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It's become a given that the American League West is the weakest in baseball, but is it really? Maybe it was at the end of May, before the A's went on their annual June tear and Seattle beat up on the National League, but how can a division that's over .500 be the weakest? If one division is over .500, then mathematically, at least one other division must be under .500. Since the American League is much better this year than the National League, even the weakest division in the American League is better than at least one and probably two divisions in the National League.
The American League West doesn't have a dominating team, but it doesn't have any patsies, either. Detroit, the White Sox and the Twins get to pad their records by playing the Royals something like 18 times (Detroit is undefeated against the Royals this year). Won-lost records aren't necessarily the best way to evaluate the relative strength of teams who play different opponents. Or to look at it this way, if two bad teams play each other and one goes 6-4, and two good teams play each other and split, does that mean the team with the 6-4 record is better than the ones with the 5-5 records? Of course not!
As for the rest of the column, put me down on the "fire Joe Morgan" side. He was a great player, but as a broadcaster, I've loathed him for over 15 years!
