ESPN.com’s leading headline as I type this: “The hottest team in the American League? That’s easy, the Yankees. The best team in the AL heading into the postseason? Tough question.”

Uh… ok. I guess it’s time for me to prove my brilliance by answering such a tough question: The Yankees have the best team in baseball. The Red Sox are the only team that can even compete.

That’s just my snap-judgment opinion, which is very often wrong. So let’s actually, you know, study it and see what happens. As a wise man once said, “Every argument is a three-edged sword: There’s your side, my side, and the truth.” Or something.

Here’s a quick position-by-position breakdown of all four AL playoff teams, and we’ll use VORP as our compare-all stat today:

Catcher
1. Jorge Posada, Yankees 69.9
2. Victor Martinez, Indians 53.9
3. Jason Varitek, Red Sox 16.6
4. Mike Napoli, Angels 12.8

Posada and Martinez are 1-2 in the league, by far. Varitek’s defense doesn’t really even begin to close the gap.

First base
1. Kevin Youkilis, Red Sox 32.1
2. Ryan Garko, Indians 26.8
3. Casey Kotchman, Angels 23.4
4. (Vacant), Yankees, 0

Youkilis is second in the league, narrowly trailing Carlos Pena. The Yankees, for our intents and purposes, don’t have a first baseman. They have three guys–Mientciewicz, Betemit and Phillips–that they tinker with at the position, plus the occasional Johnny Damon or Jason Giambi sighting, but for our purposes Giambi is a DH and Damon’s a fourth outfielder, since his bat has very little value at first anyway. All three of their “actual first baseman” have VORP below 1.

Second base
1. Robinson Cano, Yankees 36.7
2. Dustin Pedroia, Red Sox 32.6
3. Howie Kendrick, Angels 18.8
4. Asdrubal Cabrera, Indians 7.3

Hopefully the Indians will keep a fork stuck in the whole Josh Barfield thing.

Third base
1. Alex Rodriguez, Yankees 89.0
2. Mike Lowell, Red Sox 44.7
3. Chone Figgins, Angels 41.8
4. Casey Blake, Indians 16.2

Lowell and Figgins are both having great years, and Rodriguez has more VORP than both of them combined.

Shortstop
1. Cap’n Derek Jeter, Yankees 46.9
2. Orlando Cabrera, Angels 30.9
3. Jhonny Peralta, Indians 25.2
4. Julio Lugo, Red Sox -0.3

That makes three out of the five “infield” positions that the Yankees have the best player in the league.

Left field
1. Hideki Matsui, Yankees 32.8
2. Manny Ramirez, Red Sox 32.7
3. Reggie Willits, Angels 14.1
4. (Vacant), Indians 0

Matsui ranks #2 in the league; it’s not a very strong period for AL left fielders. The Indians have three guys (Ben Francisco, Jason Michaels and Kenny Lofton) that have seen most of the available playing time in left this year, and all of them are around 0 VORP.

I’m assuming Willits to be the Angels’ left fielder and Garret Anderson their DH, since that’s the assumption that is the kindest to them in this study. See the DH list for more explanation.

Center field
1. Grady Sizemore, Indians 46.3
2. Gary Matthews Jr., Angels, 16.6
3. Melky Cabrera, Yankees, 14.3
4. Coco Crisp, Red Sox, 11.5

As you can see, there’s no contest here. Sizemore’s having a ho-hum season by his standards, and he has more VORP than the other three guys combined.

Right field
1. Vladimir Guerrero, Angels 58.8
2. Bobby Abreu, Yankees 29.2
3. Franklin Gutierrez, Indians 12.0
4. J.D. Drew, Red Sox, 8.2

Vladdy Daddy is #2 in the league, behind Magglio Ordonez. We’re going to assume the Indians will inflict themselves with as little Trot Nixon and his -0.2 VORP as possible.

Designated hitter
1. David Ortiz, Red Sox 73.5
2. Travis Hafner, Indians 23.2
3. Garret Anderson, Angels 25.9*
4. Jason Giambi, Yankees 9.9

The asterisk, and the seemingly incorrect ordering, is because Anderson’s 25.9 is comparing him to left fielders. He’d lose some VORP if compared to the higher replacement level at DH. The only Angel with enough PAs as a DH to qualify for VORP at that position is Shea Hillenbrand, whose -9.5 VORP is a hazard to himself and others. Presumably the Angels will be smart enough to use Willits in left and Anderson as the DH.

As for Giambi, VORP is cumulative, so if Giambi is healthy the 9.9 figure is shorting him, since he’s only played half the season. In reality, the three non-Papis are pretty similar in value this year.

* * *

OK, let’s compare the lineups. First, simply cumulatively:

Yankees: 328.7
Red Sox: 251.6
Angels: 243.1
Indians: 210.9

Well, that’s a total blowout, and the Indians’ lineup is clearly the weakest among the playoff teams.

Just for yuks, let’s also compare them relatively: 4 points for having the best of the four at a position, 3 for the second-best, etc. Here’s how that works out:

Yankees: 27
Red Sox: 22
Angels: 21
Indians: 20

Same order. No matter how you slice it, the Yankees lineup is way better than anybody else’s. They’re not being compared to average here; they’re being compared to the best teams in baseball. The Red Sox and Angels’ lineups are not exactly low-watt bulbs. The Yankees’ lineup blows away every other lineup in the game. So the pitching better make up for that.

* * *

Now, the pitching.

We’ll look at the top four starters, in order, and then the top three relievers, in order, because in the playoffs those seven pitchers are going to see all the important innings. Pitching depth is important in the regular season, but in the playoffs–especially with the new, absurdly stupid playoff schedule with extra off days–it becomes much more about who has the best pitchers at the top, both in the rotation and in the bullpen.

#1 Starter
1. C.C. Sabathia, Indians  63.4
2. Josh Beckett, Red Sox  56.5
3. John Lackey, Angels  53.3
4. Chien-Ming Wang, Yankees  43.8

This comes with the caveat that I personally think VORP underrates a guy like Wang (and Justin Verlander), who by this point has established that he can pitch well without striking guys out. For our purposes, however, we’ll assume that’s where he really rates.

#2 Starter
1. Fausto Carmona, Indians  59.4
2. Kelvim Escobar, Angels  46.9
3. Andy Pettite, Yankees  42.6
4. Daisuke Matsuzaka, Red Sox  34.1

Carmona rates as the third-best pitcher in the AL, after his teammate Sabathia and Super Johan. The Indians ain’t here particularly because of their hitting.

#3 Starter
1. Curt Schilling, Red Sox  30.4
2. Jered Weaver, Angels  26.9
3. Paul Byrd, Indians  22.1
4. Mike Mussina, Yankees  12.1

Now, Paul Byrd probably isn’t going to be in the Indians’ rotation; Jake Westbrook probably will be, but the two pitchers are of about the same value. Mike Mussina definitely won’t be in the Yankees’ rotation; Roger Clemens probably will be, but Clemens hasn’t really been any better on the year than Mussina, for all the ballyhooing about the later being toast.

#4 Starter

#4 starters will probably serve mainly as long men, pitching the 4th through 7th or something if the day’s starter got chased. Even so, they’ll pitch some important innings, so let’s take a look at them:

1. Tim Wakefield, Red Sox  23.1
2. Joe Saunders, Angels  19.7
3. Jake Westbrook, Indians  17.8
4. Phil Hughes, Yankees  10.0

I cheated and pro-rated Hughes a little bit, since he’s only thrown 60 innings. He’s pretty clearly the Yankees’ fourth-best starter, and I think they’d turn to him before Mussina if they needed several innings of high-leverage relief.

For the bullpen, we’ll switch up to WXRL, which is certainly better than VORP at measuring relief performance.

Relief ace
1. Rafael Betancourt, Indians  6.195
2. Jonathan Papelbon, Red Sox  4.884
3. Mariano Rivera, Yankees  3.886
4. Francisco Rodriguez, Angels  3.882

Betancourt blows away the field. Yeah, I’m surprised too, but I looked him and saw it isn’t a pile of hogwash; he’s been really good, and WXRL shows that he’s been really good in higher-leveraged situations than the other guys have had to perform in. Obviously all four teams have very good relief aces. Let’s move on to the rest of the pen.

Reliever #2 (”Setup man”)
1. Hideki Okajima, Red Sox  4.305
2. Rafael Perez, Indians  3.074
3. Scot Shields, Angels  2.56
4. Joba Chamberlain, Yankees  2.53

I cheated and multiplied Chamberlain’s WXRL by 2 to adjust for playing time. He’s been awesome, but he IS a rookie, he IS on something of a stress limit, and we don’t know yet whether this is his true ability level or just a hot six weeks. I’m not comfortable moving him up any further than that.

Reliever #3
1. Joe Borowski, Indians  3.019
2. Luis Vizcaino, Yankees  1.943
3. Justin Speier, Angels  1.862
4. Mike Timlin, Red Sox  1.379

That Gagne trade sure did crash and burn, didn’t it? Yeah, I know. You look at these numbers and say, “@#($ the heck? Joe Borowski?” And while I agree with you somewhat, Borowski’s 5.40 ERA is *very* misleading. He’s been a pretty good reliever, with 51 K and 15 BB in 56 innings. Really, the four teams are pretty closely bunched here, and I think it’s fair to say the Red Sox, with Timlin and Gagne, are a little behind here.

* * *

OK, let’s evaluate the pitching staffs. First, the starters:

Indians: 162.7
Angels: 146.8
Red Sox: 144.1
Yankees: 108.5

Yeowch. This is the perfect inverse of the lineup list: Indians way ahead, Angels and Red Sox pretty close, Yankees way behind. The Red Sox probably deserve to be second, since we didn’t make any adjustment for the significant time Curt Schilling missed.

Now, the bullpen:

Indians: 12.288
Red Sox: 10.568
Yankees: 8.359
Angels: 8.308

Who’d have thought the Indians would be sporting the best back-end bullpen in the league? Well, I doubt many of us really think they do, even now, but that’s the numbers. It makes some degree of sense: The Indians lineup really isn’t all that good, so where are all the wins coming from? These numbers are what they are because–I think–WXRL is saying Indians relievers did unusually well in high-leverage situations, better than they did overall.

So here’s what we have, taking the full picture:

Yankees: Best lineup (by far), worst starting pitching (by far), 3rd bullpen
Red Sox: 2nd lineup, 2nd/3rd starting pitching, 2nd bullpen
Angels: 3rd lineup, 3rd/2nd starting pitching, worst bullpen
Indians: Worst lineup (by far), best starting pitching, best bullpen

So we have the Yankees, who win by bashing the brains out of their opponents; the Indians, who win by shutting their opponents down and scoring enough; the Red Sox; who do everything well but nothing spectacularly; and the Angels, who are just kind of there.

Now, the somewhat misguided “purists” would be inclined, I think, to look at this list and proclaim the Indians the favorites, because after all, you win with pitching, and the Indians have the best pitching. But this is probably the first place you’ve read that the Cleveland Indians are rolling into the postseason with the best pitching in baseball. I don’t know whether that’s actually true–the front of the Red Sox’ staff is awfully good–but we clearly must acknowledge that pitching is Cleveland’s best strength.

The Yankees? I set out to prove that they’re easily the best team in baseball, but I’ve only proven what we already knew, that they have a devastating lineup. Their pitching, though, is the shakiest of any team in the AL playoffs, with a lot of question marks following Chien-Ming Wang and Mariano Rivera. The Yankees offense is so good that I still have to consider them the favorites, but they’re not “clearly” the best team, as I supposed, and any of these teams could legitimately take this thing.