CTOD: Arizona Diamondbacks

Similar to their divisional neighbours, the Los Angeles Dodgers, the sun seems to be setting on what was one of the brightest young cores of talent in all of baseball for the Arizona Diamondbacks. 2010 marked the second straight year the D-backs finished in the gutter of the NL West and a lack of depth on both the big league and minors roster seems to destine them to be there for some time.

Last season, pitching was the problem. Arizona allowed 836 runs, good for third worst in baseball, and they featured one of the worst bullpens in recent memory. Not just bad, epically bad. The Diamondbacks bullpen finished the season with an almost unfathomable 5.74 ERA, which was a full run more than the next highest bullpen. Combine that with a rotation that only had two starters (Ian Kennedy, Rodrigo Lopez) pitch more than 142 innings and it was a recipe for disaster.

CTOD: Colorado Rockies

Although the Rockies finished at 83-79, and nine games back of the Giants, the NL West was largely a three team horserace for all of 2010. Indeed, things were incredibly tight until the Troy Tulowitzki show (15 September HRs) ended with the Rockies losing 8 straight to finish the season. Going into the 2011 season the Rockies made few adjustments to their roster and expect to compete in a difficult NL West once again.

Colorado definitely has all the pieces you need to field a competitive team year in and year out. They have a shutdown pitcher in Ubaldo Jimenez, two bonafide superstarts in the heart of their order in Tulo and Carlos Gonzalez, and a lockdown closer with Huston Street. Qualifying for the playoffs thus becomes a matter of maximizing production from the rest of the order and pitching staff while allowing the superstars to carry the team.

CTOD: Los Angeles Dodgers

Time is slowly ticking away for the Los Angeles Dodgers. 2 years ago the Dodgers seemed poised to dominate the NL West for years to come with a young core of Matt Kemp, James Loney, Andre Ethier. Russell Martin, Clayton Kershaw, and Chad Billingsley. Last season saw the unraveling of that dream. On the mound, Kershaw has developed into the number one starter he was always projected to be and Billingsley fits right in behind him as reliable number two. However, the young nucleus of hitters that seemed destined for stardom have seemingly peaked in their progression as hitters and struggled mightily last season. For that reason, the Dodgers scored 100 runs less than the previous year, in fact they only scored two more runs than the Padres, despite an almost identical lineup. Here's why:

CTOD: San Diego Padres

Last year was a cinderella season for the Padres, the kind of season all fans hope for during the spring, and they will be hoping for lightning to strike twice once again come April. I like to always refer to PECOTA rankings in these countdown to opening day previews as it gives a good look at what a team looks like on paper. That being said, the margin of error for PECOTA projections is usually plus or minus 8 wins, and thus as a purely predictive tool they aren't overly reliable. Critics of such projection systems would love to point to the fact that in 2010 the Padres were projected to win 74 games and instead won 90 while being in the pennant race all the way into the last weekend.