Throughout the offseason, the CBS Sports MLB experts will bring you a weekly Batting Around roundtable breaking down pretty much anything. The latest news, a historical question, thoughts about the future of baseball, all sorts of stuff. Last time, we debated whether the Yankees or Red Sox would return to the postseason sooner. This week we're going to tackle first time champions after the Rangers won the first World Series in franchise history. As a reminder, the Brewers, Mariners, Padres, Rays, and Rockies are the five teams without a championship.
Which team will be next to win its first World Series?
R.J. Anderson: I think any of those teams (except the Rockies) would be an acceptable answer. I'm inclined to say the Padres. I like it when the universe rewards owners for spending money, and I think they'll rebound next season. The Rays and Brewers are usually in the hunt, giving themselves more bites at the apple, and the Mariners are trying to get to that stage -- who knows, they just might. If I had to rank them right this minute, I'd go Padres-Brewers-Rays-Mariners-Rockies, with the Brewers over the Rays on account of the easier division/clearer pathway.
Matt Snyder: I'll go with the Mariners. They have a really strong foundation in place and only missed the playoffs by one game this year (the Padres are in a similar position but were two games back). After a pathetic effort last offseason, I can't imagine Jerry Dipoto will repeat it and so instead they'll get aggressive. The AL West has two automatic non-contenders in the A's and Angels for the next two years, at least, so that makes the path to the postseason much more workable than in the NL West, NL East or AL East, for example.
Dayn Perry: I'll say the Rays, even though I feel their current competitive window is probably within a year or three of closing. They've made five straight postseasons, and over that half-decade they played at something like a 95-win clip (not doing the precise math). It wouldn't shock me if it came together for such a deep October run at some point over the next two or three seasons.
Mike Axisa: The Rays are probably the correct answer because they're in the race every year and keep getting bites at the apple, though they repeatedly get to the postseason and then just forget how to hit. Weird. I'm going to say the Brewers. The NL Central is not especially daunting and, as the Diamondbacks showed this season, you don't need to be a truly great team to go on a run in October. This is just a blind guess, I could see any one of those teams except the Rockies winning the World Series next year. I'll plant my flag with the Brewers, because why not?
