Last year the New York Mets shocked the baseball world by not only winning the National League East; but by also advancing to the 2015 World Series. This time last year, there weren't too many pundits calling for an NL Pennant in New York; the Mets were coming off their sixth consecutive sub-.500 season and most thought the Nationals would run away with the division. Essentially, there wasn't much optimism last spring in Queens.
Now, turning our attention to Pittsburgh (or maybe, more accurately, Bradenton) and the general sense is that the 2016 version of the Pirates will be a good, not great team.