Midseason Update: How are MLB preseason predictions looking?

Jul. 10—Earlier this week we officially reached the halfway point of the Major League Baseball season, which makes this a perfect opportunity to revisit our preseason predictions from back in April.

How are they looking? Let's just say some have worked out better than others.

Here's a rundown of all of our predictions, including season standing projections and award picks. We'll revisit the playoff picks once October gets closer, but for the expanded field itself, teams marked with two asterisks indicate a bye to the divisional series while teams with one asterisk indicate an appearance in the Wild Card round.

Preseason MLB Standings Projections

AL East

* Toronto Blue Jays 98-64

* Boston Red Sox 93-69

* Tampa Bay Rays 92-70

* New York Yankees 90-72

* Baltimore Orioles 60-102

Oops. I think we may have underestimated the Yankees a little bit. While we did have them right in the mix with the other AL East contenders and in the playoff field, they're likely going to finish with close to 20 more wins than what they're pegged at here. The rest is shaping up pretty well, as the Red Sox, Blue Jays and Rays are all on pace to finish with around 90 wins and all three could easily finish as Wild Card teams. Credit to Baltimore as well, they'll finish last but they've been much better than expected.

AL Central

* Chicago White Sox 92-70

* Minnesota Twins 86-76

* Detroit Tigers 80-82

* Cleveland Guardians 78-84

* Kansas City Royals 75-87

Definitely a mixed bag here. The Twins have indeed emerged as playoff contenders and the Royals do stink, but everyone else has surprised in one way or another. The White Sox have been a huge disappointment, the Guardians have exceeded expectations and the Tigers have just been brutal. The additions of Javy Baez and Eduardo Rodriguez haven't made a difference in Detroit just yet, and it speaks to how poorly the Tigers offense has been that 39-year-old Miguel Cabrera is the only regular who currently has an OPS+ above league average. Just an absolute mess.

AL West

* Houston Astros 93-69

* Seattle Mariners 87-75

* Los Angeles Angels 86-76

* Texas Rangers 76-86

* Oakland Athletics 72-90

This could very well wind up being the correct order in the standings, but there's no doubt our hope of seeing a contending Angels team has gone up in smoke. Los Angeles has collapsed since its strong start and will now be lucky to get back over .500, much less contend for the third Wild Card spot. The Mariners have been pretty disappointing too but at least they've come on strong recently to get back into the conversation. The Astros are going to easily win the division and may top 100 wins too.

NL East

* Atlanta Braves 92-70

* New York Mets 90-72

* Philadelphia Phillies 88-74

* Miami Marlins 80-82

* Washington Nationals 74-88

Nailed it? The Mets and Braves are on pace to win more games than we have them at here, but this is shaping up to be an excellent division race down the stretch. The Mets have been great and just got Max Scherzer back, and the Braves have been on an absolute tear since the start of June. The Phillies have also picked up the pace to get back into the Wild Card conversation, and the Marlins have a lot going for them too even if they don't have much hope of seriously contending. The Nationals at least still have Juan Soto.

NL Central

* Milwaukee Brewers 93-69

* St. Louis Cardinals 84-78

* Chicago Cubs 77-85

* Cincinnati Reds 75-87

* Pittsburgh Pirates 65-97

Pretty much nailed this too, only I don't think we appreciated just how bad the Reds would be after their brutal offseason fire sale. Cincinnati is on pace to lose more than 100 games for the first time since 1982 and for only the second time in 141 seasons, and the only storyline of note they've been involved with outside of their struggles has been the Tommy Pham-Joc Pederson Fantasy Football slapping incident. The Brewers look set to win the NL Central again and the Cardinals should be in the Wild Card conversation the rest of the way.

NL West

* Los Angeles Dodgers 101-61

* San Diego Padres 87-75

* San Francisco Giants 86-76

* Colorado Rockies 72-90

* Arizona Diamondbacks 68-94

To the surprise of no one, the Dodgers are really good again and look set to reclaim the NL West title after the Giants' stole the crown with last year's incredible run. The Giants have fallen back down to Earth and the Padres have bounced back following last year's disastrous collapse to establish themselves as strong playoff contenders. If anything we may have undersold the Padres, who are on pace to finish with close to 95 wins. It will be interesting to see how they stack up against whichever team finishes second in the NL East, whoever tops the Wild Card will host the best-of-three first round playoff series and given the Mets and Braves pitching that's a series San Diego will really want to play at home.

MLB Award Predictions

MVP

AL: Vladimir Guerrero Jr., Toronto Blue Jays

NL: Juan Soto, Washington Nationals

Guerrero and Soto are both having great seasons, but they aren't going to win MVP. Guerrero's slash line has fallen well short of the astronomical heights it reached last year, and he doesn't have much of a case compared to Aaron Judge, Shohei Ohtani, Mike Trout, Jose Ramirez or Rafael Devers. Soto is in a similar spot where he's once again on pace to finish with more walks than strikeouts and top 30 home runs, but his average hovering around .230 isn't going to cut it, especially not with Paul Goldschmidt, Manny Machado and Nolan Arenado all having the seasons they're having. If I were to revise my picks now I'd go with Judge and Goldschmidt, but don't hold me to that.

Cy Young Award

AL: Gerrit Cole, New York Yankees

NL: Walker Buehler, Los Angeles Dodgers

Funny story, my original pick for NL Cy Young was Jacob deGrom, but the day before our preseason special was published his latest injury was announced so we shifted over to Buehler. Well, that's not going to happen either, as Buehler was good but not great for two months and then landed on the injured list himself. As of now this looks like Sandy Alcantara's to lose, the Miami ace has been outstanding and has pitched into the eighth inning nine times in 17 starts. As for the AL Cy Young, Tampa Bay's Shane McClanahan has emerged as the leader of the pack, though Ohtani has put together an incredible run on the mound over the past month.

Manager of the Year

AL: Rocco Baldelli, Minnesota Twins

NL: Bob Melvin, San Diego Padres

I think these are the guys! Baldelli has the Twins on track to go from worst to first in the AL Central and outside of Aaron Boone with the Yankees or Dusty Baker with the Astros there aren't too many other obvious contenders. Maybe Terry Francona with the Guardians? We'll see how things play out in the second half with them. As for the National League, Bob Melvin was already regarded as one of baseball's best managers and he's taken a Padres team that underachieved badly a year ago and turned them around. Buck Showalter has a case with the Mets too but Melvin seems like a pretty clear favorite here.

Rookie of the Year

AL: Bobby Witt Jr., Kansas City Royals

NL: Seiya Suzuki, Chicago Cubs

Bobby Witt Jr. has a bright future, but he isn't going to win AL Rookie of the Year. Barring something crazy it looks like that honor will go to Seattle's Julio Rodriguez, who has just been awesome. The 21-year-old is on pace to reach 30 home runs and 40 stolen bases, a feat only Mike Trout has ever accomplished as a rookie and only 14 players have ever accomplished period. Seiya Suzuki might have had a chance in the National League, but his missing a month with a sprained finger will significantly set back his candidacy. There aren't any runaway candidates like Rodriguez in the NL but Atlanta pitcher Spencer Strider has been a strikeout machine since he moved from the bullpen to the rotation in late May.

Winckowski: Not easily impressed

Give Red Sox rookie Josh Winckowski credit for this, he's not afraid to speak his mind.

Over the past week Winckowski has made waves for his unfiltered thoughts on both Chicago's Wrigley Field and the New York Yankees lineup he faced on Thursday. The obvious conclusion? He's not easily impressed.

"To be honest a little underwhelming. Fenway kind of has a presence to it and I really didn't get that here to be honest," Winckowski said of Wrigley Field. "I said to my mom last night this place is very stock standard if you ask me, I didn't really feel anything to be honest, it just felt like another ballpark."

And facing the high-powered Yankees lineup?

"They were missing Judge tonight and Rizzo, I think those two guys lengthen that lineup a huge amount," Winckowski said after allowing six runs, including a grand slam. "I'm not going to say the guys they had in there today are bad by any means but it felt like another big league lineup."

You could argue whether or not Winckowski was right on either point, or if he even had the right to weigh in at all, but in an era where athletes are becoming more cautious about what they say, it's refreshing to see someone come along who isn't afraid to let it rip.

Kavadas lighting it up

Niko Kavadas probably isn't a name most Red Sox fans are familiar with. He was an 11th round pick out of Notre Dame in last year's MLB Draft and only played 15 games in 2021 in the Florida Complex League and with Low-A Salem.

Now he might be the hottest hitter in the entire Red Sox system.

Kavadas has been an absolute monster in his first full season of professional baseball. He was dominant in 59 games with Salem, hitting 14 home runs with a 1.062 OPS while drawing nearly as many walks (54) as he had strikeouts (70). The 23-year-old corner infielder was subsequently promoted to High-A Greenville and has continued to mash at the higher level, smashing five home runs in his first 12 games with a 1.339 OPS.

He was especially good in the month of June, batting .400 with 14 home runs, 34 RBI and a 1.550 OPS in 25 games. According to SoxProspects.com's Chris Hatfield, that's the highest OPS by a Red Sox minor leaguer in a single month in the last 15 years, and unsurprisingly he was named the Carolina League's June Player of the Month by Minor League Baseball.

Email: mcerullo@northofboston.com. Twitter: @MacCerullo.