Clearly the biggest story of the season, and it had a huge impact on the season. Ryan Braun was the poster boy of the scandal by far being the first of the 14 players to be suspended. Braun was suspended for 65 games and will return to the Brewers lineup in 2014. Alex Rodriguez who is going to appeal his 211 game suspension was the other big name player on this list. I honestly don't get why he is appealing. It's not like A-Rod (or in this case A-Roid) has that much of a career left. Apparently the reason he's appealing is that he wants to protect his legacy. What legacy does this guy have anymore really? The guy has already admitted to taking steroids, and clearly most likely like the rest of the players on this Biogenesis list don't have any shot of getting into the Baseball Hall of Fame. The other 12 players (former Brewers prospect Nelson Cruz, Everth Cabrera, Jhonny Peralta, Antonio Bastardo, Francisco Cervelli, Jordany Valdespin, Jesus Montero, Cesar Puello, Sergio Escalona, Fernando Martinez, Faustino De Los Santos, and Jordan Noberto) all agreed to more minor suspensions of 50 games. As for Ryan Braun from a Brewers point of view, I'm glad that Dino Laurenzi Jr. finally got the apology he deserved. For Braun as a player, this sort of thing is going to be hard to come back from. There will be mixed reactions at Miller Park come April.
Now from a team standpoint:
This is the feel good story of the 2013 season. The Pittsburgh Pirates after 21 seasons have finally gotten over that threshold that could get over for some many years. They finally did it...They finally for the first time in a while have a season over .500. It's a great story. This reminds of the 2005 Brewers because I remember the Brewers used to have one of these streaks and it was right during the middle of the Pirates streak. It also seemed like the Brewers were fighting with the Pirates for a while on who was going to end that streak first. It's a great thing for this franchise especially after how rough the last two season for them have been. In 2011, the Pirates were up there in the division race in July and faltered down the stretch. In 2012, the same thing happened to them again. Going into 2013, the Pirates were trying to avoid that second half debacle again, and guess what it didn't happen. This team didn't just do it with Andrew McCutchen, Pedro Alvarez, Starling Marte, and Neil Walker. They did it with pitching. Their starting pitching was fantastic all season with Francisco Liriano (I do admit that I did think that was great signing before the season even started), AJ Burnett, Wandy Rodriguez, and Jeff Locke. They did through having a good bullpen as well, Mark Melancon and Jason Grilli were dominant all season long. That is what got this team over this hump.
3. LOS ANGELES DODGERSGoing into the 2013 season, the Los Angeles Dodgers had really high expectations. They spent over $200 million in the off-season by getting Zach Greinke, the Korean import Hyun-Jin Ryu, and also extended Clayton Kershaw's contract. Add in the late 2012 blockbuster trades that included Carl Crawford, Adrian Gonzalez, Hanley Ramirez, and Josh Beckett. This team was poised for a run at the NL West and maybe even the World Series. The 2013 season didn't start off that way for Dodgers, they struggled out of the gate and looked out of it at the start of July. Things were going so rough for this team even Don Mattingly's job was getting called into question. If you want to point one moment in the Dodgers season that gave them a bit of a spark it was Yasiel Puig. The young clutch hitter came up from the minors and gave the team a spark. Ever since Puig came up they dominated and they are in the playoff race.
The story of the 2012 season was clearly the Oakland Athletics. They came out of no where last year, and the big question going into 2013 was if they were going to continue it and that was most importantly not a fluke and it wasn't. Their young pitches like Jarrod Parker continued to pitch. Yoenis Cespedes, Josh Donaldson, and Josh Reddick continued to hit. Former Brewers journeyman Grant Balfour continued to save the day and close games for the A's. For one thing, Grant Balfour of all people man he's a great closer now. I remember when he was up with the Brewers and he didn't pitch well there. He got traded to Tampa and now has found a home in Oakland. It's amazing what this team has been able to do the last two seasons after looking like they were going to go no where prior to the 2012 season. Bob Melvin is doing a excellent job managing this team. It's really impressive that they are winning with guys little pieces like Jarrod Parker, Josh Donaldson, Yoenis Cespedes, Josh Reddick, Grant Balfour, and Chris Young..
This team may not be a surprise to some people, but they kind of are to me considering I picked them to finish last in the American League East prior to the season. It's really impressive that they went from a worst to first team in 2013. Don't give me wrong, the Red Sox have a lot of great pieces in David Ortiz, Dustin Pedroia, and Jacob Ellsbury, I just overlooked this team and didn't expect much out of them because of how good Toronto looked at the begin of the season and how the rest of the division looked. I kind of looked at this team and so a young team because of Will Middlebrooks among others. Now I look at them and I see can honestly say they proved me wrong. Who expected Clay Buchholz to pitch so well this season..not me. Who thought they'd pick up Jake Peavy from the Red Sox to bolster that rotation of John Lester and Ryan Dempster. They also have some experienced veterans on their team with Shane Victorino, Mike Carp, and Jonny Gomes. Amazing year for the Red Sox especially with the story that they went from worst to first in their division.
In a story similar to the Boston Red Sox, I didn't expect much out of Terry Francona's club to start the season. I wasn't sure what to expect out of Ubaldo Jimenez because of his recent struggles. I knew that they had some great pieces that they picked up with Nick Swisher, Michael Bourn, Jason Giambi and Mark Reynolds. Did I expect them in the playoff race no I did not. Justin Masterson led the team with 14 wins and Ubaldo Jimenez had 13. Those two pitchers carried that rotation. Newcomer Nick Swisher led the Indians in home runs and Carlos Santana wasn't too far behind with 20. Jason Kipnis had a good year hitting 17 home runs and driving in 84. So this team proved they could hit and pitch all season and made it into the playoffs.
Every year we at least have one play in game. Well at least for divisions. We've had a few times in previous seasons with the American League Central and the National League West. Since adding two more playoff teams into the mix last year and adding in the Wild Card One Game Playoff round. Whoever thought in the second year of it being in the game of baseball that we would see a play in game for one of the two wildcards in the American League. Amazing. It's also incredible that it could have been a three way tiebreaker. This just shows how good this playoff format is going to be. Teams are going to be in it until the very end and it showed with the Cleveland Indians, Tampa Bay Rays and Texas Rangers and how that finished this year. Obviously, Cleveland clinched one of the two wild cards in the American League on the final day of the season. Obviously, Tampa Bay and Texas are playing for the 2nd wild card spot. I would have loved to see a three way tie for the Wild Card spots because it would just have meant more baseball and more excitement.
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