Opening Day has come and gone, but that doesn’t mean there isn’t still plenty of interesting baseball to watch this month.
Here are three April series you should be paying attention to.
April 15-17: Houston Astros at Seattle Mariners
The 2021 Seattle Mariners had a run differential of -51, which gave them a Pythagorean record of 76-86. However, their actual record was 90-72.
Thanks to a 14-7 record in extra innings and a 33-19 record in one-run games, the Mariners did an excellent job at winning close games. Some would argue that meant the Mariners were more lucky than good, but either way, Seattle missed the postseason by just two games.
After almost making the playoffs, the Mariners made several notable moves in the offseason to try to end the longest active postseason drought in MLB. Robbie Ray, the 2021 AL Cy Young winner, joined Seattle on a five-year deal. Meanwhile, they also added a trio of hitters in trades. They acquired Adam Frazier from the San Diego Padres and got Jesse Winker and Eugenio Suarez from the Cincinnati Reds.
Frazier will be expected to provide good contact with his .300 average and low strikeout rate, while Suarez should be a source of power after hitting at least 30 homers in his last three full seasons. Meanwhile, Winker looks to be the best hitter of the trio. His .949 OPS ranked sixth in baseball among everyone with at least 450 PAs in 2021.
However, the most important addition to the 2022 Mariners might be someone who was already in the organization. Julio Rodriguez, a consensus top-five prospect, made the Opening Day roster and has begun the year starting in centerfield.
Four key additions through free agency and trades, plus the promotion of your system’s top prospect sounds pretty exciting, but will it be enough to dethrone the AL West’s powerhouse? We’ll get our first chance to see on April 15th.
Much like the prior year, the Houston Astros spent their offseason letting a key member of their core leave in free agency. After George Springer departed last season, Carlos Correa did the same by joining the Minnesota Twins. Springer and Correa combined for 152 hits and 37 homers in their postseason careers and now the Astros will have neither of them.
The Astros are still the favorite in the AL West but Correa’s departure has certainly weakened their roster. The April 15-17 series in Seattle will be our first chance to see if a busy offseason for the Mariners will be enough to beat the Astros for the AL West title.
April 18-20: Atlanta Braves at Los Angeles Dodgers
Going back to 2013, there’s no one the Los Angeles Dodgers have seen in the postseason more often than the Atlanta Braves. The two teams met in the NLDS in 2013 and 2018 and have spent the last two postseasons battling each other in the NLCS.
An early meeting between teams with plenty of postseason history is intriguing by itself, but we all know what will really make this series worth watching: Freddie Freeman.
From 2010 to 2021, Freeman made himself a franchise legend for the Braves. He ranks in Atlanta’s top ten for numerous categories including hits, homers and RBIs. He was an All-Star five times, won an MVP in 2020 and most importantly, won a World Series last year.
Freeman felt like the kind of person who should’ve been a Brave for life, but that didn’t happen. Instead, he’ll be spending the next six years as a Dodger.
Of course, Freeman isn’t the only major player in this series who will be on a new team. After racking up 350 saves as a Dodger, Kenley Jansen is now on the Braves.
An NLCS rematch is always going to be compelling by itself, but the new homes of Freeman and Jansen have the potential to make this quite the dramatic series.
April 22-24: Chicago White Sox at Minnesota Twins
After winning the division in 2019 and 2020, the wheels fell off for the Minnesota Twins in 2021.
The Twins sold at the 2021 trade deadline, unloading their best slugger and their ace. They sent Nelson Cruz to the Tampa Bay Rays and traded Jose Berrios to the Toronto Blue Jays. The Twins ended the year 73-89, finishing last in the division for the first time since 2016.
After a disappointing season, Minnesota had one of the most active offseasons in baseball.
They made a major deal with the New York Yankees, acquiring Gary Sanchez and Gio Urshela for Josh Donaldson and Isiah Kiner-Falefa. Minnesota also added Sonny Gray in a trade, giving them a new ace after the departure of Berrios. They also brought in veteran arms for their rotation in free agency by grabbing Chris Archer and Dylan Bundy.
Oh, and one more thing: they signed Carlos Correa in free agency.
The Twins pulled off the biggest surprise of the offseason, landing the 27-year-old free agent with a three-year deal that will be paying him over 30 million dollars per year.
On April 22, the Twins will have their first opportunity to see how their new roster looks against the last year’s division champions: the Chicago White Sox. Chicago won their division by a comfortable margin of 13 games and was the only team in the AL Central to end 2021 with a winning record.
After cruising to a division title, the White Sox opted for a pretty unspectacular offseason. They traded for AJ Pollock while adding Josh Harrison and Kendall Graveman, but none of those moves were quite as impressive as the Twins adding Correa.
Chicago’s roster is good enough that it likely won’t need any big moves to win the division, but it’s still easy to contrast their offseason to Minnesota’s.
The White Sox are the division favorite, but the April 22-24 series will give us a chance to see if Minnesota’s busy offseason can make them a legitimate threat in the AL Central.
BSL Analyst
Rose Katz is a recent graduate of the University of Maryland’s journalism school, where she worked for The Diamondback as the online managing editor and a sports blogger. As a student, she spent almost all of her time on campus in The Diamondback’s newsroom or at Xfinity Center, Ludwig Field and Maryland Stadium. Rose gained intern experience with the Mid-Atlantic Sports Network (MASN).