2012 AL East Preview: First Base

Mark Teixeira – NYY

Teix has been the cause of a lot spilled blogging ink lately, with fans and analysts asking: Will he continue to be the king of popups? Will he try to bunt against the shift? Will he generally sacrifice the chance of a few home runs in exchange for timely base hits? Time will tell, but Teixeira remains one of the preeminent first basemen in the game, and is second in the AL East only to Adrian Gonzalez. Factor in the runs that Teix saves on defense and the Yankees are pretty much golden at first base.

Adam Lind – TOR

Adam Lind is one of those guys that seems like he’s been in the game forever. In fact he’ll only be 28 this coming season; his 7th at the major league level. All in all he’s your typical power hitter – he’ll post above average home run and RBI numbers, but he’ll also strike out quite a few times.

Mark Reynolds – BAL

Reynolds’ projected stat lines aren’t intimidating, but last year he stepped up his offense against the Yankees. In 18 games he posted a line of .271/.333/.600 with 6 home runs, 5 doubles, 12 runs scored, and 14 RBI. Phew. Hopefully Yankees pitching will be able to keep Reynolds in check a bit better this year.

Carlos Pena – TAM

What is there to say about Pena that we don’t know from years of watching him play for the Rays? He takes a lot of walks, he racks up even more strike outs, he hits for a very low average, and he is capable to hitting the ball out of the park every time he steps to the plate. Pena is nothing if not consistent.

Adrian Gonzalez – BOS

If only the first year of the Gonzalez signing had worked out as poorly for the Red Sox as the first year of the Carl Crawford deal. But it didn’t, and that meant great things for the Sawx and bad things for any pitcher facing Gonzalez. Look for his stats to regress a bit, but expect him to continue to dominate this year.