The big story in baseball this year — bigger than Barry Bonds, bigger than labor negotiations, bigger even than Paul Lo Duca’s wife — has been the rise of the American League Central. We saw the first hints of it last year, as the Chicago White Sox were of course the best team in baseball, with the Indians not far behind them and the Twins, even in a down year, showing they weren’t far off joining them in the pennant race. Many people thought the division had a good chance at sending two teams to the playoffs this year for the first time in its history; no one, though, expected that the division would produce three of the five best teams in baseball.

It isn’t all that surprising to me that this has happened. The Tigers, White Sox, and Twins are all very well run teams. All have had some breaks go their way, in particular the Tigers, who have gotten far more out of some dodgy veterans and green rookies than anyone thought they would, but none of it has been the kind of good fortune that comes out of nowhere. Rather, it’s been the kind that results from consistently making good judgments, sticking to good plans, and taking shrewd but worthwhile risks.

What is surprising is that Cleveland, arguably the most talented team in the division, doesn’t even have a winning record. Last year the Indians won 93 and were within a game and a half of the division lead as late as September 24. It took a total collapse in crucial games against the White Sox down the stretch and an unusually poor 22–36 record in one-run games (this was especially bad considering they had a fine bullpen) to keep them from the playoffs, but considering how they’d played, the age of their core players, and the competition, they looked like perhaps the best team in the league coming into the season.

The odd thing is that they have, basically, played up to that standard. Many of you are familiar with baseball’s version of the Pythagorean theorem, which basically posits that there is a stable and predictable relationship between the number of runs a team scores and the number it allows. The vast majority of teams in a given season will be within a game or two of the expected won-loss record you’d derive from their runs scored and allowed, and most teams that over- or underperform that record in one season will, absent drastic off-season changes, decline or improve accordingly the next season.

One reason the Mets looked so good this spring, for instance, is that their expected won-loss record last year was 90–72; even if they hadn’t brought in better players over the winter and even if they hadn’t had several players with a good chance of improving, they still would have been expected to do very well this year. The Indians’ expected won-loss record was 97–65, the best in the league and behind only the Cardinals for the best mark in baseball. They were a legitimate team.

Some things have gone right for the Indians, and some have gone wrong. Jhonny Peralta hasn’t followed up his brilliant 2005 season, but the team’s other core players have been stellar. Center fielder Grady Sizemore is the American League’s David Wright, designated hitter Travis Hafner is right up there with Manny Ramirez and David Ortiz among the scariest hitters in the league, and catcher Victor Martinez continues to hit incredibly well for a catcher. The supporting cast isn’t much worse than last year’s and may be a bit better. The rotation has declined a bit with the loss of 2005 ERA leader Kevin Millwood, but C.C. Sabbathia has blossomed into an ace, and the team’s rotation has the fourth-best ERA in the league. The bullpen has been terrible, with the fourth-worst ERA in the league, but overall this is only a slightly worse team than it was last year.

The oddest thing of all is that, again, they’re underperforming their expected won-loss record, this time more than any team in baseball. Given their runs scored and allowed, you’d expect the Indians to be 67–57 — still in fourth place in the Central, but better than any American League team outside the division other than the Yankees.They’re below that mark by 11 games, which is a staggering total. The Mets’ seven-win gap last year, to give an example, was the biggest in baseball.

There are a lot of reasons why the Indians are so far below that mark — bad relief, questionable in-game tactics, bad luck, and playing in a brutal division are all part of it — but the upshot is that this division isn’t going away and will, if anything, grow stronger.

The White Sox, Tigers, and Twins all have diverse philosophies and diverse talent bases, but there’s little reason to expect any of them to be anything but 88-plus win teams next year barring foolish off-season moves. Given some fresh arms for the pen and a bit of good luck, the Indians will likely be as good as any of them in 2007. The Red Sox and Yankees are very sharp teams and you can be sure they’re very much aware of this, and very much aware that the Central might develop a lock on the wild card every bit as strong as the one the East had for several years.

If you think the arms race was already ridiculous, just wait for what happens when Boston and New York are competing for one playoff spot.