Boyd Bergquist’s Baseball Breakdown – The 2025 “All-Star Break” Edition

EDITOR’S NOTE: Boyd Bergquist was the sports director at KETS-TV in East Tree Stump, Nebraska for almost 40 years. Known across the Husker state as the voice of the Boy’s High School Basketball Tournament, Bergquist was a four-time winner of the Marv J. Butz “Golden Cob” Award For Excellence In Nebraska Broadcast Journalism. That background, along with his quick if not cliché-riddled wit and love of single-malt scotch makes Bergquist a perfect fit to be our “Question” guy.

As we find the calendar flipping to the Mid-Summer Classic, we also find a little more than half-way through the Major League Baseball season. Being at that point of the season means it’s time to take all 30 MLB squads and stack them up in my own categories based on expectations at the beginning of the season weighed against performance during it.

I’ve said it before, and I’ll say it again; baseball season is like a long horse race, which is why I like to break it down in four parts. We’ve already seen the start, we’re around half-way home, and later in the season we will revisit this on Labor Day…which is all about heading into the “home stretch.” But today is all about “half-way,” which means going back to my initial categorizations of all 30 major-league baseball teams, look at where they were on Memorial Day, and compare that to where they are today.

As we get closer to the wire which marks the end of that horse race, it only makes sense the categories would change. If you recall, I’m not about the usual “power ranking” stuff. Instead, I started this season by breaking down all 30 major league squads into six easy-to-understand groups based on what I thought these teams could realistically expect in 2025. Those original six categories were as follows.

Ready To Win Right Now: These are teams which are ready to climb the mountain right now…no ifs, ands or buts.
There’s Just One Thing Missing: Did you ever almost complete a jigsaw puzzle, but the three pieces you have remaining don’t fit the holes you have left? Welcome to the stories of these teams.
Need Some Things To Go Their Way: Welcome to a collection of clubs who almost have the goods to win on their own; but anything is possible if they get more than one “lucky break.”
At Least They Don’t Suck: Do I really need to explain this one?
Why Wait For Next Year? One way or another, these teams need to make a decision about the future.
It’s Going To Be A Long Summer: Everybody has hope on Opening Day, but some lose it far faster than others.

Once we got to Memorial Day, I had six new categories at the “far turn.” which again should be fairly self-explanatory.

Just As I Expected: Teams performing just as expected.
Off To A Great Start, But There’s A Lot of Season Left: Read this as teams potentially over-achieving.
So Far, So Good: Teams which are very much in the thick of the race at this point.
It’s Not “Panic” Time…Yet: This is for teams who may have stumbled out of the gate, but still have plenty of time
Better Figure It Out Quick: A category for teams whose problems are severe, despite the fact there a lot of race left.
It’s Not Too Early To Say It’s Over: Even at this juncture, it’s a safe bet these teams are finished.

At this point in the the race, there’s only two categories to worry about; is your team a contender or a pretender? A few years back, I was on a flight and read one of those in-flight magazines which had an article about a bunch of business management mumbo-jumbo I didn’t really understand, but it did include this grid about categorizing things based on two criteria and the relationship between them. I’m certainly no captain of industry, but this approach made perfect sense to me for this baseball breakdown.

Here’s all were looking at today; is your team a play-off contender, and should you buy or sell on their immediate future?

American League

Contenders: Buy

Detroit Tigers

Original Category: Ready To Win Right Now
Memorial Day Category: Just As We Expected

Odds To Win World Series +750: The Tigers went into the break with their first four game losing streak in 2025, although they did have a recent steak in which they dropped five out of eight, It’s hard to have a long losing streak when Tarik Skubal starts every fifth game. A guy with roughly 100 more strikeouts than walks is pretty tough to beat.

Not to mention, they’re going to win the AL Central by default.

Houston Astros

Original Category: There’s Just One Thing Missing
Memorial Day Category: It’s Not “Panic” Time…Yet

Odds To Win World Series +1100: Like a lot of other clubs, the Astros are thin on pitching due to injuries. But Spencer Arrighetti will be back soon, and Luis Garcia and J.P. France are both on the road to return. Not to mention, Jeremy Pena is having a breakout season. The Astros didn’t panic, and they are right back in the race.

New York Yankees

Original Category: There’s Just One Thing Missing
Memorial Day Category: Just As I Expected

Aaron Judge carrying the Yankees offeense

Odds To Win World Series +600: This team goes as far as Aaron Judge can carry them. The current offensive funk not withstanding, the Pinstripes themselves in the thick of a race. Look for some serious pitching reinforcements to be heading for the Bronx ahead of the trade deadline.

Tampa Rays

Original Category: Why Wait For Next Year?
Memorial Day Category: Better Figure It Out Quick

Odds To Win World Series +2800: In the latest example of the Rays coming up with yet more young talent…Junior Caminero could have easily been the American League’s starting All-Star third baseman. On the mound, Ryan Pepiot is just coming off an 11-start run where he posted a 2.30 ERA with 60 strikeouts in 66 ⅔ innings.

Seattle Mariners

Original Category: Need Some Things To Go Their Way
Memorial Day Category: Off To A Great Start, But There’s A Lot of Season Left

Odds To Win World Series +2500: Keep in mind that Cal Raleigh’s march toward being an legitimate AL MVP candidate during what could end up being the greatest offensive season by a catcher ever has been done with precious little protection in that Mariner lineup.

Toronto Blue Jays

Original Category: Why Wait Until Next Year?
Memorial Day Category: Better Figure It Out Quick

Odds To Win World Series +3500: If it weren’t for Cal Raleigh, we would be talking about Alejandro Kirk being the best offensive catcher in the game. You can talk all you want about George Springer, Bo Bichette, or Vlad Guerrero et al., but Kirk is the guy I’d hate to see coming to the plate with the ball game on the line. One of the reasons why Kirk is a massive clutch hitter is he’s one of the best two-strike hitters in the game.

Contenders: Sell

Cleveland Guardians

Original Category: There’s Just One Thing Missing
Memorial Day Category: It’s Not “Panic” Time…Yet

Odds To Win World Series +5000: The Great Cleveland Black-Out continues…

Once again, José Ramírez shows himself to be the best third baseman in the game today; 2025 is proving to be another paving stone for his road to Cooperstown. Once again, Ramírez ranks in the top 10 in the American League in all the “slash line” category; not to mention hits and stolen bases as well.

There is no truth to the rumor the Guardians are scheduling an exhibition game in Pyongyang

But once again, Cleveland’s offense suffers from a bigger power outage than North Korea at night. They rank near the bottom of the bigs in home runs, RBIs, and slugging Percentage…among other categories. Imagine where they would be without Ramírez and his 39-game on-base streak earlier this season?

Texas Rangers

Original Category: Need Some Things To Go Their Way
Memorial Day Category: It’s Not “Panic” Time…Yet

Odds To Win World Series +5500: You can take everything I just said about Cleveland and apply it to Texas…except the Rangers don’t have anything even close to José Ramírez.

There is no truth to the rumor the Rangers are scheduling an exhibition game with the Guardians in Pyongyang

Minnesota Twins

Original Category: Why Wait For Next Year?
Memorial Day Category: Off To A Great Start, But There’s A Lot of Season Left

Odds To Win World Series +4500: Remember that week when Ty France was the American League’s “next emerging slugger?” Yeah, I forgot about it too. It had to be right around that 12-game wining streak that also feels like a distant memory. Leave it to the Twins to be finally getting prolonged, full-potential Byron Buxton, yet find ways to get everybody else hurt.

Pretenders: Buy

Boston Red Sox

Original Category: At Least They Don’t Suck
Memorial Day Category: So Far, So Good

Odds To Win World Series +4500: In all the hand-wringing in Boston over the Rafael Devers trade, everybody seemed to miss it’s most obvious explanation. It’s doesn’t take much digging to see a pattern of the Red Sox having antagonistic relations with their star players. In recent memory, there’s Roger Clemens. Mo Vaughn, and Carl Crawford, but even Ted Williams once demanded a trade to the Yankees. Plus, Devers is just another case in which the Red Sox fattened somebody’s wallet just to put them in an Uber to the airport.

Kansas City Royals

Original Category: At Least They Don’t Suck
Memorial Day Category: It’s Not “Panic” Time…Yet

Odds To Win World Series +7500: This team has way too much talent to be this meh. The future is certainly brighter than 2025 will be.

Baltimore Orioles

Original Category: There’s Just One Thing Missing
Memorial Day Category: Better Figure It Out Quick

Odds To Win World Series +25000: See the immediately preceding comments.

Pretenders: Sell

Los Angeles Angels

Original Category: It’s Going To Be A Long Summer
Memorial Day Category: It’s Not Too Early To Say It’s Over

Odds To Win World Series +30000: Despite the fact Mike Trout is on the field as of this writing, and understanding there are glimpses of hope for the future, what I said on Memorial Day about this team remains my official statement until further notice.

“I swear to God, if there was a team that embodied the movie Groundhog Day, it would be the Angels. It’s yet another year in the Arte Moreno era in which the Halos spent on the cheap, generally on the wrong people, and…by the way…Mike Trout is hurt again. That’s why like the Mets, the Angels have a graphic we will use every time, because tariffs have nothing to do with why your Temu order isn’t coming.”
~Boyd Bergquist, Memorial Day 2025

Oakland Las Vegas Sacramento U-Haul Athletics

Original Category: At Least They Don’t Suck
Memorial Day Category: So Far, So Good

Odds To Win World Series +40000: On May 13^th, the Triple-A’s were 22-20, and living up to all of my expectations. Then came the biggest collapse since Biden on a bicycle. Between May 14^th and June 4^th, ~~Oakland~~ ~~Las Vegas~~ Sacramento U-Haul won a single game. That 1-20 stretch pretty much ended any optimism about this team.

They finally broke ground on the new ballpark in Vegas…at least they have that.

Chicago White Sox

Original Category: It’s Going To Be A Long Summer
Memorial Day Category: It’s Not Too Early To Say It’s Over

Odds To Win World Series +50000: Pope jokes…that’s pretty much all I’ve got here. Seems like the Doctrine of Papal Infallibility doesn’t apply to baseball.