free agency disappointment in coming over from St. Louis in the off-season. However, outside of three years with Randy Moss from 2007 to 2009 when Moss caught 47 touchdowns in three seasons including a record 23 in 2007 and the 2011 year when Welker, Gronk, and Hernandez combined for 33 touchdowns and each eclipsed 900 yards, Brady has never really had top end receivers and he has been just fine in New England. Now, that is not to say that if Brady had a receiving core like the one in Chicago with Brandon Marshall and Alshon Jeffery, or Washington with DeSean Jackson, Pierre Garcon, and Andre Roberts, or San Francisco with Boldin, Crabtree, Steve Johnson, Brandon Lloyd, and Vernon Davis that he wouldn't be a much more efficient quarterback. What I am saying, though, is that Brady's receiving core was better than many of the groups he has had in the past in New England and that Brady should be held accountable for some of the mistakes he made last year, particularly when he missed so many throws high against Denver in the first half of the Patriots 26-16 AFC Championship Game loss to the Broncos. Furthermore, Julian Edelman, was terrific last season and may have been just as lethal as Wes Welker in that slot receiver role for New England in helping the team constantly move the chains with short routes to the sidelines and slants over the middle, so exclusively blaming the receivers for some of the Pats offense struggles is just not warranted. Brady struggled against the blitz last season, especially on third down, and although that certainly had something to do with his receivers not getting off the line quick enough and making plays, Brady took too many sacks to cost him team opportunities to score in the opposing territory.

Despite all of that talk, the Patriots should still win the AFC East once again this season by several games (in the last four years, New England has won the division by 3 games, 5 games twice, and then 4 games last season), and despite some of his struggles last season, Tom Brady is not regressing to the mean and is still a top four NFL quarterback along with Manning, Rodgers, Brees. The Pats have completely moved on from the Aaron Hernandez fiasco, the most paranoid man since Joseph Stalin, and Brady should have more continuity and familiarity with his receiving core this year of Danny Amendola, Julian Edelman, Aaron Dobson, Kenbrell Thompkins, newly acquired Brandon LaFell from Carolina (sorry Cam Newton but your receivers are all but gone), and for Pats fans sake, hopefully a healthy Rob Gronkowski. Gronk has been limited in practice and will likely take some time to come back and return to his normal self, but the Pats really need the big tight end for the stretch run and the postseason more than anything else. His addition to New England's offense is so important and cannot be understated because of his value to Brady in unlocking defenses over the middle and in the red zone especially. At 6-6, Gronk is such a big body that it is almost impossible to get in front of him when he runs those inside seam routes and crossing routes over the center of the field, and with the new NFL rules, you also can't hit him up high to jar the ball loose (if you can't hit high, you have to hit low and remember T.J. Ward, now of the Denver Broncos, cost Gronk the end of his season last year when he got him down in the knees, the only spot you can hit now without getting flagged for unnecessary contact; thanks Roger Goodell). New England had a 58.11 red zone touchdown percentage in 2013-2014, which was still good enough for 8th in the NFL, but with Tom Brady at QB, only in 2009 did they have a lower touchdown success rate between the 20 and the goal line in the last 10 years and that had a lot to do with Gronk's absence. Clearly, in the red zone everything is compressed, so it is harder for smaller guys like Edelman and Amendola to find space and open field because everything is so clustered, and the two combined for just 8 touchdowns last season. New England dearly missed having the big body of Gronk to throw to up high in the red zone when things got tight and there were not as many open windows to throw to underneath. With Gronk returning, it not only gives Brady a dynamic option in the red zone and when he is under pressure and needs to get rid of the ball because of Gronk's ability to out muscle any defender whether it be a bigger but slower linebacker or a quicker but smaller safety (unless it is Kam Chancellor because he is just huge), but it will also create more room for guys like Amendola, Dobson, and Thompkins to go down the field with all of the attention that Gronk's presence down the middle of the field deservedly creates (his presence off the field also seemingly creates a lot of notice amongst people, but that is for another time). Obviously, the more time that Brady's line of Nate Solder, Josh Kline (replacing Logan Mankins), Ryan Wendell, Dan Connolly, and Sebastian Vollmer gives him, the better he will be at spreading the ball around and getting the running game going with their assortment of backs including Stevan "Nobody Lost More Fumbles Than Me Last Season" Ridley, Shane "I Am Such A Good Pass Catching Tailback Just Call Me Kevin Faulk 2.0" Vereen, Brandon Bolden, and James "Watch Out For Me Because I'm Good Even Though I Played Behind Montee Ball In College" White.

People often tend to forget with Tom Brady and the Pats offense, just how concentrated the club has been with their running game since Bill Belichick took over as head coach at the turn on the century. Obviously, the emphasis on the running game has gone away a little bit over the years with Brady maturing as a quarterback and the league rules changing in such a way where any time a defensive back touches a receiver, it is a holding or pass interference penalty. Nonetheless, New England is one of the more balanced teams in the NFL (something the Lions and Cowboys could learn from), and are at their best when they are able to move the sticks with the run game and then set up the play action for Brady when he has more time to set his feet and really step into his throws without defenders in his face. Only the Bills, Jets, Chargers, and Bengals averaged more rushing attempts per game than the Patriots last season in the AFC and that was only the case for Buffalo and New York out of necessity because you really don't want to see EJ Manuel and you really, really don't want to see Geno Smith sit back and throw the ball 35-40 times a contest unless you are the opposing defense. In 2012, New England led the league in total yards (6,846) and points per game (34.8) largely because their 9.2 rushing first downs per game led the league (it has still not been bettered by any other franchise over the past 11 seasons), but last year they averaged just 7.1 rushing first downs per contest and were down to 7th in total yardage in the NFL. The Pats have always liked to wear teams down in the Brady-Belichick days with the running game and then set up the pass as the game goes along, but they do have some offensive line question marks. New England traded long-time left guard Logan Mankins to the Tampa Bay Bucs because of some issues with contract restructuring in very Patriots like fashion and their replacement, Josh Kline, only started one game in his rookie season last year. Furthermore, Sebastian Vollmer is coming off a broken leg and missed the second half of the year in 2013-2014 with the injury. Offensively, however, the Patriots have Tom Brady and the other teams in the AFC East do not possess the same advantage, so scoring a lot of points will not be too tough for this Patriots team in the regular season, but they will have to be hitting on all cylinders to win their first Super Bowl since back in 2004 (it has been longer than you think). Time is of the essence for an aging Tom Brady, who is already 37 years old, but they should have no problem rolling through the AFC East and finishing with a 11-5 or 12-4 record like they do almost every year. I also say that in large part when you consider the fact that they will have Vince Wilfork and Jerod Mayo, the lynch pins of their defense, both returning from injuries that cost them their season in 2013, Darrelle Revis shutting down one side of the field at cornerback and bringing back Revis Island, and the very athletic Chandler Jones rushing the passer from the right defensive end spot in the Pats much improved 4-3 defense.

Miami Dolphins:

There are certain quarterbacks coming into this season that are a very delicate point in their careers amongst fans of the league and NFL teams, and if they play well, they will have faith restored in their ability to lead a club to the promise land, but if they don't have a good season, serious doubts about their future as a starting quarterback and the amount of success that they can have if the NFL may come into thinking amongst everybody involved with a particular franchise. That is not to say that if certain quarterbacks don't have a good season this year that they will no longer have a job as a starter in this league, although it could in some instances, but it does means that serious doubt will be cast over their ability to take a team deep into the postseason and clubs may need to re-evaluate if this is their quarterback of the future (for example, the Vikings did not see enough out of Matt Cassel or Christian Ponder and the Raiders saw nothing positive out of Terrelle Pryor and Matt Flynn in 2013 to give either team the confidence that any one of their respective quarterbacks could be the long term solution for the club behind center, so Minnesota took Teddy Bridgewater out of Louisville with the last pick of the first round despite some of his arm concerns and Oakland took big throwing Derek Carr from Fresno St. in the second round of the 2014 NFL draft despite some of his brother concerns in hopes that they can be the guy for the next couple of years). Some of those signal callers that are at a very make-or-break point this season include Jake Locker, Carson Palmer, and Jay Cutler and possibly if you want to stretch this category out a little bit, Andy Dalton if he gets to the playoffs and fails to win a playoff game for the 4th straight season, Robert Griffin III (Kirk Cousins is right on his back in Washington), and even Eli Manning after his 27 interception laughing stock of a season last year although I think he needs maybe one or two more poor years to put him at a breaking point because of his two Super Bowl wins against Tom Brady and the Pats in 2007 and then again in 2011. However, the first name that comes to mind under this classification of quarterbacks is certainly Miami Dolphins third-year starter out of Texas A&M, the new factory for quarterbacks, Ryan Tannehill. After a 7-9 year as a rookie and a 8-8 season that came up just shy of the postseason in 2013-2014 because of some really bad losses at the end of the season including a 19-0 defeat to the Bills in week 16 and a 20-7 clunker against the Jets in the final week of the season at Sun Life Stadium, Tannehill needs to prove himself down in Miami this year for the Dolphins to put their complete trust in him going forward as their franchise QB. Tannehill throws a really nice ball, and he has a strong arm to get the pigskin down the field in a hurry, even when he is on the run and outside of the pocket, which is perfectly suited for a team that has the down the field receiving threat of Mike Wallace breaking the top off defensive coverages with his outstanding speed. Tannehill spreads the ball out nicely, despite too many of his passes getting tipped at the line of scrimmage (he had one game in a 2012 loss when two of his tipped passes against the Texans resulted in picks), and he isn't afraid to gun some throws into tight coverage, but like many young quarterbacks, his decision making needs to improve, and he needs to get rid of the ball quicker while not staring down receivers when doing so from the pocket. Tannehill is probably a 4th level QB and somewhere in the range of 20-25 amongst NFL single callers and he will have to make a little bit of a jump into the level of Nick Foles, Alex Smith, and Andy Dalton in order for the Fins to be all-in on him.

As much as this is a make-or-break year for Ryan Tannehill in year three, the Dolphins are almost at a franchise crossroads entering the 2014-2015 season because they either need to make some strides forward or change the way their roster is shaped under new general manager Dennis Hickey because the Bills, Browns, Lions, and possibly Texans and Redskins are the only teams that have been less successful than Miami since 2000. The Fins have been so mediocre since Marino's retirement 14 years ago with a record of 107-117 since the turn of the century, not good enough to challenge in the AFC with the likes of the Pats, Colts, Steelers, Ravens, and Broncos but also not bad enough to blow the whole thing up and start all over again (they have finished between 6 and 8 wins for 5 straight seasons since 2009 and have only had three top 7 draft picks since 1993). The Dolphins have tried for years to put some nice complimentary pieces around their quarterbacks on the offensive side of the ball, and despite past failures with guys like Jake Grove, Ernest Wilford, and to a certain extent Brandon Marshall, they have tried to make some strides in improving their offensive line, which was just terrible last season, and receiving group. Miami signed Branden Albert to a 5-year, 47 million dollar contract in the off-season to hold down their left tackle spot, which was a good move since Albert is coming off his best season with the Chiefs in 2013, and drafted Ja'Wuan James out of Tennessee in the first round, who is a much better pass protector than dominate force in the run game. The Dolphins desperately needed some new linemen to keep Ryan Tannehill on his feet and Albert and James should provide that in the passing game. Last season, Tannehill was hit more than almost any other quarterback in the NFL and had very little time in the pocket to go through his progressions because of constant pressure in his face. Miami was dead last in the NFL in QB sacks per game at 3.6, the most in a year since 2006, and in plays without the opposition sending extra men on a blitz, teams were still able to sack Tannehill 30 times, the most in the league by a good margin. Tannehill really struggled with his decision making when he faced pressure in 2013, which he did on nearly 23 percent of his passing attempts, so Miami was often put into long down-and-distances because of sacks and errant throws. With Mike Pouncey on the PUP list while still recovering from hip surgery, the Fins will be starting five entirely different offensive lineman from last season, which is a positive sign in the sense that they were proactive in the off-season and didn't just sit back after their QB was constantly knocked around last season like the Texans did with David Carr, but it is also a little bit worrying since they have barely worked together as an offensive unit. If the Dolphins are able to run the ball this season with new back from Denver Knowshon Moreno along with second-year tailback Lamar Miller, it will take a lot of pressure off the back of Tannehill. The Fins were only ahead of the Browns, Steelers, and Ravens in the AFC in rushing yards per game in 2013-2014 and were 27th in the NFL in rushing touchdowns last year, which put everything on the shoulders of Tannehill. They will need to be more balanced this year to help out Tannehill and get their offensive line pushing forward in the running game.

Much like how their offense has some really nice features (their receiving core with Mike Wallace, Brian Hartline, and Charles Clay) and also some real question marks (offensive line and running game) and would be categorized overall as fairly average to below average, the same can be said for their defense and their entire team in general (essentially, they are headed for another 7-9 or 8-8 season and a year of mediocrity). The Dolphins were 24th in rushing yards allowed per game last year at nearly 125 yards and as a Colts fans, I know what it is like to have opposing teams tail backs constantly running all over you on Sundays, so they need to improve on that front or feel the misery I have become so accustomed too over the years (as an optimistic Colts fan, however, with the newly acquired 30-million dollar Arthur Jones from Baltimore, Montori Hughes, and Cory Redding up front in the 3-4, Indy is going to have their best run defense since they ranked 15th in rushing yards per game in 2007 and went 13-3). Like many teams with below average rush defenses, Miami does have some dynamic pass rushers to get to the quarterback because their defensive ends just shoot down their lanes on the outside of offensive tackles and get to the QB on occasion, especially in obvious passing situations, but also leave openings in between the guard and the tackle in the running game. Aldon Smith, DeMarcus Ware, and Miami defensive end Cameron Wake are the only defenders to have two seasons of 14 or more sacks since 2010 and only Robert Mathis and Mario Williams had more sacks in the AFC than Miami's other defensive end, Olivier Vernon, last season, who came up with 11.5 including 7 in his last 7 games. In the secondary, any team that has to be heavily reliant on the very erratic and unpredictable Cortland Finnegan, like Miami is going to have to do this year with second-year players Will Davis and Jamar Taylor as their only other main cornerbacks, is a little nerve wrecking. Miami probably did make an upgrade in bringing in safety Louis Delmas from the Lions and letting the worse Chris Clemons, not the former Seattle and now Jacksonville one, go to Houston, but it may not make up enough for some of the defensive woes that the team has in the run game and with the unreliable Finnegan at the other starting corner spot across from Brent Grimes. Expect another year of .500 football from a very mediocre Miami Dolphins team and more head scratching and pondering of what to do moving froward with the club.

New York Jets/Buffalo Bills:

It is the Jets and the Bills. They are starting Geno Smith and EJ Manuel at quarterback respectively, two guys who make me confident in the abilities of Shaun Hill and Ryan Fitzpatrick. Do I need to say anything more? They are actually two teams that have a lot of similarities when you really come to think about it. New York and Buffalo both have second year quarterbacks that did not show nearly enough in their rookie seasons to give their fan bases any confidence in them going forward. When Manuel was on the field last year and not dealing with his knee injury, he showed his athleticism and ability to throw the ball on the run, but he still needs to improve on his pocket awareness this upcoming season. Geno Smith looked out of his comfort zone at times last season, like the game was just moving too fast for him, and he will have to be, at the bare minimum, a servicable quarterback for the Jets to do anything in 2014-2015. The Jets and Bills were also two teams that ranked at the top of the AFC in rushing play percentage in 2013 despite the fact that Chris Ivory's only good game came against the Saints, his former team, and C.J. Spiller single-handled ruined 30 percent of all fantasy football leagues last season when he went late in the first round and had 2 touchdowns all year long and had 23 rushing yards or less in 5 out of the 15 games he played in for Buffalo. The clubs have some serious defensive problems heading into this season despite the Jets very solid interior and Bills above average secondary, as New York's cornerback situation is in such disarray that Dimitri Patterson ran away from the team in fear of what was going to come in the future and the Bills lack the quality linebackers that you need in a 4-3 defense to stop the run (they ranked 28th in rushing yards allowed per game in 2013 and that was with a Marcell Dareus that didn't come to camp way overweight and a healthy Kiko Alonso, who will be out for the entirety of the season with a torn ACL). New York and Buffalo also have new wide receivers to help their young quarterbacks, as the Jets spent the big bucks for Eric Decker and the Bills traded up with the Browns to acquire Sammy Watkins. Nonetheless, expect 5-11 or 6-10 seasons for New York and Buffalo and top 10 picks in the 2015 Draft with questions circling around the teams all season long about future quarterback prospects such as Jameis Winston, Marcus Mariota, Brett Hundley, Connor Cook, and Kevin Hogan. Also expect Rex Ryan and Doug Marrone to be looking for jobs this off-season and Muhammad Wilkerson and Sheldon Richardson of the Jets defensive line and Mario Williams, Kyle Williams, and Leodis McKelvin of the Bills defense wishing they had more capable offenses to help them win some more football games. New York football teams are in for another tough season, especially if the new look Giants offense mirrors their miserable performance in the pre-season and the Jets and Bills play the sub-par football must people expect from them in 2014-2015.