Winning the World but Losing Their Souls: Tim Alberta's "The Kingdom, the Power, and the Glory: American Evangelicals in an Age of Extremism"
PLUS: A 2024 MLB preview
One of the more remarkable developments in contemporary American politics is the degree to which members of the Christian evangelical tradition—generally understood as a strain of conservative Protestantism that emphasizes a strict reading of the Bible, personal conversion, and a traditional moral code—have rallied around Donald Trump. For many years (and especially when Bill Clinton was president) evangelicals insisted political leaders needed to possess a strong moral character. Yet that concern fell to the wayside when the twice-divorced, foul-mouthed, religiously illiterate reality TV host who both bragged about committing sexual assault and committed adultery with an adult-film star shortly after his wife gave birth became the Republican nominee for president. Yes, there were some doubts at first (and there have been many times over the past ten years when those doubts were confirmed) but now, evangelicals—who amount to roughly 25% of the American population—constitute Trump’s base.
The reason for Trump’s popularity among evangelicals is easy to grasp: He supports evangelical policy priorities, especially on the issue of abortion. His moral shortcomings—both personal and political—are said not to matter, as evangelicals view Trump as God’s instrument here on Earth. Their devotion to Trump, however, has cost them dearly. As Tim Alberta, the author of the recently published The Kingdom, the Power, and the Glory: American Evangelicals in an Age of Extremism, argues, evangelical Christianity in the United States is in a deep spiritual crisis as a result of emphasizing the political over the spiritual. In fact, one could even argue evangelical Christianity today is not so much a religion as it is a nationalist, identity-based political movement.
Alberta is a writer for The Atlantic and the former chief political correspondent for Politico. His previous book, American Carnage: On the Front Lines of the Republican Civil War and the Rise of President Trump (2019), is a voluminous account of how the illiberal right came to dominate the GOP in the decade following the electoral repudiation of the George W. Bush presidency. He is also a conservative and an evangelical himself.
Alberta grew up in suburban Detroit, where his recently-retired father served as pastor of a large evangelical church. After his father passed away a few months after the publication of American Carnage, Alberta returned home and was confronted during his father’s visitation by many members of his dad’s old congregation over his book’s unflattering portrait of Donald Trump and the Republican Party. One mourner even questioned if Alberta was still a Christian. The experience led Alberta to set aside his focus on political reporting and turn his attention to the state of the evangelical church in America.
What Alberta found time and time again was a religious movement animated not by spiritual concerns but by nationalist political fervor. He begins by visiting his father’s old church, which had been conservative in nature but not overtly political during his father’s tenure. His father’s conservative successor watched membership plummet in 2020 when he refused to use the pulpit to attack pandemic-era restrictions, the Black Lives Matter movement, and Joe Biden. Meanwhile, a nearby church festooned in flags but nary a cross exploded in popularity when its pastor openly defied emergency state shutdown orders and devoted his sermon not to scripture but to conspiratorial right-wing fever dreams. The same story plays out in other churches and religious institutions Alberta visits: Either a religious leader challenges or refuses to indulge in the political views of his congregants and sees attendance crater and his own position imperiled, or he embraces extreme right-wing talking points and watches attendance and his personal popularity soar.
Alberta travels to churches, religious conventions, and one very unhinged tent revival (featuring a speaker who regularly drops f-bombs while preaching) to survey the state of modern-day evangelical Christianity. One place Alberta returns to often is Liberty University in Lynchburg, Virginia. Liberty was founded by the late televangelist and political activist Jerry Falwell, Sr., to educate a new generation of evangelicals, but the university soon morphed into a bastion of anti-intellectual political conservatism and a monument to the Falwell brand. Alberta interviews Liberty faculty members, administrators, and students who dared to question the university’s embrace of Trump, its suppression of dissent, and the administration’s focus on material rather than spiritual development. The school comes across as a training ground for culture warriors and an indoctrination camp for the converted rather than an institution inspired by the example of Christ. (During the writing of The Kingdom, the Power, and the Glory, Liberty’s president, Jerry Falwell, Jr., was forced to step down when his heavy drinking, uncouth conduct, and an affair he and is wife were having with a Miami pool boy humiliated the university.)
Alberta also reports on many of the nation’s most prominent evangelical figures, including megachurch pastor and Trump confidant Robert Jeffress, veteran political operator Ralph Reed (who, like others, vigorously defends Trump and Republican Georgia senate candidate Herschel Walker despite their compromised personal lives), Charlie Kirk (who commands the theological devotion of many evangelicals despite his non-theological background) and pseudo-historian David Barton. Alberta contrasts their stories with people like Russell Moore, whose criticisms of Donald Trump led to resignation as head of the public policy arm of the Southern Baptist Convention. Like others Alberta talks to, Moore (whose conservative credentials are impeccable) experiences a kind of spiritual liberation by breaking with corrupted evangelical institutions.
Alberta’s main critique of the evangelical movement is that it has shifted its focus from spiritual matters to the pursuit of political power. The question Alberta would ask those who have entwined their faith so tightly with politics comes from Mark 8:36: “What good is it for someone to gain the whole world, yet forfeit their soul?” Alberta reminds readers Christianity is a counter to political authority and does not aim to rule in this world. It was born of weakness rather than strength or power, which is corrupting. Christians do right when they minister to the souls of others and live in accordance with Christ’s teachings no matter the cost. There may be sadness but no shame in losing, so long as Christ is glorified through one’s actions. Positive political change occurs not by gaining dominion over an earthly kingdom but by opening people’s hearts to Christ.
This is hardly the position many evangelicals adhere to today. Alberta argues that just a few decades ago, most evangelicals would have approached politics from a defensive crouch: Fearing the creep of the secular world into American society, they sought policies aimed at preserving their way of life. Today, the evangelical political movement fears their way of life is under direct assault and subject to state-sanctioned oppression, making them more willing to go on the offensive against secular political authority and replace it with conservative Christian rule. This form of “Christian Nationalism”—which embattled Speaker of the House Mike Johnson is affiliated with—hopes to restore a Christian political regime that, despite the claims of Christian Nationalists, never existed in the United States.
Given the stakes of this supposedly apocalyptic battle for the soul of the nation, Christian Nationalists cannot tolerate losing. That leads many evangelicals to align themselves with individuals (like Trump) and endorse tactics (like dishonesty and threats of political violence) that are unchristian in character. As Alberta writes, “The first step toward preserving Christian values, it seemed, was to do away with Christian values.” Some evangelicals might justify this strategy as a Machiavellian accommodation to the cutthroat world of politics, but Machiavellian ethics are incompatible with Christian “turn the other cheek” ethics. (I would add it’s easier for people to adopt this position when “Christian” is understood less as an ethical concept than as a cultural signifier like nationality and race.)
Alberta does acknowledge one issue makes it very difficult for evangelicals to stand down politically: Abortion. Even if evangelicals were to pivot away from politics or reject political extremism, it would be hard for them to support pro-choice candidates or concede that the life-or-death issue is a matter of personal choice. Rather than pursue their political goals within the political arena, however, Alberta suggests evangelicals should proselytize a more comprehensive “life” ethic aimed at changing people’s hearts and minds. Yet given the urgency of the abortion issue for evangelicals, it is understandable why so many would refuse to quit a political crusade to outlaw the procedure.
The Kingdom, the Power, and the Glory isn’t so much a takedown of contemporary evangelical Christianity in the United States as it is an intervention. Despite its hard-hitting reportage, Alberta clearly believes his faith tradition has much to offer the world and is worth redeeming. I wonder, however, if Alberta correctly diagnoses some of the problems that plague the evangelical church or if those problems run deeper than evangelical Christianity’s lust for political power.
For example, Alberta never questions the entrepreneurial nature of the evangelical tradition. I’m not simply thinking about the commercialism, hucksterism, and ostentatious displays of wealth that seem to stalk the church (Alberta certainly comes down hard on that) but rather the way evangelical pastors frequently set off on their own to start new churches that are often unaffiliated with major Christian denominations. In doing so, these pastors may feel they are filling a community’s unmet spiritual demands, but it’s the pastor’s need to find parishioners and fill the fledgling church’s coffers that can lead a pastor to deviate from a strictly spiritual mission or drift from doctrine. Furthermore, their evangelism often poaches members from mainline Protestant churches and other evangelical churches, which can hollow-out established faith communities with long-standing local ties. For a faith tradition that often touts its religious traditionalism, evangelical churches are actually very disruptive. Perhaps it’s the nature of Protestantism and American religion to constantly reinvent itself, but maybe some of that entrepreneurial spirit would be better used reinvigorating established churches and their doctrinal traditions.
There’s also the way evangelical churches treat women. Very few women are profiled in the pages of Alberta’s book; those who are featured are either sexual assault victims or journalists investigating sexual assault within the evangelical church. It’s not Alberta’s fault that women appear so sparingly in his work, as there are very few women in positions of leadership within evangelical Christianity for him to interview. (In fact, in some evangelical churches, women can’t even teach Sunday school, as they are not allowed to instruct male members, including boys.) Evangelicals would insist this gendered social structure mirrors the Bible, but that focus on Biblical literalism misses Christ’s overarching message, which emphasizes the equality of all of God’s children. This is a problem that should be easy for evangelical Christianity to fix, but their stubbornness not only discredits them spiritually but confers a second-class status onto half the members of their church and leaves them vulnerable to mistreatment and abuse.
Another problem—one even evident in Alberta’s own thinking—is how evangelicals conflate “evangelical Christianity” with “Christianity.” For example, at one point Alberta frames the conflict within the evangelical community as a “war for the soul of American Christianity.” But evangelicals—who often refer to themselves as “Christian” to imply that other Christians are not real “Christians”—do not have a monopoly on Christianity in the United States. Not only is it condescending and arrogant of them to think they do, but it also testifies to an underlying streak of intolerance within the evangelical tradition.
What makes this problem even worse is that over the past fifty years, evangelicals in the United States have cornered the market on use of the term “Christian,” so much so that when many mainline Protestants identify themselves as Christian, they feel compelled to distinguish themselves from evangelicals (i.e., “but not like Mike Pence,” “but we accept LGBTQ people,” “but my pastor isn’t crazy,” etc.) Even Alberta admits this conflation of evangelical Christianity with Christianity has had disastrous results for Christianity in general in the United States, as the hypocrisy, materialism, bigotry, and spiritual emptiness so many now associate with evangelical Christianity have not only driven people away from evangelical churches but away from Christianity itself. Alberta considers this one of the major failings of evangelical Christianity:
Instead of testifying confidently to the presence of a supreme and sovereign God—a celestial chess master rolling His eyes at our earthly checkerboard—Christian conservatives have acted like toddlers lost at the shopping mall, panicked and petrified, shouting the name of their father with such hysteria that his reputation is diminished in the eyes of every onlooker.
Alberta may want his readers to focus on the state of evangelical Christianity in the 2020s, but these problems have been around for a long time. The record of evangelical Christianity in the United States over the past half century is quite disgraceful. From its opposition to racial integration and women’s rights to the demonization of LGBTQ Americans and its embrace of war in the Middle East during the Bush administration to its idolatry of Trump, all done in the name of God, one has to wonder if evangelical Christianity ever had the answers to the nation’s most pressing questions, or, even if they did occasionally, if we’re better off on the whole for that.
Alberta repeatedly argues the evangelical church could change course if its leaders simply retreated from political advocacy and focused instead on personal spiritual development and helping the marginalized and those in need. (It’s worth noting that many mainline Protestant churches already operate the social ministries and have adopted the doctrinal positions Alberta endorses.) That would be a good first step, but as Alberta shows throughout his book, when pastors have done that, their followers have abandoned them in droves. Alberta has seen some signs of hope—his father’s old congregation has started to grow again, and young evangelicals seem exasperated with current church leadership—but that doesn’t seem to be where the energy is at among the laypeople. Furthermore, when reformers step forward, they don’t go far enough. For instance, when Jonathan Falwell stepped into a leadership role at Liberty after his brother Jerry’s fall from grace, he broke from Trump…by inviting Ron DeSantis to campus. DeSantis is not the answer.
I would go further than Alberta and argue that reforming evangelical Christianity is not merely a matter of distancing evangelical Christianity from political affairs but of adopting a humbler approach to faith. As Job learned the hard way, even when we think we have God all figured out, something is bound to happen that will remind us God is too big for mere mortals to understand. That means we should be careful not to speak with certainty about God and cautious about the causes we attach to God’s name. Humility reminds us not to leap to judgment about others or when applying doctrine to affairs of the world, and to constantly (and conscientiously) question what we think we know about matters of faith. There is always room to grow closer to God. That’s impossible to do, however, when we’re convinced we’re right.
Signals and Noise
Trump said the country faces a “bloodbath” if Biden is re-elected in November. By David Smith of The Guardian: “‘It’ll Be Bedlam’: How Trump is Creating Conditions for a Post-Election Eruption”
Alexandra Hutzler of ABC News reports many of the internal policies enacted by the Justice Department following Watergate to insulate DOJ from politics are not codified by law, so an attorney general appointed by Trump could easily roll back those policies to persecute Trump’s political enemies.
Trump accused Jewish people who vote for Democrats of hating Israel.
Sahil Kapur of NBC News looks at Trump’s past comments on entitlements and finds he is all over the place when it comes to Social Security and Medicare. (Now House Republicans have proposed raising the Social Security retirement age. They’ve also endorsed a plan similar to the one proposed by Paul Ryan that would allow Medicare to compete with private plans.)
Trump keeps hinting he’ll get behind a 15-week abortion ban.
Josh Dawsey of the New York Times reports Trump plans on bringing Paul Manafort back into the fold. Manafort was convicted of tax and bank fraud as a part of Robert Mueller’s investigation into Russian interference in the 2016 election but was pardoned by Trump after serving some time in jail. And Maggie Haberman of the New York Times reports former Trump official Corey Lewandowski may be brought back for a convention role. Lewandowski has been fired from the Trump orbit twice, most recently following accusations of sexual harassment.
Tom Nichols of The Atlantic considers a darker side to Trump’s promise to pardon the imprisoned 1/6 rioters: They’ll owe him, and he’ll need foot soldiers. (“As the historian and scholar of authoritarian movements Ruth Ben-Ghiat has noted, would-be dictators deploy such promises to build groups that will ignore the law and obey the leader. ‘Amnesties and pardons,’ she told me earlier today, ‘have always been an efficient way for leaders to free up large numbers of the most criminal and unscrupulous elements of society for service to the party and the state, and make them indebted to the rulers in the process.’”) MORE: “Trump Escalates Solidarity with Jan. 6 Rioters as His Own Trials Close In” from the Washington Post
Trump’s lawyers told the judge in his financial fraud case it is “impossible” for him to post the $464 million bond needed to appeal the case. If he doesn’t post bond yet appeals, New York’s attorney general could start taking his property to cover the amount. MORE: “What Could Happen as Trump Faces Deadline on Half-Billion-Dollar Bond” from the Washington Post
FOX News: Is there any effort on the part of your team to secure [the money Trump needs to come up with] through another country, Saudi Arabia or Russia, as [The View co-host] Joy Behar seems to think?
Trump lawyer Alina Habba: Well there’s rules and regulations that are public. I can’t speak about strategy.
Thanks to meme investors who have driven up the price of the stock, Trump is slated to make a windfall ($3 billion perhaps) on his sale of Truth Social. (Trump wouldn’t have access to that money for six months, though.) According to Citizens for Ethics, the biggest investor in the company that’s merging with Truth Social social media company is Jeffrey Yass, who is a major investor in the company that owns TikTok. Trump has flipped his position on TikTok and now opposes its divesture from its Chinese owners.
The judge in Trump’s classified documents case is suddenly asking for jury instructions (even though she has yet to schedule a trial) and set up a scenario in which prosecutors must allow jurors to view the classified documents themselves or essentially let Trump walk free. She also appears to have no clue what she’s talking about when it comes to the issue of immunity. MORE: “‘Very, Very Troubling’: Judges, Lawyers Flummoxed by Judge Cannon” by Devlin Barrett and Perry Stein of the Washington Post
A recent Politico poll found Americans may be more likely to write off Trump if convicted of a crime than many assume. (I still think a lot of it will come down to how the media cover those cases, particularly if it turns into horserace coverage without context.)
Time looks at the state of the Biden campaign, which seems stuck in the mud.
“It’s Not the Economy. It’s the Pandemic” by George Makari and Richard A. Friedman for The Atlantic (“Experts have struggled to find a convincing explanation for this era of bad feelings. Maybe it’s the spate of inflation over the past couple of years, the immigration crisis at the border, or the brutal wars in Ukraine and Gaza. But even the people who claim to make sense of the political world acknowledge that these rational factors can’t fully account for America’s national malaise. We believe that’s because they’re overlooking a crucial factor. Four years ago, the country was brought to its knees by a world-historic disaster. COVID-19 hospitalized nearly 7 million Americans and killed more than a million; it’s still killing hundreds each week. It shut down schools and forced people into social isolation. Almost overnight, most of the country was thrown into a state of high anxiety—then, soon enough, grief and mourning. But the country has not come together to sufficiently acknowledge the tragedy it endured.”)
I try not to focus too much on campaign finance, but this article by Brian Schwartz of CNBC is a good look at Trump’s campaign cash crunch, why it’s happening, and its spillover effects on the RNC.
It looks like Congress will manage to keep the government open, with Democrats once again coming to the rescue of Republican Speaker Mike Johnson. That should put an end to the government shutdown drama that’s been playing out for months. After all that time, the final bill is barely different from the framework former Republican Speaker Kevin McCarthy and Joe Biden had agreed to last year.
In response to keeping the government open, Republican Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene has filed a motion to vacate the Speaker. It would only take three Republicans to make the plan work, but it looks like Democrats will line up to save Johnson, particularly if he promises a vote on Ukraine aid in return.
“Our Republican majority is a complete failure.”—Republican Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene on X.
Republican Rep. Mike Gallagher of Wisconsin will resign in less than one month, reducing the Republican majority in the House to one seat.
The bipartisan House tax bill that includes a child tax credit and an R&D tax break for businesses is opposed in the Senate by Republican Idaho Senator Mike Crapo, the ranking member on the Senate Finance Committee. Even Mitt Romney, who is retiring in less than a year and has pushed a child tax credit, came out in opposition to it. The bill received overwhelming support in the House.
The Senate is in no hurry to take up the House’s recently passed bill that would require a Chinese-owned company to divest itself of TikTok.
Trump-endorsed car salesman Bernie Moreno won the Ohio Republican senate primary last week despite some unflattering revelations that came out on the eve of the election. Moreno’s campaign was supported financially by Democratic-aligned groups, who believe Moreno is too extreme even for red-state Ohio voters in a race against Democratic incumbent Sherrod Brown.
The Biden administration forgave another $6 billion in student loan debt.
The Biden administration announced major new regulations limiting tail pipe emissions in an effort to increase sales of electric and hybrid vehicles. Umair Irfan of Vox has more on this.
A week after Biden announced his opposition to the sale of US Steel to a Japanese firm, the United Steelworkers union endorsed him.
Gannett and McClatchy, two of the nation’s largest newspaper conglomerates, have dropped AP. The small- to mid-sized newspapers that relied on AP to fill out their world and local news aren’t sure how the gap will be filled.
Dan De Luce and Kevin Collier of NBC News report on what happened when experts war-gamed what might happen if deep fakes were used to disrupt the 2024 election. It didn’t go well, with many unsure how to respond given our highly polarized and contentious political environment.
Lauren Weber and Sabrina Malhi of the Washington Post look at the newest topic of misinformation sweeping social media: The “dangers” of birth control.
Despite widespread perceptions that crime is rising, new FBI data confirmed crime is actually falling, with murder rates expected to see their biggest year-to-year drop on record.
Oregon has repealed the nation’s most radical experiment in drug decriminalization. Keith Humphreys and Rob Bovett write in The Atlantic about why Oregon’s law failed.
The EPA announced a comprehensive ban on asbestos.
Apoorva Mandavilli of the New York Times finds there have been more cases of measles so far this year than in all of 2023. The numbers are rising due to unvaccinated migrants. Measles had been eliminated in the United States in 2000, but there is concern now that outbreaks could occur due to anti-vax sentiment..
Israel has once again raided al-Shifa hospital in Gaza City.
Patrick Wintour of The Guardian reports Don Trump’s son-in-law and former White House important person Jared Kushner told an audience at that woke bastion of liberalism Harvard University that Gaza’s waterfront is “very valuable” and that Israel should consider moving Gazans to the Negev in order to develop the area. Pressed on if that was a proposal under serious consideration anywhere, Kushner replied that he was just sitting in Miami Beach thinking about what could be done. Aren’t we all?
By Thomas Friedman of the New York Times: “Netanyahu is Making Israel Radioactive”
ISIS claimed responsibility for an attack on a Moscow concert venue that left at least 130 dead and over 100 injured. Putin is trying to link the attack to Ukraine.
Garbage Time: The Biggest Question Facing Every Major League Team (A 2024 MLB Preview)
(Garbage Time theme song here)
See-through pants. That’s what everyone was buzzing about during spring training. The uniforms are now made by Fanatics, which has apparently acquired a monopoly over American professional sports uniform production and merchandise. My experience with the company (overpriced clothes, crappy production) leaves me unsurprised. The new unis are supposed to be lighter and more comfortable to wear, something I’ve always wondered about since authentic MLB jerseys seem heavy, but these new ones seem pretty chintzy to me. There’s also disappointment with Nike, which has made some unwelcome changes to uniform design, such as using a smaller font for player names on the backs of jerseys. Am I to assume they’ll have this all worked out by opening day? That’s a good question, one of many that could be asked about every team this season. Had I also finished writing this introduction before a story broke linking the sport’s biggest star to gambling? Yes I did. But I deal with that below.
AMERICAN LEAGUE EAST
Baltimore Orioles—What team do the Orioles remind you of? Young, confident, joyful in their approach to the game, fun to watch? Yeah, they kind of do remind me of the 2016 Chicago Cubs. The Orioles finished 2023 with 101 wins, the best record in the American League, and the second-best in Major League Baseball, but were swept by the Rangers in their only postseason series. This year, they’ve added former Milwaukee Brewer ace and 2021 Cy Young Award winner Corbin Burnes to their rotation, but will be without closer Felix Bautista (Craig Kimbrel is taking his place; not too shabby.) Baseball’s top prospect, middle infielder Jackson Holliday, is waiting in Triple-A. Baltimore doesn’t have to win it all this year or win 100 games again. There’s still room to improve their rotation, which may happen once all their starters get healthy. But don’t be surprised if everything suddenly clicks for this team and Baltimore returns to the World Series for the first time since 1983.
Boston Red Sox—Will anyone be talking about baseball this summer in New England? No. In fact, if someone mentions the Green Monster this year in Boston, they’ll be talking about these guys
who have, far and away, the best record in the NBA and look poised to win a title. That right there is a good team. Can’t say the same about the Red Sox.
New York Yankees—What’s more likely: The Yankees winning the World Series this year or finishing with their first losing record since 1992? The Yankees finished with an 82-80 record last year and for a while there looked like they were going to end up on the wrong side of .500 for the first time since Don Mattingly was playing first base. Their big addition this year is Juan Soto, one of the most-feared players in baseball; pair him with Aaron Judge and the Yankees are suddenly having flashbacks to the days of Ruth and Gehrig. They also have Cy Young Award winner Gerrit Cole, who is in a class of his own among current major league pitchers but who will start the season on the IL. The addition of Soto should be enough to keep the Yankees above .500, but I’d say it’s more likely they end up with a losing record just because it will be easier for injuries to derail the season than it will be for this underwhelming squad to make a deep postseason run. That, and they’ll have to make the playoffs to begin with if they hope to win the World Series. A better goal: Give Soto a reason to re-sign with the team this winter. It will probably take $500+ million, which may be all the convincing Soto needs.
Tampa Bay Rays—What is it I don’t know about Aaron Civale and Ryan Pepiot? Civale and Pepiot were just back-of-the-rotation pitchers for the Guardians and the Dodgers, respectively, last season. The Rays have added them both. Last season, Tampa Bay acquired Zach Eflin from the Phillies and turned him into one of MLB’s most consistently good pitchers. Will they do the same with Civale and Pepiot? What did Tampa’s front office see in those guys? The Rays are known for player development; just look at their lineup, which consists of mostly homegrown talent. Last year they won 99 games (although that was boosted by a 13-game win streak to start the season). I’m doubtful the Rays will be that good again, but they can’t be counted out.
Toronto Blue Jays—Am I buying the Blue Jays again? I’ve been high on this team for the past few seasons, but they keep underperforming. Vladimir Guerrero Jr. (as good as he is) hasn’t lived up to his full potential, players like George Springer and Alex Manoah (oof) may be melting down, and they’ve bid farewell to essential pieces like Matt Chapman. They’ve got the potential to be a good team, but I’ll have to see it to believe it.
AMERICAN LEAGUE CENTRAL
Chicago White Sox—In a weak division, could the White Sox—
Oh. Never mind.
Cleveland Guardians—Wait, was that Guardians all-star third baseman Jose Ramirez delivering the knockout blow to (now ex-)White Soxck Tim Anderson? Does that mean the Guardians are going to be good this year? That is Guardians all-star third baseman Jose Ramirez clocking Tim Anderson! But is Cleveland going to be good? Maybe by accident. They’ve got a solid rotation, but their two biggest arms—Shane Bieber and Tristan McKenzie—are coming back from injury-plagued seasons. Closer Emmanuel Clase appears to be slipping, and there’s not much behind him in the bullpen. Offensively, they’ve got Ramirez and Bo and Luke Josh Naylor and that’s it. Cleveland’s been wanting to start a rebuild for a few years now, and that kind of started last year, when they finished behind Detroit in the standings, but the rest of the division won’t improve enough to knock them out of playoff contention. Maybe they’ll be good enough to win a lousy division.
Detroit Tigers—Do you know this year marks the 40th anniversary of the Tigers’ last World Series championship? I do. And it’s been ten years since they made the playoffs. The Tigers are kind of a dark horse to win the division this year, but if that comes to pass, they’ll probably have done so with less than 80 wins.
Kansas City Royals—Will Taylor Swift be attending any Kansas City games this season?
OK, but probably not a Royals game. That would be a lucrative rumor for someone in the Royals organization to start, however. Bobby Witt and Co. will be better than they were last year when they only won 56 games, but they won’t be good. (By the way, do we think Taylor and Travis are going to make it to the start of the NFL season? My money is on a “cruel summer” for Mr. Kelce.)
Minnesota Twins—Is there anyone in this division who can top the Twins? I don’t think it should be that hard because this whole division is TRASH. The Twins have a good top of the rotation pitcher in Pablo Lopez, but they lost Cy Young runner-up Sonny Gray (did I really type those words?) Closer Jhoan Duran is a trustworthy ninth inning option but will start the season on the IL. Their two best players—Carlos Correa and Byron Buxton—are usually hurt. When it comes to the three true outcome stats in 2023, the Twins ranked 3rd in home runs, 4th in strikeouts, and 1st in walks in MLB. That was good enough to finish six games above .500 last season in a division that didn’t even require a winning record to make it into the playoffs. But instead of building on that record, the Twins cut payroll. People are picking the Twins to win the division again based on last season’s performance, but this year ain’t last year.
AMERICAN LEAGUE WEST
Houston Astros—Are the Astros still World Series contenders? They were only one game away from the World Series last year, which they probably would have won had they made it there. And they have made it to seven consecutive ALCS. The thinking is the Astros should run out of gas eventually, but I’m expecting MVP-caliber seasons from 27-year-old OF Kyle Tucker (a league-leading 112 RBI and one home run shy of joining the 30-30 club) and 26-year-old OF Yordan Alvarez (the only player with 30 home runs and 90 RBI in each of the three seasons since the pandemic.) The weak spot is first baseman Jose Abreu, whose power numbers regressed significantly, but there’s probably a trade deadline option that could solve that problem (H-h-h-Halonso. Excuse me.) Houston has enough pitching depth to work around injuries to their starting rotation, and the bullpen now features the one-two punch of Ryan Pressly and Josh Hader. Age and injuries tried to do this team in last year, but the Astros are built to contend.
Los Angeles Angels—Is baseball a top priority for this team? I ask because baseball isn’t for oft-injured Angels third baseman Anthony Rendon, who signed a 7-year, $245 million deal four years ago and has yet to play the equivalent of a full-season for the Halos. Rendon told an interviewer this spring, “[Baseball’s] never been a top priority for me. This is a job. I do this to make a living. My faith, my family come first before this job. So if those things come before it, I’m leaving.” Which is fine. It’s not like he has misplaced priorities. Rendon probably articulated how many MLB players feel, given the way a 162-game season with few off-days and long road trips can grind someone down. At some point, playing professional baseball probably does turn into a job someone does for the sake of a paycheck. But this does seem like an organizational issue. The Angels have squandered Mike Trout’s prime and let Shohei Ohtani go for nothing in return. They’re not just a rudderless team; even if they had a rudder, they wouldn’t know where they’d want to go.
Oakland Athletics—Where are the A’s playing this year? Apparently Oakland. They’re supposed to be moving to Las Vegas, but not until 2028. Their lease in Oakland expires at the end of this season, though. There’s talk the team may decamp to Salt Lake City for a few years until their stadium is ready in Las Vegas. (That stadium looks pretty cool, by the way, although it would be way cooler if they moved into the Sphere. I like how the stadium’s not a retro park but something modern and new, although everyone’s getting Sydney Opera House vibes from it. And nothing screams Vegas more than the New York skyline beyond the left field wall.)
But the mayor of Las Vegas doesn’t sound all that excited about bringing a team to Sin City. Is the move even a done deal yet? Meanwhile, can you really expect fans in Oakland to buy tickets to watch a team that’s already broken up with them?
Seattle Mariners—Will the Mariners make the playoffs this season? Maybe? They made the playoffs two seasons ago, breaking the longest playoff drought in professional American sports, but even though they had the sixth best record in the American League, they couldn’t claim one of the AL’s six playoff spots. Their starting pitching, which features Luis Castillo, George Kirby, and Logan Gilbert, is unchanged from last season, when they had the fourth best ERA in the majors, and their bullpen was also fourth in ERA. It’s just a matter of if they’ve got enough offense around 23-year-old sensation Julio Rodriguez. They hope middle-of-the-order additions Jorge Polanco and Mitch Garver will be the difference makers, but an upgrade at the corner infield and outfield spots (projected to bat 6-9 in the batting order) would push this team over the top.
Texas Rangers—Can the Rangers win back-to-back World Series championships? If they did that, the Rangers would be the first team to do so since the 1998-2000 Yankees, so I don’t think the odds are in their favor. It’s just too easy for some rando team (like, say, the Rangers last year) to get hot in October and start knocking contenders out of the playoffs. They’re not much different this season than they were last year, although they’re missing trade deadline acquisition Jordan Montgomery (who remains unsigned.) Jacob deGrom is supposed to come back from Tommy John surgery at some point, but he’s been hurt so often, the Rangers shouldn’t count on him. The Corey Seager/Marcus Semiem/Adolis Garcia triumvirate can anchor this lineup, and there’s a lot of buzz surrounding prospects Wyatt Langford and Evan Carter. Still, this isn’t a team that screams “repeat champion.”
NATIONAL LEAGUE EAST
Atlanta Braves—Will the Braves top 100 wins again? This is a loaded team, starting with baseball’s only 40-70 man, reigning NL MVP Ronald Acuña Jr., and baseball’s only 20 game winner last season, Spender Strider (who also led the league in Ks.) I’d say the only thing holding Atlanta back is injuries, but this team was actually injured a lot last year and still managed to top 100 wins. It will be interesting to see if new acquisition Chris Sale can finally stay healthy for a full season and what he has left in the tank. One hundred victories in certainly within reach, but it’s another postseason title this wannabe dynasty is really after.
Miami Marlins—Will the Marlins improve on last year’s surprise playoff appearance? Don’t bet on it. When a team makes the playoffs and then turns over their front office as the Marlins have, that’s a sign the team is more interested in rebuilding than contending.
New York Mets—Will the Mets re-sign Pete Alonso? My favorite baseball player should be Mookie Betts, but weirdly, its power-hitting first baseman Pete Alonso of the Mets. Alonso is a free agent at the end of this season. Having bashed 192 home runs since he entered the league (the most of any MLBer in that time span) he should be a Met lifer. But he’ll also turn 30 at the start of the 2025 season, and hitters like Alonso have a tendency not to age well. Maybe the Mets will throw him a boatload of cash out of a sense of loyalty, but they also have the big league’s biggest payroll at $328 million. That’s down from close to half a billion from last year, when they had World Series aspirations but began falling apart before the season even started when closer Edwin Diaz got hurt celebrating a win during the World Baseball Classic. The Mets now are in a holding pattern until the prospects they got in return for Verlander, Scherzer, and Co. are ready. Alonso’s agent Scott Boras can’t reach a deal with new Mets GM David Stearns, so Alonso is likely headed to free agency, which also means he could be trade bait for a team looking for a power hitting 1B/DH. In the meantime, maybe Alonso’s walk season will give him the incentive to match his 52 home run output from his 2019 rookie season.
Philadelphia Phillies—Can I still get a hot dog at Phillies games? Yes, you can, but gone are April dollar dog days, when hot dogs were so cheap, fans last year started throwing them onto the field and at each other just for the hell of it. It was a family promotion. The team said they ended the deal because the lines were too long on the concourse but also people were throwing them and some people got hurt. (Do they put mustard on their dogs before hurling them? No, probably ketchup. Animals...) Has to go down as one of the most Philly things ever. But what can you expect when this guy is a role model:
Now the team has a buy-one-get-one-free hot dog promo, which, I mean, that’s like one to eat, one to throw, right? The Phillies are giving their fans free ammunition. And now that this is a thing, you know it’s gonna happen. But the team? What about the team? Yeah, they’re still good, the core is intact, I’ll bet Trea Turner will be better than he was last year, and Bryce Harper has settled in at first base. They had a 3-2 lead and two chances at home to wrap up the NLCS but blew it, but it just seems like this team—which gets super focused when October rolls around—is due to make a World Series run. (BTW, I made it to a game in Philadelphia last year and it was awesome. Pre-game tailgating and the most engaged crowd—hanging on every pitch—I’ve ever been a part of, and that was for an August interleague game. Check out a game if you can.)
Washington Nationals—Is anyone ever going to buy this team? Nope, because once DC businessman/philanthropist David Rubenstein bought the Orioles for $1.7 billion, the Lerner’s took the Nationals off the market. Which brings up the question, what’s been the point of the past four years? Washington wins the World Series in 2019, begins dismantling itself to lower the price tag of a sale, and finishes in last place for four (and, in all likelihood, five) consecutive seasons. They could have been sitting on a dynasty in 2019. Instead, they seem to be taking their cues from the Commanders and Wizards. On the bright side, as a Washington Post subscriber, I can get cheap tickets to games.
NATIONAL LEAGUE CENTRAL
Chicago Cubs—How many more games can Craig Counsell win than David Ross? Perhaps sensing the Brewers were a sinking ship, Milwaukee manager Craig Counsell let his contract expire with the team on November 1, 2023. There was a lot of talk he was going to replace Buck Showalter in New York, but then, out of the blue, the Cubs dumped David Ross and made Counsell the highest paid manager in MLB ($40 million over 5 years). (How humiliating is it for Milwaukee that their manager fled to their biggest rival?) Was Ross a suboptimal manager? How much better is Counsell? The Cubs melted down in September last year; had they been a couple games better that month, they would have taken the Diamondbacks’ postseason spot, and look how far Arizona got with that. The Cubs’ roster isn’t changed much from last year, so if Counsell squeezes a few more wins out of them, maybe that’s all it takes to justify his $40 million contract. But will Cody Bellinger keep the comeback alive? Will Justin Steele turn into an ace? Is Adbert Alzolay the answer in the ninth? Will the Cubs build on 2023, or did they peak in August? Counsell’s hiring seems to suggest the front office believes this is a team that can contend.
Cincinnati Reds—Is Elly De La Cruz the real deal? De La Cruz made the biggest splash of recent memory when he debuted with the Reds in June of last summer. By the All-Star break, he was hitting .323 and was the first player in MLB history to collect 40 hits and steal 15 bases in his first 30 games. He threw hard (a league-leading 95.6 mph for infielders) and ran very fast (30.4 feet per second), becoming the first player since 1919 to steal second, third, and home in one inning.
But in the second half, he only hit .191, and he was on base so infrequently, he only stole 20 more bases. De La Cruz has star power. I’m not convinced he has staying power. For the good of the game, I hope I’m wrong.
Milwaukee Brewers—Does Major League Baseball even want a team in Milwaukee? Things were already looking bleak in Milwaukee, where the Brewers cruised to a Central Division title last season. Their big offseason signing—first baseman Rhys Hoskins—suddenly looked like a stopgap when they traded away ace Corbin Burnes. Number two starter Brandon Woodruff is shelved for most if not all of the season. Manager Craig Counsell ditched the team for the Cubs. Then closer Devin Williams—perhaps the best in baseball—was lost for three months after injuring his back. But that’s small potatoes stuff. Let’s rewind to last season, when MLB got in a huff with the Brewers about updating their 23-year-old stadium The Brewers did so with the help of taxpayer money. Now they’ve got a deal in place to keep the team in Wisconsin until 2050. MLB is pushing Oakland and Tampa to resolve their stadium/location issues too, although it’s more glaringly obvious what’s wrong with those two franchises’ parks. So why is MLB picking on Milwaukee? How about that they play in the smallest market in MLB, and that to catch up to the second-to-last smallest market (Cleveland), the Milwaukee metro area would need to grow by at least 33%. How about that four other potential expansion cities (Charlotte, Austin, Portland, and Nashville) are all significantly bigger or growing more rapidly than Milwaukee, which is shrinking in size. Are we really sure the big leagues are long for Milwaukee?
Pittsburgh Pirates—Is Oneil Cruz the real deal? The season got off to a bad start last year when phenom Oneil Cruz broke his leg in early April and never made it back. Like the Reds’ De La Cruz, Cruz is an electrifying player, but we haven’t seen enough of him yet in the major leagues to know what he’s fully capable of.
St. Louis Cardinals—Can it get any worse for the Cardinals? God I hope so. The Cardinals had high hopes heading into the 2023 season but got off to a wretched start. And then, like a clogged toilet at a sketchy highway rest stop that someone decides to flush, it went from bad to so much worse to quick, let’s get in the car and get the hell out of here before the EPA shuts the whole place down. If you want a taste of St. Louis’s 2023 campaign, check out this game from July 5. The Cardinals had already dropped two games in Miami that were just complete disasters. Then, in this one, the Marlins got out to a 5-0 lead before the Cardinals tied it 6-6 in the 4th. Miami would tack on two more runs before the 7th inning. I’ll let you pick it up from there:
They worked so hard to get back into that game! Their catcher of all people hustled out an infield single in the ninth inning! They were down to their last strike and then took the lead on a home run! Hope springs eternal! And then that pitcher was like, “I’m just gonna throw this away. Won’t even make it close, that’s how undeserving we are. I invite the mockery.” Suddenly the toilet is overflowing and the Cardinals are standing in two feet of rancid sewage with no clue how they got there or where to go. I hope we get highlights like this from St. Louis for the next hundred years.
NATIONAL LEAGUE WEST
Arizona Diamondbacks—Will the DBacks make it back to the World Series? Nah. Beyond Rookie of the Year Corbin Carroll, I’m not high on this team. They barely scraped into the playoffs last year. An above average rotation should keep the team afloat, and a National League that scans weak could land them a wildcard berth by default. But the odds of the team with the third worst record to ever make the World Series (84-78) returning to the World Series are pretty low.
Colorado Rockies—How much time should I spend researching this terrible team before writing this preview? About as much time as Kris Bryant spent before signing with the Rockies two years ago.
Los Angeles Dodgers—On a scale of 1-10, how concerned are you about this Shohei Ohtani news? Forget the signings of Tyler Glasnow and Yoshinobu Yamamoto and all the help on the way once the rest of the Dodgers’ pitching staff gets healthy. The big story is the signing of two-way superstar Shohei Ohtani to the biggest contract in not only MLB history but probably professional sports history: $700 million for ten years (62% higher than Mike Trout’s previous record salary) much of that deferred past the end of the contract so it does not count toward the luxury tax and so the Dodgers can sign players like Yamamoto. And Ohtani can’t even pitch this year as he recovers from Tommy John surgery (and who knows what form he’ll have when he does return.) But the bigger story now is the news that broke last week that Ohtani’s interpreter Ippei Mizuhara was fired following allegations of illegal gambling and theft. Mizuhara initially said Ohtani gave him the money to pay off his [Mizuhara ’s] gambling debts but then said he actually stole the $4.5 million from Ohtani. The feds are looking into it, and if Ohtani gave Mizuhara the money, that would violate baseball’s gambling rules. I’m not super concerned about it right now because Ohtani is cooperating with authorities, so I’ll say I’m a 3.5 at this point, I’d be concerned if I were the Dodgers because Ohtani says he’s cooperating with authorities but no one seems to know who those “authorities” are, so I’ll say I’m a 5.5 at this point. This is not how the Dodgers wanted to start the Ohtani era.
San Diego Padres—You wouldn’t happen to have a convenient visual metaphor that could represent the state of the Padres right now, do you? Strange that you ask, but I do! From last week’s regular season opener in South Korea:
Yeah, that was weird. It was just a ground ball, too. Imagine if the third baseman had whipped one over to first and the ball had blasted through Cronenworth’s glove and smashed him in the face. But that’s what the Padres were like last year. They had it all in hand. Loaded roster. World Series aspirations. And they broke down. Now OF Juan Soto, closer Josh Hader, and Cy Young winner Blake Snell are with other teams. Fernando Tatis, Jr. and Manny Machado are hoping for bounce back years. And the club—which had to take out a $50 million loan last September to cover end-of-year expenses despite doubling their 2019 revenue and bringing in a record 3.2 million fans to Petco Park—is praying for better results despite a diminished team.
San Francisco Giants—Is the recent signing of 2023 Cy Young Award winner Blake Snell a difference maker? First in the league in ERA, third in Ks, first in walks…given the way teams manage starting pitchers these days, I’m not sure starters are difference makers anymore. Snell and Logan Webb make a potent 1-2, though, and they’ll play half their games in a pitcher’s park, but the Giants don’t have enough offense to contend.
AL MVP: Kyle Tucker (Houston Astros)
NL MVP: Pete Alonso (New York Mets)
AL Cy Young: Corbin Burnes (Baltimore Orioles)
NL Cy Young: Jesus Luzardo (Miami Marlins)
AL East: Baltimore Orioles
AL Central: Cleveland Guardians
AL West: Houston Astros
AL Wildcards: Tampa Bay Rays, Texas Rangers, New York Yankees
NL East: Atlanta Braves
NL Central: Chicago Cubs
NL West: Los Angeles Dodgers
NL Wildcards: Philadelphia Phillies, San Diego Padres, New York Mets
NL Championship: Philadelphia over Los Angeles
AL Championship: Baltimore over Houston
World Series Champion: Baltimore Orioles