There are Esteban Loaiza and Shawn Chacon surprises every April.

But this April, every surprise was dwarfed by the Kansas City Royals, who hadn't had a winning season in a decade and celebrate May Day atop the American League Central. The story has been their young pitching, led by Runelvys Hernandez and major-league saves leader Mike MacDougal and a bunch of youngsters feeding off the energy of manager Tony Pena.

	MacDougal

Surprise No. 2 are the San Francisco Giants, who will go into May with the National League's best record. Dusty Baker and Jeff Kent may be gone and Robb Nen is hurt, but GM Brian Sabean's changes -- half the starting lineup and three-fifths of the starting rotation is new, not to mention the insertion of Felipe Alou as manager -- makes him the executive coup of the offseason.

No. 3? Rocco Baldelli. Four years ago, he was batting ninth for Bishop Hendricken High School in Rhode Island. At this time last year he was in the California League. Now he's being compared to Joe DiMaggio, Tampa's first baseball hero.

No. 4 is the San Juan/Montreal Expos. No one may want them, but everyone wants their pitchers, especially Javier Vazquez, as they lead the National League in ERA.

No. 5? Hideki Matsui, but not because he's the Japanese Babe Ruth, as advertised. In fact, right now he's struggling, but while he may not be what George Steinbrenner wanted, he is what the Yankees needed -- the second coming of Paul O'Neill, both in tough at-bats and playing the best defensive left field in the American League.

On the other hand, there may be no bigger disappointment than the Arizona Diamondbacks. They are down near the bottom of the league in runs scored, a fact noticed because injuries and bad luck. Randy Johnson, Curt Schilling and Byung-Hyun Kim will take three wins between them into May.

The next biggest disappointment is Minnesota. Picked by many to make a run at 100 wins, they have had a losing April, have a pitiful on-base percentage and played with a glaring lack of urgency.

	Tejada

Disappointment No. 3? Miguel Tejada, whose batting average is lower than the Tigers in what apparently is the fog of free agent expectations.

Disappointment No. 4 are the Mets, right at the bottom of the National League in runs, on base and defense, and near the top in strikeouts. You can hear the booing on Mo Vaughn, Armando Benitez and Roger Cedeno all the way to Tarrytown.

Finally, the fifth biggest disappointment has been the Boston bullpen. As GM Theo Epstein says, the idea wasn't wrong, he had the wrong mix of pitchers. If they only didn't cut off beers saled in the seventh inning, this would be making the new Red Sox owners a lot of money.

This story originally aired on SportsCenter and Baseball Tonight