Adding Curt Schilling and Keith Foulke in the off-season may have made the most tortured franchise in sports the best team in baseball. But as the AL wild card, the Red Sox will have to go through AL West champion Anaheim, which added the likely league MVP, and squeaked into the playoffs. So while both teams have been here before, they have changed significantly.

To rate the two teams, we’ll use Baseball Prospectus’s Value Over Replacement Player metric. VORP shows how much better, in runs, a player was over a freely available replacement player at his position (like Joe McEwing).

BOSTON RED SOX

BATTING ORDER

POS PLAYER VORP

CF JOHNNY DAMON 51.9
2B MARK BELLHORN 39.5
RF MANNY RAMIREZ 70.5
DH DAVID ORTIZ 72.8
1B KEVIN MILLAR 37.6
RF TROT NIXON 12.7
C JASON VARITEK 47.9
SS ORLANDO CABRERA 13.9
3B BILL MUELLER 22.2

The Red Sox have the best offense in baseball. The closest thing to a weak link in this lineup is Orlando Cabrera, who arrived in the controversial deadline deal for Nomar Garciaparra. But even Cabrera is no offensive sinkhole, though his poor plate discipline stands in stark contrast to the rest of the Sox, who lead the majors in on-base average. Mark Bellhorn is a perfect example of what the Sox prize: Despite his low batting average, he walks so much that he would be one of the better leadoff hitters in the game.

And it gets better from there. The rest of this lineup hits for average, draws walks, and can hit homers, without exception. They lead the big leagues in slugging, too. Power and plate discipline are the foundation stones of the 21st century offense, and Boston has more of both than anyone else.

The defense is shakier. The Cabrera-Nomar swap did help them there, and the Sox concede some of their bludgeoning power and use their bench to help prevent runs in the late going. But the lineup responsible for 900-plus runs is not the most mobile bunch of ballplayers out in the field. It’s a tradeoff they’re willing to make.

BENCH

With the strength of their lineup, the Red Sox won’t pinch-hit often to get better matchups. But their bench still serves a purpose. Pokey Reese and Doug Mientkiewicz are there for defense, while Gabe Kapler and Kevin Youkilis serve as platoon partners and injury insurance for Nixon and Mueller. (Mueller switch-hits, but is far worse against left-handers.) Dave Roberts can come in for defense or pinch-run in a close game, and Doug Mirabelli, Tim Wakefield’s personal catcher, has hit a formidable .285 AVG/.376 OBA/.543 SLG in the backup role.

STARTING PITCHING

PLAYER VORP

CURT SCHILLING 73.4
PEDRO MARTINEZ 51.7
BRONSON ARROYO 25.1
TIM WAKEFIELD 9.8

Kudos to the Red Sox for taking talent over experience and tabbing Bronson Arroyo for Game 3. The decision to bump Derek Lowe to the bullpen, and not Wakefield, is interesting but not unprecedented: Lowe came out of the pen last year, too. Their roles this series look set, but if the Sox go deep into the playoffs, each may see both starting and relief work.

It must be October, because we’re once again wondering if Pedro is hurt. Somehow, he always shows himself capable of strong playoff pitching. Uncertainty aside Martinez is fully capable of being anyone’s daddy on any given night.

BULLPEN

PLAYER VORP

KEITH FOULKE 36.1
MIKE TIMLIN 18.5
ALAN EMBREE 8.7
DEREK LOWE -11.5
MIKE MYERS 7.9
RAMIRO MENDOZA (?) 9.5
SCOTT WILLIAMSON (?) 14.4

Lowe’s move to the bullpen says something about Scott Williamson’s readiness; the Sox would love to rely on Williamson, their setup man, but he’s not fully healthy. Mendoza is a big step down. Depth isn’t essential in a postseason relief group, especially because Boston won’t hesitate to throw Foulke for multiple innings. He doesn’t bring traditional closer heat, but his fastball is above average, and that changeup devastates. Everyone else is solid but not dominant. Curt Schilling excepted, the Red Sox starters aren’t good bets to throw eight, so one or two bullpen arms will have to step up.

ANAHEIM ANGELS

BATTING ORDER

POS PLAYER VORP

2B CHONE FIGGINS 33.6
1B DARIN ERSTAD 25.0
RF VLADIMIR GUERRERO 93.4
CF GARRET ANDERSON 28.5
DH TROY GLAUS 21.0
LF JEFF DAVANON 20.0
C BENGIE MOLINA 13.2
3B DALLAS MCPHERSON 2.0
SS DAVID ECKSTEIN 18.7

The lineup you see here is not the one Angels fans have been cheering all season. Conspicuously absent is Jose Guillen, suspended with a week to go; his .849 OPS would be second on the team among full-time starters. Jeff DaVanon draws plenty of walks (.370 OBA), but he doesn’t have Guillen’s power. Troy Glaus was out of for much of the year; he’s back DHing (taking the place of Tim Salmon, who is – guess what? – injured).

The injuries gave Chone Figgins a chance, and he has been a godsend. Figgins played the outfield early in the year and then became the starter at third base. Starting 2B Adam Kennedy blew out his knee in September, so the Angels can shift Figgins to second and throw uberprospect Dallas McPherson into the fire. It’s not ideal, but the Angels are no strangers to rookie playoff messiahs.

We’ve said nothing about Vladimir Guerrero, but what can we say? When Willie Mays was a young player, Giants skipper Leo Durocher was running down the Cardinals’ lineup for him. Leo described the leadoff man, then the number two hitter, then the cleanup hitter. “What about number three?” asked Mays. “The third hitter,” said Durocher, “is Stan Musial. There is no advice I can give you about him.”

BENCH

Here’s where those missing players will really hurt them: None of the Angels’ reserves hit worth a lick. A couple of them have defensive value, but the utility of right-handers like Adam Riggs is lessened by Boston’s right-handed rotation (it’s worth noting that Riggs and Alfredo Amezaga have seen some time in the starting lineup lately too, with McPherson and DaVanon sometimes sitting). A thin bench isn’t a deal-breaker, but there will be times in this series when the Halos will miss having a quality pinch hitter in the late innings.

STARTING PITCHING

PLAYER VORP

JARROD WASHBURN 22.7
BARTOLO COLON 22.7
KELVIM ESCOBAR 53.7
JOHN LACKEY 29.7

Statistically speaking, only Escobar resembles a pitcher you’d want starting a playoff game this year. But they’ve all come up huge in the postseason before. Though he’s been disappointing for most of 2004, Bartolo Colon can dominate a game. He, or someone else, will have to, because the chance that both Schilling and Pedro will fail is very slim, and the Angels need to hang with them.

BULLPEN

PLAYER VORP

TROY PERCIVAL 15.8
FRANCISCO RODRIGUEZ 37.8
BRENDAN DONNELLY 15.4
SCOT SHIELDS 31.8
KEVIN GREGG 18.5
RAMON ORTIZ 25.2

The endgame is the one place where the Angels have a clear advantage. Because of his seniority, Troy Percival is the closer, but Frankie Rodriguez is the better pitcher, and fully capable of duplicating his nonpareil playoff work of 2002.

Anaheim could pull a ’96 Yankees and shorten games to six innings if Mike Scioscia is willing to deploy K-Rod early and often. The playoffs have more travel days, so there will be plenty of time off. Even if Rodriguez only pitches one inning at a time, Donnelly, Shields, and Co. are solid for the middle innings. While the Boston pen is full of question marks, the Angels will be trying desperately to hand leads to theirs.

THE MATCHUP

This series looks to hinge on Pedro Martinez and the Anaheim starters. Baseball’s a funny game, though, especially in the playoffs, and we may be singling out Bronson Arroyo or Curtis Pride when all’s said and done. Both teams dispatched a player for off-the-field reasons (Garciaparra and Guillen), and while each move seemed to make the roster worse, both teams have been on fire since. And of course all eyes will be on Sox manager Terry Francona as he tries to avoid duplicating Grady Little’s mismanagement of last year.

Boston is the better team, and the difference between the two clubs is greater than the six games separating them in the standings.

Anaheim’s starters are not as good as Boston’s, and they face a tougher lineup, but if they come up big they can hold down the Sox and turn this series into a battle of bullpens. The Red Sox have the pitching to shut Anaheim down, and the offense to bludgeon them to death. If the Angels stop one of the two from happening, they can win behind K-Rod and some timely hits.

This article was provided by Baseball Prospectus. The Sun will run exclusive content from Baseball Prospectus throughout the 2004 season. For more state-of-the-art baseball content, visit www.baseballprospectus.com.