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Everything posted by Steve Drumwright
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The World Baseball Classic begins March 4 with Pool C in Tokyo. This pool has a dramatic time difference, which is why some teams will play what seems like two games on the same day (see the schedule below), when in fact they are on different days. Tokyo is 14 hours ahead of Eastern time (soon to be 13 with daylight saving time Sunday) and 17 hours ahead of Pacific. Wednesday's game: Chinese Taipei vs. Australia, 10 p.m. ET (FS1) Thursday's games: Czechia vs. South Korea, 5 a.m. ET (FS1), Australia vs. Czechia, 10 p.m. ET (FS1) Travis Bazzana, Australia The 23-year-old second baseman, who was the No. 1 overall pick in the 2024 draft by the Cleveland Guardians, makes his WBC debut as his country's top player. Bazzana only played in three Cactus League games this spring, going 2-for-8 with a homer. Ticketed to begin 2026 at Triple-A, where he finished with 26 games last year, Bazzana could be on track for a midseason promotion if he hits like he has done throughout his amateur career, including a .360/.497/.660 career slash line at Oregon State. An oblique injury interrupted his 2025, in which he played at three stops and had a put up a .245/.389/.424 slash line with nine homers, 39 RBIs, and 12 steals in 84 games. Australia advanced out of pool play for the first time in 2023. Chieh Hsien Chen, Chinese Taipei The 32-year-old outfielder and captain of Taiwan's team is playing in his second straight WBC. He represented his home country very well in the 2023 tournament, putting together a .357/.438/.643 slash line in four games. He is a 10-year veteran of the Chinese Professional Baseball League, posting a .337/.413/.443 slash line all while playing for the Uni-President 7-Eleven Lions. There isn't much power in his game (career high of eight), but he does get on base. Chinese Taipei is coming off a surprising Premier12 championship in 2024, upsetting Japan in the gold-medal game, and will be looking to advance out of pool play for just the second time in six WBC trips. Hyeseong Kim, South Korea This is a big spring for the 27-year-old infielder-outfielder for the Los Angeles Dodgers. In his second season since coming over from the Korea Baseball Organization, Kim is one of a handful of MLB players on the roster and is looking to get a foothold with the Dodgers. He started last season at Triple-A before getting a May call-up, then dealt with bursitis in his left shoulder that landed him on the injured list. Kim only played in 71 games but had a nice .280/.314/.385 slash line with three homers and 17 RBIs in 170 plate appearances. Perhaps playing for his country will give Kim a springboard for the MLB season. Whole Team, Czechia While Czechia might rank at or near the bottom in terms of the talent brought to play in the WBC, there will not be a more fun team to watch. This roster is a bunch of guys with regular jobs who have elevated the country's status in the baseball world after winning its debut game in 2023, beating China 8-5. There are electrians and firefighters who led Czechia to a bronze medal, the country's first, at the 2025 European Baseball Championships. -
With most rosters in a finished form as spring training rapidly approaches, the first ZiPS standings of 2026 are out. And as expected, the NL Central will be a dogfight between the three-time defending champion Milwaukee Brewers and the Chicago Cubs, who have finished second to the Crew in each of those years. Will that change in 2026? ZiPS, the projection system developed by Dan Szymborski of FanGraphs, has the Brewers and Cubs once again in the top two spots, only with the team from Chicago having a very slight projection edge. ZiPS has the Cubs going 87-75 with the Brewers one game back at 86-76. The Cincinnati Reds, as expected, will finish third, per the projections, at 78-84, with the St. Louis Cardinals at 77-85 and Pittsburgh Pirates bringing up the rear at 74-88. The NL Central is the tightest of MLB's six divisions, with 13 wins separating first place and last place. The AL Central was next with a 14-win gap. These results were the result of "a million simulations," not just through number-crunching. The Cubs won the division 42.1% of the time and the Brewers 40.3%. When not winning the Central, the Brewers earned a wild-card spot in 20.9% of simulations and the Cubs 20.5%. Overall, the Cubs made the playoffs at a 62.5% rate and the Crew 61.2%. As for chances of winning the World Series, the Cubs came out on top at 5%, with the Brewers at 4.5%. In case you are wondering how the recent Freddy Peralta trade by the Crew affected the projections, Symborski said it only had a minimal effect. During his write-up on the team projections that came out Dec. 9, Szymborski said the Brewers would win between 86 and 94 games. That fits with this standings projection, albeit on the bottom end. Most projection systems do tend to have lower numbers across the board. For instance, only four teams are projected to win 90 or more games, led by the two-time defending World Series champion Los Angeles Dodgers at 96-66. Szymborski explains that by saying: "These are median standings, meaning that they represent every team’s 50th-percentile projection." Over the last three years, the Brewers won the division with 92, 93, and an MLB-best 97 wins, with the Cubs second at 83, 83, and 92 victories. The rivalry took another step with the first postseason meeting, with the Brewers winning the NL Wild Card Series in a decisive third game. Regarding the Peralta trade to the New York Mets, Symborski said the Brewers are "looking strong even without Freddy Peralta in large part because I’m giving more playing time to the players ZiPS likes than I usually do, as my failure to do so has been the biggest reason the system has underestimated Milwaukee in recent years." The Cubs, meanwhile, "remain very strong, with ZiPS mainly concerned about the rotation," Szymborski wrote. As for the remaining three teams, Szymborski said the Reds, Cardinals, and Pirates have "serious enough problems" that it is very unlikely they challenge the Brewers and the Cubs. -
Image courtesy of © Benny Sieu-Imagn Images / © Benny Sieu-Imagn Images With most rosters in a finished form as spring training rapidly approaches, the first ZiPS standings of 2026 are out. And as expected, the NL Central will be a dogfight between the three-time defending champion Milwaukee Brewers and the Chicago Cubs, who have finished second to the Crew in each of those years. Will that change in 2026? ZiPS, the projection system developed by Dan Szymborski of FanGraphs, has the Brewers and Cubs once again in the top two spots, only with the team from Chicago having a very slight projection edge. ZiPS has the Cubs going 87-75 with the Brewers one game back at 86-76. The Cincinnati Reds, as expected, will finish third, per the projections, at 78-84, with the St. Louis Cardinals at 77-85 and Pittsburgh Pirates bringing up the rear at 74-88. The NL Central is the tightest of MLB's six divisions, with 13 wins separating first place and last place. The AL Central was next with a 14-win gap. These results were the result of "a million simulations," not just through number-crunching. The Cubs won the division 42.1% of the time and the Brewers 40.3%. When not winning the Central, the Brewers earned a wild-card spot in 20.9% of simulations and the Cubs 20.5%. Overall, the Cubs made the playoffs at a 62.5% rate and the Crew 61.2%. As for chances of winning the World Series, the Cubs came out on top at 5%, with the Brewers at 4.5%. In case you are wondering how the recent Freddy Peralta trade by the Crew affected the projections, Symborski said it only had a minimal effect. During his write-up on the team projections that came out Dec. 9, Szymborski said the Brewers would win between 86 and 94 games. That fits with this standings projection, albeit on the bottom end. Most projection systems do tend to have lower numbers across the board. For instance, only four teams are projected to win 90 or more games, led by the two-time defending World Series champion Los Angeles Dodgers at 96-66. Szymborski explains that by saying: "These are median standings, meaning that they represent every team’s 50th-percentile projection." Over the last three years, the Brewers won the division with 92, 93, and an MLB-best 97 wins, with the Cubs second at 83, 83, and 92 victories. The rivalry took another step with the first postseason meeting, with the Brewers winning the NL Wild Card Series in a decisive third game. Regarding the Peralta trade to the New York Mets, Symborski said the Brewers are "looking strong even without Freddy Peralta in large part because I’m giving more playing time to the players ZiPS likes than I usually do, as my failure to do so has been the biggest reason the system has underestimated Milwaukee in recent years." The Cubs, meanwhile, "remain very strong, with ZiPS mainly concerned about the rotation," Szymborski wrote. As for the remaining three teams, Szymborski said the Reds, Cardinals, and Pirates have "serious enough problems" that it is very unlikely they challenge the Brewers and the Cubs. View full article
