As part of the lead-in to Season 4, BBL News Center will provide previews of each division, doing analysis on each team’s 9-kid roster.

Pittsburgh Pirates
Coach: Schlim Shady (Season 1 champion, Season 2 and 3 playoff coach)
Home Field: Cement Gardens
First Draft Pick: Pete Wheeler (#21 overall)
Last Draft Pick: Samantha Winslow (#213 overall)
Why they’ll do well: Half the team is super speedy, and they all hit well. A lone 6 is the lowest batting rating to be found on the Pirates, and four players have speed of 8 or higher, which should very well indeed on the cement surface of the Gardens. Schlim can have a field day with those players on offense, while the high batting ratings ensure that the others can contribute at least some. The Pirates also have a pretty solid defense, only three players with Fielding lower than 7 and one with throwing lower than 3, and Pete Wheeler in left field and Jason Kendall behind the plate are causes for opponents to worry.
Why they won’t do well: Half the team is super slow – four players have running of 4 or 3, and rely on power hitting (which, given batting ratings of 7 or 8, is uncertain) to do well on offense. We saw this sort of players at Cement Gardens last season with the Cubs, and it didn’t work out so well for them. The Pirates also have very poor pitching depth, with Jerry Winchell at 8 their best pitcher, followed by Olga Tollefson at just 6 and then a bunch of crappy pitchers. This might be an easier pitching staff to crack than most.
The X-factor: How well the two halves of the lineup will synergize. Will the slow players prove useful for driving in the fast runners and advancing themselves well enough, and the fast players’ good bats be enough to deal with the slow players? Or will this lineup collapse on itself and send Schlim to the bottom of the standings for once?

Texas Rangers
Coach: GreenDayEagles (Season 1-3 veteran, Season 3 Tier 3 playoff champion)
Home Field: Steele Stadium
First Draft Pick: Jay Green (#3 overall)
Last Draft Pick: Perry Marx (#203 overall)
Why they’ll do well: Eagles started out the Rangers’ draft by securing Jay Green, Achmed and Amir, AND the Webber twins, all on the same team! This is going to be an incredibly fun group to play with, with potential to rack up a lot of runs on offense and mounting a solid defensive presence as well. Eagles rounded out the team with some more solid fielders (including Season 2 fan favorite Johnny Omar) that leave defense looking like the Rangers’ main strength, but they’ll certainly be able to drive runs in as well.
Why they won’t do well: While the last four players are good at defense, they’re also all rather slow, and only one of them hits well. While the core quintet of the Rangers is going to be potent on offense, the rest of the team may struggle to keep those rallies going.
The X-factor: Amir Khan playing catcher. At first glance, this seems quite bad, as Amir has the weakest arm out of everybody on the team, and could be considered a catcher who would be easy to take advantage of. But Amir also gets his fielding boosted from being on the same team as Achmed – just how much of an effect will that have on his arm, and will it erase what would otherwise be a glaring flaw in the Rangers’ defense?

Toronto Blue Jays
Coach: Eggy215 (Season 4 newbie)
Home Field: Casa de Pablo
First Draft Pick: Luanne Lui (#10 overall)
Last Draft Pick: Betty Houston (#202 overall)
Why they’ll do well: A mostly quite fast sqaud. Six players have running of 8 or better, and I still think that speed is probably the overall most valuable skill for a player to have, making it easier to get on base, advance bases, and get to hit balls faster. The Blue Jays also have three different ace pitchers for plenty of depth, and mostly pretty good fielding ratings.
Why they won’t do well: The Jays will struggle to get the ball anywhere fast, on both offense and defense. Five of the players don’t hit the ball all that hard, which makes their speed a necessity, and the team also has a whopping five players with arms rated worse than the average of 3! Speed can help some with this shortcoming, but it’s still going to result in opposing teams having a much easier time taking advantage of the Jays’ defense. They also have a home field of Casa de Pablo – not the ideal field for a low-hitting, high-running team to prosper. And the last three players on the team are mediocre in speed, relying instead on their bats without even having strong arms. There’s a lot that could go wrong for this team.
The X-factor: Last season I looked at a speed-heavy, everything-else-light team and figured they’d fizzle out. That team was the Royals, who ended up being the most dominant team in the league! Can the Blue Jays usurp my expectations in a similar manner, or will the relative inexperience of their coach combined with the slower players do them in?

Humongous Giants
Coach: crazyei8hts (Season 1 and 2 Backyard World Series runner-up, Season 3 playoff coach)
Home Field: Sandy Flats
First Draft Pick: Marsellus Marx (#11 overall)
Last Draft Pick: Terry Vega (#210 overall)
Why they’ll do well: Crazy is back for some more Bomberball! That’s a lot of high batting ratings on the Giants, and while you have to take Jocinda Smith’s 10 with a grain of salt, it still leaves six ratings of 7 or above. If all of those come with a good dose of power, then Crazy should have a field day knocking balls out of even the Flats. Most of his team has pretty good fielding ratings as well – in fact, in many respects, this team is looking like last season’s Humongous Hornets who won their division with a 10-4 record.
Why they won’t do well: There are slow teams, and then there are the Giants. Two players have running ratings of 10… and every single other player has running below 7! Six of them are slower than a 6 in running, and coupled with the home field of Sandy Flats you know this team will be going nowhere fast. That could also translate into weakness on defense, especially when you look at the roster with six decent arms… and three noodle arms rated at 1 or 1.5! The Giants may have a difficult time on defense indeed with these shortcomings and their home field, and with Bobby Bulgrien their only quality pitcher, what starts as a small edge by the opposition could become big, fast.
The X-factor: What in the world was Crazy thinking when he drafted Stuart Sullivan??? He completely goes against the grain of the Giants team, with a measly 2 hitting rating and a noodle arm, made up for by a super 10-running rating. If this indeed makes for a bad mesh with the rest of the team then Stuart could be a terrible pick for Crazy – but he could also turn out to be just what the team needs to complement its roster of big hitters. Only time will tell.

Eauxps’ Predicted Division Standings

4) Toronto Blue Jays. I think Eggy is an unfortunate case of a new coach in over their head. With a team that opponents will be able to score a lot against, and that doesn’t work well with their home field, and facing three of the OG BBL coaches, it will be a rough entry to the BBL for Eggy indeed.

3) Humongous Giants. Crazy may well prove me wrong, but I see the Giants as a team with serious weaknesses in speed and defensive holes that will limit their ability to perform effectively. Bomberball or no bomberball, his Wombats weren’t able to reach .500 last season, and I don’t think the Giants can either.

2) Pittsburgh Pirates. Given the respective track records involved, I should perhaps have predicted Schlim to take home another division title. But the slow runners on the Pirates won’t work to well on the Cement Gardens, and the weak pitching have the potential to give opponents the opportunity to crack them wide open and put up big scores against them. This is a solid-looking team, but after the initial layer is broken through, they may not be so strong.

1) Texas Rangers. Is this Eagles’ year? The Rangers have a much stronger defense than any of their division rivals, coupled with plenty of pitching depth in case things go south. They’re not going to be the best on offense, but with those five stars to start the team off they should definitely be able to score runs more easily than they could last season. Another team (most likely the Pirates) could surge forward and take over the division, but preseason, I think the Rangers have the best chance of dominating.