NL West Power Rankings After One Month of Baseball

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Sep 28, 2016; San Francisco, CA, USA; Colorado Rockies third baseman Nolan Arenado (28) and right fielder Hunter Pence (8) and shortstop Daniel Descalso (3) and center fielder Charlie Blackmon (19) and right fielder Carlos Gonzalez (5) celebrate after the end of the game against the San Francisco Giants at AT&T Park the Colorado Rockies defeated the San Francisco Giants 2 to 0. Mandatory Credit: Neville E. Guard-USA TODAY Sports /

The San Francisco Giants and Los Angeles Dodgers are currently not in first or second, and one of them is last place. Safe to say the NL West is turned on its head.

However, the standings, probably don’t tell the whole story about the shape of the division, especially after just 16% of the season has taken place. The season has not started kindly for the San Francisco Giants, while the Rockies and Diamondbacks have raced out to a solid lead.

Even though the Giants are in last place, they’re still only four games out. And with 84% of the season still ahead of them, there is plenty of time to flip that on its head.

So now that we’ve seen roughly one month of baseball (Opening day was April 2nd, it’s May 2nd) it’s time to give a bit our first power-ranking of the division. Here is how we would’ve given the NL West Power-Rankings at the start of 2017:

Given that this was how we think the division will end up anyways, it definitely hasn’t shaken out that way to start, so there might be a few surprises.

I would encourage you not to be shocked at where your team may or may not land. After all this is pretty much arbitrary, but an attempt to be realistic about what happened in the first month, and where the respective teams actual limit on performance might be at.

* NOTE: the little power ranking graphic says “Last Week.” It will not necessarily be last week, it will be their record at the time of the current ranking. Don’t blame me.

Apr 30, 2017; San Francisco, CA, USA; San Diego Padres catcher Hector Sanchez (44) celebrates with third baseman Luis Sardinas (2) and third baseman Cory Spangenberg (15) after hitting a two-run home run against the San Francisco Giants in the ninth inning at AT&T Park. Mandatory Credit: John Hefti-USA TODAY Sports /

. Previous: 5th. san diego padres. 5. 127.

Look, the San Diego Padres are currently fourth in the division, but that probably won’t last. No, they aren’t going higher than that, likely for the rest of the season. That’s unless they somehow land Mike Trout in the next week. But that’s not happening, so you’re stuck with rookies learning the big-league level at a minimum.

You’re also stuck with Jered Weaver, whose HR/9 is sitting at a lovely 3.14. More than a quarter of the fly-balls surrendered by him have ended up being home-runs. He’s a middle of the rotation guy for them. As a team, their percentage of home-runs on fly-balls is the second worst in baseball. The Giants are currently within the top ten in that category.

There are some really encouraging things with the future of the Padres though, as Manuel Margot, and Hunter Renfroe have been decent to start the season. Their averages are well below what people think they’ll be over the course of their career, and that’s probably ok for their first month in the big leagues. They do, however, have 8 HRs between them, which is more than the entire Giants outfield put together. But, hitting was going to be the strength of this Padres team anyways.

The Padres had a great April, and frankly the version of these San Diego Padres is likely the best version of them possible. If they continued at this rate, they’d end up with 66 wins, which is just about right for them. They will likely sit last in these rankings throughout the season, unless the Giants are really just this bad (they aren’t).

Apr 26, 2017; San Francisco, CA, USA; San Francisco Giants third baseman Christian Arroyo (22) is congratulated by third base coach Phil Nevin (16) as he rounds the bases against the Los Angeles Dodgers during the seventh inning at AT&T Park. Mandatory Credit: Neville E. Guard-USA TODAY Sports /

. . Previous: 2nd. san francisco giants. 4. 40

Ok, the Giants have been pretty miserable in April. But, there are reasons to be relatively encouraged. Ok, so the Giants offense has been really bad. It’s just not going to continue to be this bad throughout the season. The Giants’ OPS was 20th in baseball last season with a .728. Not good, but nobody really complained about the offense being an issue last season. The Giants OPS in 2014 was a .699, good for 14th in baseball. In 2012, the Giants’ OPS was .724, good for 14th. In 2010, the Giants had a .729 OPS, good for 19th in baseball.

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Look the whole offensive power numbers and all of that is relatively subjective to the season they’re in. Right now, the San Francisco Giants OPS is a .634, good for second worse in baseball. That’s not good. But history tells us that this team will be roughly 80 points higher than that. The bats are going to come around, and they’ll straighten things out.

Buster Posey is still slugging .464 which is slightly under his career average. He came out of a funk where he wasn’t driving the ball, and responded to plenty of critics with a bomb off of Clayton Kershaw. Hunter Pence is slugging .367, Well below his career average. While it’s conceivable that Pence may begin to drop off around this season, your drop-off doesn’t come immediately 120 points below your career average, especially if you are as good as Pence has been throughout his career.

The starters were an issue, and Bruce Bochy called them out. Their ERA went from worst in baseball, up ten places. That’s pretty darn good. The bullpen still might have some kinks to work out, but the rotation as a whole has been getting the job done in recent weeks. Now it’s time for the offense to step up.

When it does, the Giants will be right back where they expect them to be. A bad month doesn’t doom an entire season. They’ve had these stretches before, just in the middle of the season, where fans have something else to base the reality of the situation off of. When you slump in April, your fans don’t have that reality. A slow start means they need to be good the rest of the year, but this is a team you can, and should expect that from.

Apr 2, 2017; Phoenix, AZ, USA; Arizona Diamondbacks shortstop Chris Owings celebrates with teammates after hitting a walk off single in the ninth inning against the San Francisco Giants during opening day at Chase Field. Mandatory Credit: Mark J. Rebilas-USA TODAY Sports /

. . Previous: 4th. arizona diamondbacks. 3. 8

They’re second in the west, but have faltered a bit in recent weeks. After starting out 7-1, they’ve gone 9-10 since. The Diamondbacks at their best were probably going to be close to .500 in 2017, and that seems relatively likely.

Their pitching has been extremely good, as they are now second the NL in ERA as a pitching staff. They also have the second best average, and have scored the third most runs in the National League. However, you can ask the Rockies about runs. They don’t win the NL West, it’s the pitching.

Look, I think these Diamondbacks are playing way better than people anticipated. Also, you have to remember that this is only 16% of the season. Even the Braves had a winning record in one month during their 2016 campaign. It’s also not to say they can’t continue this.

However, the Diamondbacks have pretty well evened out after their hot start. While other teams are starting to return to what we expect of them, the D-Backs are doing the same. In reality, they’re probably a .500 team, or slightly better. Their pitching won’t continue to be this good. However, D-Backs fans will be impressed with the return to power of Patrick Corbin. Corbin’s numbers are beginning to resemble those of his all-star 2013 season. If he and Zack Greinke can continue to be good, the Diamondbacks have a shot at surprising quite a few people, including me.

May 1, 2017; Los Angeles, CA, USA; Los Angeles Dodgers starting pitcher Clayton Kershaw (22) reacts in the fifth inning against the San Francisco Giants at Dodger Stadium. Mandatory Credit: Richard Mackson-USA TODAY Sports /

. . Previous: 1st. los angeles dodgers. 2. 71

The Dodgers also started bad, and haven’t been that consistent. However, this is till a team that won the NL West without Clayton Kershaw for a majority of the season. They’re still quite good, but their offense has been the subject of some questions.

The Dodgers have below a 100 wRC+ as a collective unit, and are only slugging .402, good for 15th in baseball. To go along with that, Adrian Gonzalez, a key cog in their lineup, is hitting below .250, and only has an OPS of .684. His slugging percentage is the lowest it has been over his entire career. I anticipate him raising that up a little bit, but someone entering their 35 year old season is going to experience a bit of a drop-off.

The Dodgers are hoping that some of their younger studs, like Joc Pederson, Cody Bellinger, and Corey Seager end up carrying some of the drop-off from guys like A-Gon. So far, Seager has been up to the task. Bellinger is still getting his big league feet under him, and Joc Pederson is currently on the 10-day DL. The big surprise has been Justin Turner, who has been exceptional at the plate to start this season.

The Dodgers have four major guys on the DL at the moment, which is certainly some cause for concern. When they get most of these guys back, the Dodgers should be looking pretty good for the summer run. If they can handle their injuries like they did in 2016, they’ll be back on top of this list in no time.

Jul 24, 2016; Denver, CO, USA; Colorado Rockies right fielder Carlos Gonzalez (5) gabs the hat and glove of center fielder Charlie Blackmon (not pictured) in the third inning against the Atlanta Braves at Coors Field. Mandatory Credit: Isaiah J. Downing-USA TODAY Sports /

. Previous: 3rd. colorado rockies. 1. 108.

First in the division, and well deserved as the first number one of the 2017 season in our NL West Power rankings. The Colorado Rockies have been doing a little bit of everything well. While a couple of their stud pitchers are on the DL, the others have stepped up and done an OK job. They also have a top ten offense right now.

The big thing for them, that is far beyond anything that they’ve had in Colorado, has been the bullpen. The Rockies bullpen, despite a not so great ERA, is 7-1 with 12 saves, the most in baseball. The Rockies have never really had that type of unit behind their offense. When their pitching rotation gets healthy, they might be causing some serious problems.

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One of the big things about this Rockies team is always the offense, and they have been pretty darn good to start the season. They are within the top ten in Runs Scored in the MLB, and they haven’t even played a game with Ian Desmond in their lineup yet. That’s kinda scary.

They are likely the only team with the ability to rival the power and run production of the Nationals in 2017. But the question always remains, is all of this a product of Coors Field? It’s a question asked when looking at them every year. In looking at a few factors here, you can tell this team is different. While only 7-6 at home, they are 9-4 on the road, the second best road record in baseball (behind the Nationals).

Next: Good, Bad, and Ugly of the Giants April

We’ll see how long these rankings play out. We’ll revisit these at various points throughout the year. The biggest thing to keep in mind is the fact that we are only 16% of the way through the season, and quite a lot can change.

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The San Francisco Giants and Los Angeles Dodgers are currently not in first or second, and one of them is last place. Safe to say the NL West is turned on its head.

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