NL Central Division Predictions

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Brewers

Milwaukee has been at the head of the division for a while as they have not finished under 2nd in the division in a 162 game season since 2016. It is their division to lose as they will be returning much of their production from the last year, excluding Willy Adames.

Freddy Peralta is someone I was mock drafting for my fantasy baseball drafts but was unable to get. He has been an above average pitcher for the Brewers since the 2020 season, and will look to keep that up. He will look to get his third double-digit win total in a row in 2025. Nestor Cortes will hold onto the second starter spot until Brandon Woodruff is back and healthy. His ability to change looks should look really good in Milwaukee, who seems to always get the best out of their arms.

They have loads of fun hitters. Jackson Chourio, William Contreras, and Christian Yelich will make up the heart of the order most of the year. Chourio may lead off now and then if Brice Turang needs a break. The 21-year-old outfielder finished with a great rookie season last year with 21 homers and 39 steals along with a good batting average of .275. Yelich is coming off an injury and when he is healthy it is hard to find someone that can hit to all fields like he can. He was another player I wanted to draft in fantasy but did not have the luxury of doing so. I think there’s a good chance that he hits close 20 to homers this year with close to 15 steals while hitting above .300. With Willy Adames leaving, the lineup will need their other guys like Joey Ortiz and Sal Frelick to show up, which is something they did at the end of the regular season last year, they did exactly that.

If this bullpen continues to shine as they have been for the past couple of years, there will be lots of games won in the innings they do the work. Last year, they had the second-best bullpen era at just over 3.00 The only team they did not beat was the Guardians who had the best pitching season of all time on their team.

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Cubs

The Cubs made a big splash in the offseason trading for Kyle Tucker who was on the last year of his contract with Houston. Tucker is instantly the guy on this team which should make him feel better after he had been sharing the light in Houston. I don’t think this will be enough, however, to get him to extend with the club. He has had some injury history in the past but when he is healthy he is a top 7 player in the game. He has a great glove, hits with great power and also steals bases when needed. He does fit so well into this lineup that as a Cardinals fan, so part of me is nervous that the chemistry will develop quick and the team ends up extending him early. The other part of me knows that Tucker has always wanted to test the market, so a big season here from Tucker would be sort of a pay day to himself.

Seiya Suzuki will be getting full time DH work and I’m ready to watch this. Even as a Cardinals fan, I like how hard Seiya plays and most importantly hits and him not needing to worry about making plays day-to-day in the outfield, he can focus on his batting approach. He has progressed every year while playing right and I think could be around a 150 OPS+ guy for the Cubs which would be the best on the team I would think.

Their pitching staff added some names to the bullpen and back end of the rotation. Colin Rea and Matthew Boyd will both eat innings for the team and if they can be 5 to 6 inning guys consistently, it will give the bullpen less stress. This bullpen has blown a lot of games for the organization over the past 2 seasons and Ryan Pressley will look to get a hold of the 9th inning better. It has just been released that

Matt Shaw will join the team in Tokyo for their opening series, and could be their every day 3rd basemen by mid May. I think it will take some time to weave him into the lineup full-time based off of the Justin Turner signing late. As someone who doesn’t like Justin Turner, this is the best team for him to go to so I can hate on my least favorite team and one of my least favorite players at the same time.

Reds

I almost put the Reds higher on this list but I couldn’t do it based on how young this team is. They made some moves I think are really good for the organization and their effort to keep pushing out of the rebuild they had been in after Joey Votto had started to fall apart. Elly De la Cruz has been the MVP of the team and may take the place of Votto as the next guy to bring them their postseason series win. The last time they did this was in 1995.

One move I really like for this team was the trade for Brady Singer with the Royals. He will be a perfect front line starter to pair with Hunter Greene and should be a great guy to keep the bullpen from needing to bail the team out in more games.

Hunter Greene is not another move they made, but he will be fun to watch yet again. He has great speed on his fastball and offspeed pitches that have been getting better since he got to the league in 2022. Coming off his breakout season in the majors in 2024, he might be one of the guys that gets a few Cy Young votes towards the bottom. I expect him to be around Cy Young-8 when it’s all said and done.

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Cardinals

I will keep this one short and sweet since I will be talking about them a lot throughout the season, and to keep the relatively same outline throughout these posts. The Cardinal way is starting to pass the organization by. Baseball is not the same game as it used to be and John Mozeliak does not seem to understand that. There were virtually no moves done in the offseason from this front office, and in a division that seemed to be wide open I am surprised by this. 4th is about where I thought they would finish last year and they ended up getting 2nd, so who knows.

We will see if Willson Contreras getting moved to 1B in the absence of Paul Goldscmhidt will be a big boost to the lineup. He has not played tremendous 1B in the limited innings there, but he has been good enough to move and get Ivan Herrera more at-bats while catching. Jordan Walker and Nolan Gorman struggled in 2024 and for a team that needed their young guys to produce better, that was not the case. Walker ended up in the minor leagues for big stretches of ‘24 and Gorman had an insanely high strikeout rate.

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Pirates

Paul Skenes and Oniel Cruz are the crucial 2 for the Pirates. Skenes is coming off a Rookie of the Year Campaign and also received some MVP votes. He did not even pitch for a full season and came away with one of the better rookie pitching seasons we have seen in a long time. I picked him to win the Cy Young in his first full season not only with this team, but in the majors.

Oniel Cruz will be another guy besides Skenes who needs to produce well going forward for the team to get out of their rebuild. Cruz will be getting moved to the outfield and it should help both his offensive and defensive numbers. He was struggling heavily with errors at Shortstop, and the team has decided to keep his electrifying bat and quick speed in the lineup, but move him to a place in the field where the team needs help and where he can evolve into an even better player.

In a season that should have some great ups for the team there will be plenty of downs to go around for most of the players.