2009 Predicted Standings - Who's Winning How Many

With Opening Day right around the corner and the O's WAR projections up, it's a good time to put out my projected standings. I was hoping to go one team at a time, but I've found that I lose momentum when trying to comment on all 30 teams separately (and even here I noticed that my comments got shorter as I went along - maybe that has something to do with decreasing levels of familiarity as I move from AL East to NL West). As always, I reserve bragging rights for getting just about anything correct.

AL East

BOS - 95
The have a good offense, a good defense, a good rotation, a good bullpen, good depth, good payroll flexibility, and some good trade chips. Hard to ask for much more (maybe a catcher).

NYY - 94
Losing A-Rod for any length of time really hurts their chances, as the offense just isn't as great as it used to be. If they hadn't signed Teixeira, then it would actually look merely OK. The rotation might be the best in baseball though, and they've finally put together a solid bullpen in front of the consistently amazing Mariano Rivera. There is a lot of downside on the roster though, so I think that they could beat the Red Sox or come in third with equal probability.

TBR - 92
The best front-office in baseball now. The defense will regress some but Upton (among others) may break out in a big way. If they had even half of the resources of Evil Empires I & II then they would be perennial contenders. As it is, they need to make the most out of the pieces that they've assembled now.

BAL - 76
The pitching's a mess but the position players are above average. Looking to compete in '10-'11, hopefully.

TOR - 76
They have some talented players, but unless top prospect Travis Snider comes out of the gate swinging a big stick the offense isn't going to be very good. Injuries and free agent defections have taken their toll on the pitching staff, and it's possible that if they play poorly enough in the first half that Roy Halladay may be traded (which might lock up last place). It's not a good sign when a team picks up so many O's castoffs (Millar, Fahey, and Burris - plus Adam Loewen).

AL Central

CLE - 86
Big disappointment last year, though they found an ace in Cliff Lee and turned things around towards the end of the season. Travis Hafner may be done, but I think Fausto Carmona and Victor Martinez will bounce back. If they make the playoffs, Grady Sizemore may be adding an MVP plaque to his Gold Gloves.

DET - 82
Nobodies talking about them scoring 1,000 runs this year, even though Miguel Cabrera quietly led the AL in home runs in 2008. The lack of pitching will hold them back, even if Justin Verlander turns things around.

MIN - 81
Joe Mauer's injury is huge - if he can't play much this season then I don't think the Twins have much of a chance. The rotation will carry them a long way though.

KCR - 75
If only they weren't hamstrung by such stupid free agent signings. There was no reason to give Horacio Ramirez, Kyle Farnsworth, and Willie Bloomquist the kinds of contracts they did (to go along with the Jose Guillen mistake of last year). They do have a lot of talent on the roster though, and locking up Zach Greinke was a good decision.

CHW - 74
Question marks all over the place, but at least they'll hit a bunch of home runs. A lot of their success last year was "flukey" and regression to the mean will not be kind.

AL West

LAA - 85
Injuries in the rotation and a glut of outfielders that aren't particularly good at either hitting or fielding (or both) are cause for concern. While still the favorites, it wouldn't take much for another team to steal their crown. They somehow won 100 games last year, so I'm hesitant to be any harsher.

OAK - 82
Billy Beane is really going for it this year, with the additions of Matt Holliday, Jason Giambi, and Orlando Cabrera, as well as the decision to start pitching prospects Brett Anderson and Trevor Cahill in the rotation. I have too many doubts about the pitching staff (when adjusted for their pitcher friendly ballpark) to think they'll win the division, but their chances are at least decent.

SEA - 76
If the new front office wasn't saddled with the Carlos Silva and Jarrod Washburn contracts then they might have been able to turn the team around enough to contend more seriously. As it is, they've gotten better cheaply and - with a few breaks - could actually overtake the teams in front of them.

TEX - 72
Just like in Baltimore, the question is pitching. At least the O's have assembled a good defensive club though. The farm system is loaded though, so it's only a matter of time.

NL East

NYM - 90
Santana, Wright, Reyes, and Beltran are the core of a championship level team. How much they get from the rest of the roster will determine if they're sitting at home in October again. At least the bullpen shouldn't blow it for them again this year.

PHI - 86
That Chase Utley is likely to return from surgery much sooner than originally expected is a big plus, but I still have doubts about the rotation (health of Hamels and production otherwise) and the decline of Ryan Howard. Trading out Pat Burrell, $13 M, and a draft pick for Raul Ibanez was the kind of move that should result in a team missing the playoffs.

ATL - 85
They've restocked the rotation, but might need a little more offense if Chipper Jones misses more than his usual time this season (and he's not likely to flirt with .400 again for very long).

FLA - 74
Hanley Ramirez is really good, but a lot of other guys will see some regression this year. May they enjoy trying to figure out how to make Hayden Penn a quality staring pitcher.

WSH - 73
Not nearly as bad as their record last year, and they're moving in the right direction with the firing of Jim Bowden. They've got some offense and some pitching, but just not enough of either yet to contend with the big names in the division.

NL Central

CHC - 93
Best team in the NL. Easily the best team in the NL if Rich Harden and Milton Bradley stay healthy (ha ha).

STL - 83
Albert Pujols is seriously a beast. Year-in, year-out. It's pretty neat to watch the guy that may go down as the greatest right-handed hitter of all time. Oh, and the Card's have some other players that are OK.

MIL - 83
Can Yovanni Gallardo really be the #1 starter on a team that wants to go to the playoffs already? At least the middle of the order should put up a lot of runs for them.

CIN - 78
A popular dark-horse pick because of a rotation with a lot of potential, but I have too many doubts about the offense.

HOU - 72
Way over-preformed last year, and are pretty bad outside of Roy Oswalt and Lance Berkman. But they can't trade them and rebuild. Or sign more guys and contend. Or wait for help from the minors. Yikes.

PIT - 67
Just not a good team, but heading in the right direction. It's nice for the O's that the Pirates are around, as they've been bad for longer and don't look like they'll pull out of it sooner.

NL West

LAD - 88
Will Manny play full-effort all year? Will Russell Martin play third-base some more? Will Juan Pierre play much at all?

ARI - 86
Don't really understand letting Randy Johnson go and then singing Jon Garland, but Webb and Haren at the top of the rotation solves a lot of problems.

SFG - 78
Brian Sabean has actually done a relatively good job with the team since the Bonds era ended. The biggest question is probably if all of the people that said that Tim Lincecum's size and motion made him a health-risk will be proven right. I don't think so, but if he does go down then it'll be another long year by the Bay.

COL - 75
Their magical run to the World Series was based largely on production on defense that regressed last year. Will a healthy Troy Tulowitzki help them bring that back?

SDP - 73
Their ballpark hides that fact that the pitching may be more of an issue than the offense. Read more ...

PECOTA Has O's In Fourth

I've never done a spit-take before in real life - I didn't think things like that actually happened. Then I saw this from BaseballProspectus:

American League, ranked by projected 2009 record

East		W	L	RS	RA	AVG	OBP	SLG
15	Boston Red Sox	99	63	852	695	.270	.348	.434
13	New York Yankees	95	67	794	671	.263	.337	.415
6	Tampa Bay Rays	91	71	805	718	.254	.335	.416
9	Baltimore Orioles	77	85	827	885	.269	.336	.434
5	Toronto Blue Jays	75	87	704	761	.253	.319	.403

Fourth place. I don't even know what to say about that. Awesome? Unlikely? I do have the O's with about the same level of offense for 2009 (though with more OBP and less SLG), but with better pitching. I've been of the opinion that the 80 win projection from the team WAR is high due to natural home-team optimism, and so I've been bumping it down to 75-77 when people ask me about them. If the O's can find some pitching amongst the host of candidates they have auditioning, then a .500 season is definitely within reach. Crazy. Read more ...

Still In Last, But Getting Closer

BaseballProspectus has released the current version of their PECOTA projected standings for 2009.

The AL East

BOS: 98-64
NYY: 96-66
TBR: 92-70
TOR: 81-81
BAL: 76-86

That's right people, 76 wins. And that doesn't even include Koji Uehara (and possibly some others).

Runs Scored: 859, Runs Allowed: 896, BA: .270, OBP: .340, SLG: .440.

Right now, I've got the O's with a .272/.342/.426 line. BP's .440 SLG mark is their highest in all of baseball. I find that very hard to believe, but if it happens, their projection of 859 runs scored (3rd in baseball behind the Cubs and the Red Sox) may be accurate. I don't like their runs allowed number (2nd worst, to the Rangers), but it's nice to see that my 80 win number right now is close to what the best projection system around has.

The Orioles have gotten a fair amount of good press lately, but they still might sneak up on some people.

Also, the East is stacked. (AL East team denoted w/ *)

BOS: 98-64 *
NYY: 96-66 *
TBR: 92-70 *
CLE: 84-78
OAK: 82-80
TOR: 81-81 *
LAA: 79-83
MIN: 79-83
DET: 78-84
BAL: 76-86 *
KCR: 75-87
CHW: 74-88
TEX: 72-90
SEA: 70-92

The O's are around a league-average team, and they aren't that close to getting out of last place (though I think they've got a decent enough chance at it). In the East they have no shot of making the play-offs. In the West they might be seen as the favorites. It's entirely conceivable that the five best teams in the AL this season (if the O's can get some pitching together) will all reside in the same division. Read more ...

Others' Projections

Just like last year, ReplacementLevel.com (a Yankee blog) has some projected standings for the AL East (though they are preliminary).

He has the O's offense putting up a .267/.336/.422 line compared to my .275/.341/.425. That's 779 runs scored to 791. He also has the O's pitching staff putting up a 4.80 ERA with a 4.92 FIP and giving up 832 runs, while I have them with a 5.07 tRA (5.42 for starters and 4.59 for relievers) and giving up about 811 (different scales, I know).

That means his O's have a Pythagorean record of 76-86, but then he makes an adjustment to all of the teams for being in the AL East and having to play each other more. After that, the O's lose 5 wins to go to 71-91.

The final standings, by the way, where:
NYY - 96
BOS - 94
TBR - 90
TOR - 75
BAL - 71

Last year pretty much everyone was low on the O's win totals, and even those that got the 68 wins were off because they had that as the Pythagorean record whereas the Orioles RS/RA implied they should have won 73 games. I was higher on Nick Markakis than almost all projections, and he still managed to exceed my expectations for total production (lower SLG, much higher OBP). This year I'm once again on the high end for him as well as the team as a whole. We'll see how it turns out. The AL East adjustment is interesting - even though I already started things off 5 wins lower than I understand it should be, I'll probably knock off a couple more for the final guess. Read more ...

Where I Stand

I hadn't heard of WhereIStand before, but it did a neat little thing:

"Before the 2008 MLB season began, whereIstand.com members and researchers tracked predictions of 42 sports media personalities for which teams they picked to win each respective division. Three months into the regular season, we’ve determined their accuracy, by rank, based on the standings as of July 1...

Scores were based on team standings as of Wednesday, July 1. Picks for a first place team were worth 12 points; points for second, third, fourth and fifth place teams were estimated on a sliding scale of depreciating value based on how many games back they were on July 1. The rankings above are based on the accumulative scores of each team per division that a person or media organization picked"

Where I stand:
5 points for picking the Yankees in the AL East (they were in third)
1 point for picking the Indians in the AL Central (last)
12 points for picking the Angels in the AL West (first)
8 points for picking the Mets in the NL East (third)
12 points for picking the CUbs in the NL Central (first)
12 points for picking the D'Backs in the NL West (first)

50 points total, which would tie Jonah Keri for 19th out of the 42.
Sean McAdam and Jason McIntyre each have 64 points (both picked Red Sox, Tigers, Angels, Phillies, Cubs, Dbacks) for the lead, and Buster Olney, Bill Madden, and Mike Greenberg are bringing up the rear with 33 points (all three picked the Mariners to win the AL West, and received no points for that one). Read more ...

Mid-Season Review

The All-Star break is a little passed the half-way point of the season, but it provides for a nice opportunity to look back at the pre-season projections/predictions.

First the team records: Projected Wins (win pct * 162) - My Predicted Wins - Whether the Over/Under call was right

NYY - 85 - 95 - I said Over 93.5; Wrong - they've been improving, but have actually been outscored by the Orioles - they're 3rd-order projected record (calculates equivalent runs scored and allowed (like EqA) and adjusts for strength of schedule) is up to 89 so they still may make a run at this thing

BOS - 95 - 94 - Under 94.5; Wrong - best team in baseball with projected 104 3rd-order wins

TOR - 80 - 83 - Under 85; Correct - may end up wrong, as they've played better than their record indicates based on RS/RA (85 wins) and Eq.Adj. RS/RA (90 wins)

TBR - 95 - 79 - Over 73; Correct - second best team in baseball with projected 98 3rd-order wins

BAL - 78 - 72 - Over 66; Correct - have to go just 22-47 (play like a 52-win team) to seal this one; I'm pretty confident

CLE - 71 - 90 - Under 90.5; Correct - they've been unlucky (82 wins based on RS/RA) but the team has Grady Sizemore, Cliff Lee, and not a whole lot else left to contend this year - that's why it was a good move to trade CC Sabathia

DET - 81 - 89 - Under 94.5; Correct - improving, but still a mid-level team

CHW - 93 - 75 - Under 77.5; Wrong - they haven't been lucky; they're riding one of the better run-prevention units in the league to a strong record, just like they did when they won the World Series

MIN - 90 - 74 - Over 73; Correct - 78 win team by Eq.Adj. RS/RA, but a pitching staff that never walks guys goes a long way towards helping a team stay competitive

KCR - 73 - 72 - Under 72.5; Wrong - they're playing at about their talent level (sorry - Brian Bannister too)

LAA - 97 - 89 - Under 92.5; Wrong - quite lucky based on RS/RA (85 wins) and Eq.Adj. RS/RA (82), but their actual record makes it hard for the A's to really go for it this year

OAK - 87 - 77 - Over 73.5; Correct - the best team in the AL West should be on pace to win 94 games in a "rebuilding" year

SEA - 63 - 77 - Under 84.5; Correct - must go 48-19 (116 win pace) to make this one wrong; must go 58-9 (140 win pace) to get to the 95 wins some predicted - they have been a bit unlucky though

TEX - 84 - 73 - Under 74.5; Wrong - who expected Ian Kinsler, Josh Hamilton, and Milton Bradley to be three of the four best hitters in the AL at this point? They'll have to keep it up, as the pitching staff has given up easily the most runs in baseball

NYM - 87 - 93 - Under 93.5; Correct - don't look now, but the Mets are just a half-game out

ATL - 77 - 88 - Over 85.5; Wrong - RS/RA (88 wins) and Eq.Adj. RS/RA (87 wins) agree with me - poor Braves

PHI - 88 - 85 - Under 88.5; Correct - they're better than I anticipated, mostly on the pitching side (4th fewest runs allowed in the NL)

FLA - 85 - 73 - Over 68.5; Correct - best hitting middle-infield combo in baseball

WSH - 61 - 71 - Under 71.5; Correct - wow have they been bad; they've even been a bit lucky

CHC - 97 - 89 - Over 87.5; Correct - the class of the NL at this point

MIL - 89 - 87 - Over 84; Correct - adding Sabathia may make them the second best team in the league

CIN - 78 - 77 - Under 78.5; Correct - they've been lucky (should have about 72 wins) and things aren't looking up with Harang on the shelf

STL - 89 - 73 - Under 77; Wrong - it's been over three months and I still don't get it

HOU - 75 - 73 - Under 74.5; Wrong - it's gotten much closer though, as the team has really fallen off; are some of their veterans on the block? (probably not, but they should be)

PIT - 76 - 71 - Over 68.5; Correct - the team's being led by a great outfield, but the 3rd-order wins paints a different picture (should be on pace for 62)

ARI - 80 - 86 - Over 87.5; Wrong - boy have they ever played down to their competition; I'm pretty sure they'll still win the division (and get over .500) but this is kind of embarrassing

LAD - 78 - 86 - Under 87; Correct - same things here; the team has too much talent to be this bad

SDP - 63 - 85 - Under 84; Correct - hey, at least they have Adrian Gonzalez (22 HR already, playing half his games in that giant park)

COL - 66 - 83 - Under 83.5; Correct - it'll take an even more impressive run this year to get them back to the play-offs, even in the NL "Worst" (you see what I did there? - that's funny stuff)

SFG - 68 - 71 - Under 71.5; Correct - Tim Lincecum is awesome... just really, really awesome - he may win 20 games for a 90+ loss team

That's 20 out of 30 Over/Under picks that are correct so far, with an average difference between my predicted record and the projected finish of about 9 games (it was 10 at the one-quarter point, and is only about 7 off when using RS/RA or Eq.Adj. RS/RA instead of the actual records). Ironically, for the two teams I was most right about record-wise (Boston and KC), I've been wrong about the O/U. Crazy game. Of the 10 incorrect picks, I think only Boston, the Angels, and maybe Arizona have a good chance to end up right. The Phillies and Reds may switch the other way. In any case, I think it looks pretty good at this point.

Now, the O's:
(Pre-season projected line, actual line, predicted line from the Hardball Times based on batted-ball data - PrOPS, and the like)

C: Ramon Hernandez
Proj: 267 / 333 / 437
Act: 238 / 285 / 379
Pr: 296 / 338 / 455
Razor's not been playing that well, but he has been unlucky.

1B: Kevin Millar
Proj: 263 / 355 / 416
Act: 239 / 339 / 391
Pr: 277 / 370 / 458
Millar's has been fairly productive anyway (not really for a 1B though), but he's been unlucky also.

2B: Brian Roberts
Proj: 285 / 370 / 430
Act: 296 / 375 / 489
Pr: 288 / 369 / 424
He's having a great year, but his predicted stats are right in line with where they were expected to be.

3B: Melvin Mora
Proj: 268 / 336 / 402
Act: 233 / 301 / 387
Pr: 284 / 347 / 455
It looks like Mora's collapsed, but he's actually hitting the ball pretty well; more bad luck for the infield.

SS: Luis Hernandez
Proj: 245 / 279 / 309
Act: 241 / 295 / 253
Pr: 271 / 326 / 335
If he had been able to play defense well enough to keep his job, then the predicted line would look OK.

LF: Luke Scott
Proj: 269 / 367 / 511
Act: 254 / 334 / 474
Pr: 267 / 346 / 488
Luke's been a mild disappointment for me, but he's still been a productive player.

CF: Adam Jones
Proj: 269 / 327 / 464
Act: 281 / 324 / 408
Pr: 249 / 297 / 362
Jones' lack of power is very disconcerting for me, as it was the only thing I thought he'd do well on offense. He's been pretty lucky, so I'm afraid that his stats will actually get worse after the break.

RF: Nick Markakis
Proj: 297 / 365 / 500
Act: 299 / 401 / 492
Pr: 295 / 395 / 488
I think I went a little overboard with the power, but the extra 35 points of OBP is a very welcome trade-off. Sign the man!

DH: Aubrey Huff
Proj: 273 / 336 / 447
Act: 284 / 349 / 526
Pr: 290 / 353 / 512
Nobody is boo'ing Huff now, eh? Will he still improve in the second half?

C: Guillermo Quiroz
Proj: 237 / 288 / 344
Act: 203 / 276 / 304
Pr: 238 / 305 / 375
A step up from the Paul Bako's of the world. And cheaper, too.

OF: Jay Payton
Proj: 273 / 319 / 403
Act: 243 / 283 / 370
Pr: 264 / 300 / 427
He's actually been worse than even I expected. Maybe they should stop playing him against righties when they can help it.

UTIL: Brandon Fahey
Proj: 246 / 304 / 309
Act: 230 / 254 / 344
Pr: 271 / 293 / 340
Fahey showing more power than could have reasonably been expected. You know the shortstop situation is bad when a .344 SLG has you excited.

Total (includes others): Projected; 269 / 337 / 427, 789 runs, 4.9 runs / game.
Actual; 258 / 327 / 421, 439 runs (764 pace), 4.7 runs / game.

The average AL line has dropped from 271 / 338 / 423 to 264 / 332 / 411 so, relatively speaking, the Orioles offense is about where I thought they would be.
I said their BA would be 0.7% worse than league average, and it's been 2.3% worse (largely due to poor luck for the infielders not named "Roberts"); their projected OBP was 0.3% worse than average, and its 1.5% worse; and their projected SLG was 1.4% better than average, and it's been 2.4% better (thanks, Aubrey). Projected OPS: 0.7% above the league average - Actual OPS: 0.7% above the league average. Not bad, if I do say so myself. Now if only they can get their pitching straightened out... Read more ...

Predictions & Projection

We're about at the quarter mark of the season, so I wanted to see how my pre-season predictions were holding up.
Projected Wins (win pct * 162) - My Predicted Wins - Whether the Over/Under call was right

NYY - 79 - 95 - I said Over 93.5; whoops
BOS - 90 - 94 - Under 94.5; correct
TOR - 77 - 83 - Under 85; correct, but I still gave them too much credit
TBR - 93 - 79 - Over 73; The Rays and Yanks have switched places
BAL - 85 - 72 - Over 66; this looks very solid

CLE - 85 - 90 - Under 90.5; correct
DET - 65 - 89 - Under 94.5; super-duper correct
CHW - 79 - 75 - Under 77.5; wrong
MIN - 83 - 74 - Over 73; correct
KCR - 75 - 72 - Under 72.5; wrong, but I said this team could be pretty good

LAA - 93 - 89 - Under 92.5; wrong
OAK - 91 - 77 - Over 73.5; Billy Beane's a pretty smart guy
SEA - 62 - 77 - Under 84.5; I saw a lot of people saying they'd win 94-97 games.
TEX - 77 - 73 - Under 74.5; wrong

NYM - 85 - 93 - Under 93.5; correct
ATL - 83 - 88 - Over 85.5; wrong so far, but they've been unlucky
PHI - 87 - 85 - Under 88.5; correct
FLA - 93 - 73 - Over 68.5; Over indeed
WSH - 67 - 71 - Under 71.5; I still like Manny Acta though

CHC - 97 - 89 - Over 87.5; Second best record in baseball
MIL - 81 - 87 - Over 84; I am pretty disappointed, but injuries happen
CIN - 71 - 77 - Under 78.5; Jay Bruce, anyone?
STL - 93 - 73 - Under 77; shocking really
HOU - 91 - 73 - Under 74.5; pretty shocking too
PIT - 77 - 71 - Over 68.5; correct

ARI - 101 - 86 - Over 87.5; Best record in baseball
LAD - 83 - 86 - Under 87; correct
SDP - 59 - 85 - Under 84; eww
COL - 61 - 83 - Under 83.5; They've fallen far
SFG - 67 - 71 - Under 71.5; correct, but they're still in third

So that's 18 out of 30 for the Over/Unders. I should have just flipped a coin - it would have saved some time. Of the ones I was most confident in, so far I'm right on SEA, BAL, OAK, DET, PHI, and FLA and wrong on STL, MIL, and LAA. 2/3 isn't half bad (I guess it's actually a third bad). For the records, I'm projected to be off by an average of 10 games. That's pretty bad. As standings go, I'm 10/30. Predicting the future is hard. I'll check back at the half-way point to see how things changed. Read more ...

April Record

After the O's started 6-1, I predicted how they would finish the month of April. Here's what I said:

"I'll go with:

CWS: 3-3
TB: 2-3
TX: 1-1
NYY: 1-2
TOR: 1-1
SEA: 1-2

TOTAL W/L: 9/12

April Record: 15-13

Contain complain with a record over .500. I think this is near the low point of what they can do. 17-11 or even 18-10 are certainly possible."

So what happened?

CWS: 2-3 (The sixth game ended in a rain delayed tie, for now.)
TB: 2-3 (Yup.)
TX: 0-2 (Lost both in the double header.)
NYY: 2-1 (Nice job, O's.)
TOR: 1-1 (Yup, again.)
SEA: 2-1 (Ha ha, Seattle. Pnwd.)

TOTAL W/L: 9/11

April Record: 15-12

Now that's what I'm talking about.

The Orioles are on pace to win 90 games this year. If they play like a 62 win team from now one, they'll win 67. Play like a 66 win team and they'll win 70. A 70 win team will take the total to 73. I doubt they are still above .500 at the end of May, but they only need to play like a 72 win team to get there (they'd go 12-15 and be at 27-27).

If the season ended today, the play-offs would look like this:

BOS vs. OAK
LAA vs. CHW

ARI vs. STL
FLA vs. CHC

Yaye, small sample sizes! Read more ...

"They Were Who We Thought They Were"

Best record in the AL? How about them Oakland A's? Moving to 17-10 with their 14-2 win over the Angels, Oakland got major contributions from their latest pick-up. Frank Thomas went 3-3, and missed the cycle by a home run. That was Thomas' first triple since 2002. Billy Beane may not be quite the genius he is sometimes made out to be, but he got the Big Hurt's comeback year (2006 - 39 HR and a .926 OPS) for cheap, let him go to the Blue Jays for a lot of money (and got a draft pick for losing him), then resigned him for the minimum when Toronto let him go. Thomas moved right into the middle of the A's line-up and is hitting 313 / 476 / 500 so far for them. Oakland is scoring nearly 5 runs per game due to a .344 OBP (almost 30 points higher than Seattle despite similar batting averages), and that's with Emil Brown leading the team in HR (3) and RBI (25). By the way, the guy who replaced Brown in Kansas City (for $36 million), Jose Guillen, is hitting 177 / 202 / 323. Oakland's starters are giving them solid innings, so they are employing an 11 man pitching staff. That means that they have an extended bench, so they can play match-ups on offense, get platoon advantages, make pinch-running and defensive substitutions, and generally fully utilize their roster. Now that's a smart front office.

Teams I thought would be better than expected:

O's: 15-10 (first place in the AL East)

Rays: 14-12 (second in the AL East)

A's: 17-10 (first place in the AL West)

Braves: 12-14 (have scored 23 more than they've allowed so should be 15-11 and in first place in the NL East)

Marlins: 15-11 (first place in the NL East)

Brewers: 14-11 (second place in the NL Central)

Not bad, so far.

Teams I though would be worse than expected:

Blue Jays: 11-16 (last in the AL East)

Tigers: 12-15 (last in the AL Central)

Angels: 16-11 (second in the AL West - in fairness, I did pick them to win the division)

M's: 13-14 (third in the AL West)

Phillies: 15-12 (second in the NL East)

Cardinals: 17-11 (second in the NL Central - if you had Ryan Ludwick with a 1.006 OPS then raise your hand; or Skip Shumaker having a .390 OBP; or Kyle Lohse with a 2.36 ERA. So many surprise on this roster.)

It's still early, but I'm feeling pretty confident about most of my picks. I thought the Yankees would be better than they've been, but I did say "other than Cano and A-Rod, that offense is susceptible to some age/health issues." Woops on A-Rod there. And Cano has been pretty bad. And "Hughes is going to be really good" could still end up being true, but it isn't looking good so far. So yeah, why not the O's? They've been playing above their heads (third order wins via BaseballProspectus of 13-14 (it's in between), which is last in the East but still better than the M's) but it's not completely crazy to think that they could get lucky for another five months. Read more ...

Not A Bulls-Eye, But Close

The HardballTimes has put out their weekly DartBoard, that looks at the way each team has played thus far and projects out their records based on their level of play to date and a neutral schedule.

The Orioles are ranked #11, with a projected wins of 87. They made a comment similar to one I had last week:

"If only they could play the Mariners all season long (6-1 against them so far), they might have a chance, but since they cannot, it's unlikely they'll sustain this level of performance though their defense may prop up their pitching enough to make them look like a decent team."

Keep in mind, the wins are determined by actual production, not the team's current record.

The total rankings are:
ARI - 113
CHC - 103
CHW - 100
OAK - 98 (What rebuilding?)
ATL - 98
STL - 94 (Surprised me)
TBR - 93 (Legit contenders)
PHI - 91
BOS - 91
NYY - 88
BAL - 87
FLA - 85
CLE - 83
LAA - 83
CIN - 82
MIL - 82
COL - 82
NYM - 81
DET - 79 (Not as good as some thought, eh?)
LAD - 78
SEA - 74 (Just as good as I thought, eh?)
TOR - 71
HOU - 70
SFG - 65
MIN - 65
KCR - 63
SDP - 62
TEX - 62
WSH - 55
PIT - 52 Read more ...

BP's Gone Crazy

Wow. Even I'm not going to go this far. The writers over at BaseballProspectus put up their individual standing predictions for the AL. Averaged together they are:

AL East
(Team - Average Position)
Boston Red Sox - 1.2 (13)
New York Yankees - 1.8*(4)
Tampa Bay Rays - 3.4
Toronto Blue Jays - 3.6
Baltimore Orioles - 4.9

AL Central
(Team - Average Position)
Detroit Tigers - 1.5 (9)
Cleveland Indians - 1.5 (8)
Chicago White Sox - 3.7
Minnesota Twins - 4.0
Kansas City Royals - 4.2

AL West
(Team - Average Position)
Los Angeles Angels - 1.1 (16)
Seattle Mariners - 2.5 (1)
Oakland Athletics - 2.8
Texas Rangers - 3.6

The "wow" was for the O's. That's not a 5.0; that's a 4.9. That means one (actually intelligent) person picked them to finish in fourth place - above the Blue Jays. Kudos to you Nate Silver. I don't know if he was of sound mind, or if Andy MacPhail paid him off, or if he just really hates Toronto (a lot), but I like it. No real other surprises here. Read more ...

That's Why They Play The Games

Some guy at a Yankee blog (gasp!) did an interesting thing with all of the projections floating around. Instead of just using runs created predictions and the Pythagorean Wins formula, he actually simulated the games using the Diamond Mind program. I would gladly have done this, but my Baseball Mogul simulator is far less advanced and didn't give very realistic result. The simulator was run 1,000 times each for six different projection systems; Chone, Diamond Mind, Hardball Times, Cairo, PECOTA, and ZiPS. This is about as close as you can get to predicting the standings, I think.

The average over all six, and (my projections)

AL East:
NYY - 95 (95) [Yaye, I got one!]
BOS - 92 (94)
TOR - 85 (83)
TBR - 82 (79) [Those extra O's win have to come from somewhere.]
BAL - 67 (72) [I'll admit that emotion probably added a couple wins here.]

AL Central:
DET - 91 (89)
CLE - 89 (90)
MIN - 75 (74)
CHW - 74 (75)
KCR - 73 (72)

AL West:
LAA - 88 (89)
OAK - 80 (77)
SEA - 77 (77) [HA!]
TEX - 74 (73)

NL East:
NYM - 95 (93) [They aren't the best team in baseball - 95 wins seems a bit too high with the injury risks.]
ATL - 87 (88)
PHI - 86 (85)
WAS - 70 (71)
FLA - 68 (73) [I'm probably too optimistic here, but we'll see.]

NL Central:
CHC - 88 (89)
MIL - 85 (87)
STL - 78 (73) [If they win 80 then Pujols deserves the MVP.]
CIN - 77 (77)
HOU - 75 (73)
PIT - 70 (71)

NL West:
LAD - 85 (86)
SDP - 84 (85)
ARI - 84 (86)
COL - 83 (83)
SFG - 73 (71)

He even breaks down how often each team won their division. The Mets were most dominate, winning the NL East 70% of the team. The NL West looks like the most competitive division (minus the Giants) with each team winning between 20% and 28% of the time. The Orioles were the only team that never won its division, and only managed 6 Wild Cards (1 in 1,000 is about that odds I'd put on the O's playing in October). The most positive projection had Seattle winning 83 games (well, 82.6). No system had Tampa Bay winning less than 80 games - that is a pretty amazing turn-around.

Will multiple computers/analysts do better then me (with a sprinkling of PECOTA - hey, I'll still take credit for picking a system to augment my information)? I'll review at the end of the year. Read more ...

Oh, How The Mighty Have Fallen

Man, ESPN has really gone down hill. I rarely read ESPN, so hat-tip to VegasWatch.net for this tidbit.

On the site, each team was reviewed and the different "analysts" predicted how many games each team would win. Now, baseball is a zero-sum game. That means that when one team wins, another has to lose. Therefore, at the end of the season the average team (assuming they all play 162 games) will have a record of 81-81. There's no way around it. That's why, when I looked at the Over/Unders, I just used offensive and pitching stats to determine how many wins the team would win on its own, but when I predicted the standings, I made sure that the average wins was 81. It seemed like common sense - if I have excellent analysis skills (or, more probably, got extremely lucky) then I could get every team right. Of the five guys at ESPN however, only Keith Law has that as a possibility. Tim Kurkjian has the average team winning 82.1 games; Jayson Stark - 82; Buster Olney - 81.3; and Steve Phillips - 81.1. That just isn't possible. It is therefore not surprising that Keith Law's predictions are much more in line with what PECOTA has than the other guys. Steve Phillips isn't that far off, but he has 14 teams winning 88 or more games. That is ridiculous. This man was a General Manager (of the Mets - he traded Scott Kazmir for Victor Zambrano) and yet I am very confident that I could win a good deal of money from him betting on baseball. Way to go ESPN.

In fact, Jayson Stark is so bad that he picked the Detroit Tigers to win 92 games and finish first, while the Indians finish second, but one game ahead. That's right - he said Cleveland would win 93 games.

That everyone but Keith Law picked Seattle to win the West with 90-92 wins actually makes me more confident that they won't get past 84. Law went with a very reasonable second place finish and 82 wins. Read more ...

I'm Going Out On That Limb

Predicted Final Standings For 2008:
[These are taken mostly from the Over/Under projections, but there are some small alterations / rounding]

AL East
New York Yankees - 95 wins
Boston Red Sox - 94
Toronto Blue Jays - 83
Tampa Bay Rays - 79
Baltimore Orioles - 72

AL Central
Cleveland Indians - 90
Detroit Tigers - 89
Chicago White Sox - 75
Minnesota Twins - 74
Kansas City Royals - 72

AL West
Los Angeles Angels - 89
Oakland Athletics - 77
Seattle Mariners - 77
Texas Rangers - 73

NL East
New York Mets - 93
Atlanta Braves - 88
Philadelphia Phillies - 85
Florida Marlins - 73
Washington Nationals - 71

NL Central
Chicago Cubs - 89
Milwaukee Brewers - 87
Cincinnati Reds - 77
Houston Astros - 73
St. Louis Cardinals - 73
Pittsburgh Pirates - 71

NL West
Arizona Diamondbacks - 86
Los Angeles Dodgers - 86
San Diego Padres - 85
Colorado Rockies - 83
San Fransisco Giants - 71

This, of course, won't happen. I do think that I'll be close though. We'll see. If I pick every division winner then I'll call it a win. Or if I get a bunch of team's records right. Or close. Maybe just one or two teams (come on O's and M's). Really, I don't have high standards for thinking I did a pretty good job here. Read more ...

Over/Under

This in response to the over/under betting lines for each team’s wins in the 2008 MLB season being announced. I think this may be the general set-up for this kind of thing: a short section for quick reference and a long section for expansion.

Short: (In order of confidence) SEA – Under, BAL – Over, (small gap) OAK – Over, STL – Under, (small gap) MIL – Over, DET – Under, PHI – Under, FLA – Over, LAA – Under.

Luck does play a huge role though.

I’d put the over/under on how long I keep up with this blog at about 2 months.

Long:

Predicted wins were determined as follows:

(1) Take the teams AB,OBP, and SLG from ’07, as well as ERA

(2) Make minor adjustments to OBP and SLG based on; player additions/subtractions, (un)lucky batting averages, new parks, aging, injury, etc. (it was off the top of my head – ex. CHC went from .333 / .422 to .338 / .421 since they added OBP with their new RF and C (and maybe 2B), but lost some power in center (made up a little by the added power at C)

(3) Similar adjustments made for ERA (ex. MIL went from 4.41 to 4.35 based on less bad luck for Bush/Capuano, more innings from Gallardo, and a slightly improved bullpen)

(4) Approximated Runs Scored via AB * OBP * SLG and then dampened it a touch as it tends to overestimate (about 2% over for 2007) and Runs Allowed via ERA (with a earned to unearned adjustment)

(5) Found MY expected record with the Pythagorean formula (win% ~= RS ^ 1.83 / ( RS ^ 1.83 + RA ^1.83))

(6) Used the Baseball Prospectus projections for next year (they’re pretty much the best at is) for the teams RS and RA

(7) Averaged my RS/RA with BP’s RS/RA and found the predicted wins that I list.

(8) BP actually runs simulated season for the projections they have for each player to come up with their projected standings. I generally agree with their W/L numbers but I’m higher on the O’s (they’ve been pessimistic on various O’s players before and turned out wrong – on Markakis especially) Braves, Rockies, Royals, Phillies, Padres and Mariners than they are, and lower on the White Sox, Marlins, Angels, Mets, and Rays. They correctly predicted the DBacks winning the NL West last year, as well as the White Sox collapse, which nobody else saw coming. I didn’t suggest betting in any situation in which we disagreed on the O/U expect Atlanta . They have them at 85 and I have them at 88, though it comes out to 88 via RS/RA averages.

As always, happy to give input on any team/player/etc.

Team O/U Pred. Wins Pick Comment

ARI 87.5 86 U I wouldn’t feel great about betting here as young talent has a larger variance. They outperformed their expected W/L record based on Runs Scored/Allowed last year by 11, so 87 wins would still be an 8 game improvement in talent. The top two SP should be great and if the Big Unit can come back strong they’ll have a great rotation. SP Micah Owings could probably bat in the middle of the Giants’ order.

ATL 85.5 88 O I like the Braves. I think Renteria’s good year was balanced out by Jones’ bad one and a full year from Teixeira plus small improvements from McCann and Francoeur make them better. Should have won 88 last year. Not a slam-dunk, but solid if you were leaning this way anyway. I don’t know how Smoltz is still doing it, but that guy has a wicked slider.

BAL 66 72 O It’s only this low because of the division. A quietly solid line-up (except for SS) with average OBP scores some runs. Pitching can’t be worse then last year, and there are enough arms to go with the ones that are succeeding. It would take some serious bad luck for the team to lose 100 games. I personally think 75 would be reasonable.

BOS 94.5 94 U I wouldn’t pick here. The main contributors on offense are getting up there in years, but they can still hit, and the pitching should be very good. Buccholz is pretty much as good as he showed in that no-hitter vs. the O’s. Jonathon Papelbon’s fastball is one of the best in baseball, to lefties as well as righties.

CHC 87.5 89 O I’m fairly confident in this one, as the Cubs have a good team. A trade for Roberts would pretty much seal it for me. Zambrano’s declining control is worrisome, but Rich Hill has a big-time curveball and Marmol has some of the best late-inning stuff in baseball. Soto should provide a major upgrade at catcher, and if Pie can add some offense to his defense the line-up will be very good. I just hope Sweet Lou keeps Ryan Theriot as a bench player. He’s turning into the new David Eckstein (more on that later).

CHW 77.5 75 U I really don’t like the White Sox. I think the pitching isn’t good, and the main offense (minus Swisher, who may hit 40 in that park) is getting older. Plus their manager is one of the worst in baseball (“Let’s play Owens over Quentin because Owens is fast and will hit as well as he did last year hopefully. Quentin will just get on base more and might actually play really well if we give him a chance – Let’s bunt a lot. It doesn’t matter that we only score with homeruns”). I wouldn’t bet on this though – if Thome, Konerko, and Dye each have the years they can then they’ll score a good number of runs.

CIN 78.5 77 U Speaking of bad managers – Dusty Baker… wow. (“I don’t want people getting on base (via walk / if they aren’t fast); then they just stand out there clogging up the bases for the next hitter.” Seriously. That’s pretty much in every interview he gives. If he hadn’t had Bonds on his team he would probably not have gotten another job after the Giants.) If Baker plays the young guys this team could challenge for the division. I don’t think he will, so I don’t think they’ll be that good. Wouldn’t bet on it, though. The Jay Bruce / Joey Votto hitting combination / comedy team should be fun to watch for the next 10-15 years.

CLE 90.5 90 U They weren’t as good as their record last year, and Hafner’s down year worries me. The walks were still there but the power was down (not just HR, doubles too) and he wasn’t injured. Still, I think they’re the best team in the division, they have one of the best front offices, and they have some pitchers ready to step in if need be (Carmona’s workload is worrisome). Could win 96 again. No bet.

COL 83.5 83 U Definitely no bet. They were as good as their record last year, but I have to think the pitching will regress a bit – especially with the younger guys getting a larger workload. If Holliday goes down then their offense just won’t be that scary anymore. It was nice to see Larry Walker admit the he isn’t a Hall of Famer. He isn’t, but he still has about as good of a case as Jim Rice.

DET 94.5 89 U They’re a good team. Very good even. But I still think they’re a step below the Indians. Getting Cabrera helps the offense, but not by as much as you’d think, as Granderson, Ordonez, and Polonco should all be downgraded a tad from last year. Pudge never walked before and is getting worse with age. Sheffield might be pretty close to done. The bullpen is kind of a mess, especially if Rodney goes down, and I’m not buying too much into the starting pitching behind Verlander and Bonderman. I don’t think they’re 7 games better than last year.

FLA 68.5 73 O They lost Cabrera and Willis, but the still have Hanley Ramirez, who was one of the best offensive players in baseball last year (led the NL in Value Over Replacement Player). They got a bit unlucky last year, and I don’t think the team is that much worse (at all, even). They’re in a similar situation as the O’s – lost quality hitter and pitcher, but extra depth and non-down years from players improves their record. Better pitching is the key. Not the safest bet, as they could collapse - especially if H-Ram’s shoulder affects him – but they’re not that bad.

HOU 74.5 73 U Not a good team. Offense is there with Berkman, Lee, Pence, and Tejada but there’s no pitching after Oswalt and maybe Wandy Rodriguez. Michael Bourn may steal 50 bases though. 75 wins wouldn’t be at all surprising so it’s a tough bet to make. Also, the park actually has slightly favored pitchers recently, not hitters.

KCR 72.5 72 U No bet. They definitely might be better than this. I like where the team is going (though signing Guillen for that much was a stretch). Billy Butler is a great hitter, Gordon should be better, and if the give Esteban German a chance he could produce. Plus, Brian Bannister is one of the smarter pitchers around and Zach Greinke has got some wicked stuff. 50 mph curve after a fastball at 97 is really unfair. Plus they were 5 games worse than they should have been last year.

LAA 92.5 89 U The outfield is a mess. They have 5 players for 3 spots, and no one wants to DH. If Escobar doesn’t pitch well after injury it will hurt, but they have some good starting pitching. John Lackey is very underrated. I like 89 wins better for 2009 than 2008 (major deals not withstanding) but it’s not a terrible bet. They won 4 games more than expected in ’07.

LAD 87 86 U I like this team a lot. Like Cin., if they let the best players play they would be much better. Pierre should be a fourth outfielder, no question, and not letting LaRoche play third is kind of crazy. Definitely no bet.

MIL 84 87 O I picked the BrewCrew to win the central last year and they were so close. Ryan Braun is one of my favorite new players and that offense is going to be good (even with some OBP and SO problems). Picking up Cameron improved the defense in two places. The manager has talked about batting Braun 2^nd, Fielder 3^rd, Kendall 9^th, and the pitcher 8^th to get the two best hitter more at bats while having guys on base for them. Keeping Fielder 4^th would be better so that his HRs aren’t wasted with no one on base, but still. It’s the kind of thinking outside the box that makes sense and helps a team pick up a game or two. Gallardo is going to be very, very good, and if Sheets pitches the whole season I could easily see playoffs (even, dare I say, a World Series trophy). [I wasn’t a Brewers fan until a couple years ago. I like teams that are young and exciting, as well as having a clear plan and quality execution. O’s over Brewers in ’10? (it’s a joke now)]

MIN 73 74 O No bet. Liriano, when healthy is astounding. How many pitchers have that good control with that many strike-outs and all those ground balls? One. Liriano. The man had a 2.16 ERA in’06! They’re not a bad team, but they lack too much offense for Mauer and Morneau (and some from Cuddyer and Young and Kubel), to make up for it. Their starting third baseman hit .210 with 1 HR last year. Why not sign Corey Patterson to steal 40 bases and play quality defense instead of rushing a player to the majors when he isn’t ready (and Gomez is pretty clearly not ready).

NYM 93.5 93 U No bet. David Wright should have been the MVP last year. He is a major talent. Jose Reyes is also talented but very overrated. He might end up being really good, but a career OBP around .330 isn’t going to cut it from a lead-of hitter, even if he steals 100 bases (which he could, if he got on more). Santana is the favorite for the Cy Young, but what the get from Pedro and Oliver Perez may determine how good they really are. John Maine is turning into a #2 starter (wish that deal hadn’t gone down). Is Delgado done, or does have another 30 HR 100 RBI season left?

NYY 93.5 95 O A-Rod, like him or hate him (I just kinda’ dislike him) is the best player in baseball. He isn’t a choke artist, he may be a jerk, but he is the best. Jeter’s defense is really, really bad. Every quality metric says the same thing – he has no range. If he planted, turned, and threw instead of leaping and spinning he would get more guys out. It’s common sense (less momentum going away from first = stronger throw). Still, Wang is a quality #2; Andy (who is some sort of hero now for admitting (after the third time he was asked) to using HGH and then changing what he thinks he knows so many times) is still valuable; Mussina (maybe my all time favorite player, and future HOF hopefully – he deserves it) will bounce back a bit; Hughes is going to be really good; Kennedy isn’t a young Mussina as people say, but as a #5 he’ll be good. The bullpen could use a little work, but if they keep Joba there all year and use him effectively (multiple innings, important situations) that’ll solve that. He has to be really good in the pen to merit keeping him out of the rotation if he only pitches an inning at a time.

I think they’re the team to beat in the East, but other than Cano and A-Rod, that offense is susceptible to some age/health issues.

OAK 73.5 77 O Another one of my favorite teams. Lost one of their best hitters and their best pitcher and everybody thinks that they’ll be awful because they don’t have pitching and the offense is thin on stars. They did get a lot of pitching depth though, and a good hitting young outfielder who has some power but may still have some plate discipline issues. Hmm, sounds familiar. If Rich Harden is healthy, then a .500 record is in reach. They can’t possibly have as many injuries as they did last year, can they? Even if they trade Blanton, I still like the over. Billy Bean isn’t the genius some make him out to be, but he’s still one of the better GMs out there. This is the first year in the last 5 that I’m not picking them to win the division. Daric Barton = young Mark Grace?

PHI 88.5 85 U I picked them last year, but I won’t do it again. I don’t trust the pitching outside of Myers and Hamels, who is one of the top pitchers in the league (though I worry about his risk of injury). The offense is really good though. I’m fairly confident here, but if it was 88 instead I would be more hesitant. They cost themselves a lot of money with they Ryan Howard arbitration situation. If they had offered $1 million more they could have saved a couple mil this year, plus he would have gotten smaller raises in the next couple years. I don’t think I’d sign him long term though. Howard at first base at age 35 might be pretty scary.

PIT 68.5 71 O Even with the discrepancy I don’t bet here. Sill, they may not be worse than the Card’s. Ian Snell at the top of the rotation isn’t a #1, but he is a solid #2 (200 K’s this year?) and there is some pitching depth. If Jason Bay can make a bit of a comeback then 72-73 wins is certainly possible. The new front office is going to take the team in the right direction, but the almost complete lack of a farm system is going to take time to overcome.

SDP 84 85 O If Greg Maddux had been on the O’s then he would definitely be my favorite player. He could pitcher forever if he wanted to, and if you don’t trust Clemens’ late career numbers, then Mad Dog is the best pitcher in recent memory and near the top all-time. Add in Jake Peavy and Chris Young, with anything at all from Mark Prior, and you have a great pitching staff, especially in that ballpark. Kevin Towers is one of the best GMs in baseball, and I’m hoping for one last good season for a guy that deserves to get into the HOF – Jim Edmonds. I like the team a lot, but I don’t know if they have enough offense to pull off a season better than 82-80, even. No bet.

SFG 71.5 71 U Worst. Offense. Ever. That might not even be an exaggeration. Bengie Molina batting cleanup? Aaron Rowand at #3, without question? I feel bad for Matt Cain and Tim Lincecum. Cain had one of the best 7-16 seasons ever last year and Lincecum is a beast – a skinny little beast – but a beast none-the-less. Barry Zito is the most expensive #4 starter ever. All that pitching is going to be wasted for a number of years – especially with how bad the front office is. It goes to show you how many mistakes having Barry Bonds can cover up. There are going to be a lot of 1-0, 2-1 losses but it wouldn’t take much for them to luck into a 74 win season. It’s not a terrible bet though.

SEA 84.5 77 U If I had to put money on any one team, it’s the M’s. I didn’t expect this until I looked at it, but the irony is really too great. The two team that I have as furthest away from their lines are the M’s and the O’s, but it’s M’s below, even with Bedard, and O’s above, even without him. They won 9 more games than they should have last year, but unlike the DBacks, they don’t have improvements coming from all of their young players and both teams added a top starter. The pitching is good (especially at Safeco) but after Bedard and Felix Hernandez, do Carlos Silva, Jarrod Washburn, and Miguel Batista really scare you? [Now I am even less scared of Batista.]They’re all very solid, but the offense has too many holes. I actually looked at the team player by player. The players who walk don’t hit for average (Sexson) or power (Vidro. Seriously, 6 HR from the DH?). If it wasn’t the case that Sexson was only unlucky last year, then they haven’t got much to offer.

After looking at this I later (independently of this) read the following: Bill James looked at what happens to teams after they outplay their expected record. He took the 100 teams who exceeded the expected most and looked at how they did the following year. The results: on average, the teams won 87 games (M’s won 88) when they should have won 78 (M’s should have won 79), and the next year they won 80 games (I have the M’s at 81 myself. BP has them at 73). Keep in mind that teams that do well generally try to improve the following year, so it’s not that the M’s are the only one to get new pitchers.

They were very lucky last year with no explanation whatsoever, and they just aren’t that talented.

At least the O’s players have some upside. With the M’s it’s mostly downside (yeah, I’m sure Bedard will K 11 per 9 innings again). This isn’t 100%, but I think the A’s have the better team. Maybe even the O’s too. Wouldn’t that be something?

[The guy at USS Mariner, an M’s blog, has the team winning 77 games with a standard deviation of 71-84 wins. Interestingly, he also has the A’s as the division favorites over the Angels 47% to 42% with Texas about even with Seattle . 95% of his simulations had the team with 86 wins or under, 77% at 82 or under and 27% with 74 or under. The best-case was 93 wins. The problem wasn’t pitching (which their GM addressed) but a terrible offense and a bad defense. He said “Since I ran the season, I’ve stared at the results and tried to find a reason to not write this post. Some thing that would invalidate the results, or that would give me an excuse to change something and go back to do it all over with even more pro-Mariner assumptions. But there isn’t…If you start from last year’s team and make adjustments, it’s easy to come up with another five, ten, sixteen wins. But starting from scratch, using reasonable assumptions, the picture looks much bleaker.”] Even real slam-dunks miss sometimes, if the ball gets stuck or bounces off the rim, but I’d call this my “shoe-in” or “lock” or whatever other term they use.

STL 77 73 U A bad team. If Pujols goes down then they’re done. The scary thing is; Pujols has been playing with injuries most of his career. What would he have done if healthy? They should have been a 71 win team last year, but somehow won 78 games. At least the fans don’t need to deal with David Eckstein articles anymore. Yes he’s small. And really white. We get it. Even if he tries really hard he still isn’t very good. He gets on base OK. That’s it. He’s just not good, no matter how scrappy he is. (And don’t even get me started on Darin Erstad. Who cares that he was a punter for his college football team? That doesn’t make him good at baseball. That doesn’t even make him that tough. He was the punter.) Anyway, I like the under a lot. I really would be surprised if the were over 77.

TEX 74.5 73 U I like the direction the team is heading, but it’s not there yet. I wouldn’t bet on this one though, in either direction.

TOR 85 83 U I don’t think I’d bet here. At 86 I might, but not 85. Dustin McGowan is a quality pitcher (he had the highest average fastball velocity among starters last year; 96.1 mph I believe it was). It’s hard to tell what they’ll get from Vernon Wells, and that contract doesn’t look good if he’s merely “good”. Alex Rios is the best defensive RF in the league, and Aaron Hill might surprise at second base. A shame they won’t let Adam Lind play, though I do love seeing Matt Stairs around. The guy kind of looks like a lumberjack he makes his own bat out of a tree that he chopped down. I doubt they’ll challenge the Sox and Yanks much - they should be more concerned with Tampa Bay next year.

TBR (Since its Rays instead of Devil Rays TBD should change to TBR right?) No O/U given, but predicting 79 wins. That’s right, 79. If they signed Bonds it would be over .500 (as long as Kazmir isn’t hurt). Kazmir/Shields/Garza/McGee/Davis/Sonnastine/Price/… whoever is going to be a very good rotation. Maybe not this year, but soon. They have some actual major leaguers in the bullpen now. Pena probably won’t repeat last year average wise, but the power and on-base skills are legit (though 46HR is a bit much). The defense should go from bad ( Upton made ~12 errors in 48 games at second) to good (new SS Bartlett is one of the better defenders in baseball), and Evan Longoria can seriously hit. If they weren’t in the AL East I would be rooting for them more, but their front office is finally on-the-ball and they should have their eyes set on the division crown in the near future (especially if they can afford to keep their best players). If the line is as low 76 wins I’m in, as I’ve seen predictions as high as 89 (as a median).

WAS 71.5 71 U No bet. They overachieved last year. The team is improving but the rotation is still lacking behind Shawn Hill and John Patterson (hopefully) and the lineup is improved but still nothing great. Dmitri Young playing over Nick Johnson is a waste. If the new park is as friendly is it sounds to be Lastings Milledge could go 20/20 next year. Wily Mo Pena might go 30/150 (that’s homeruns/strikeouts). Zimmerman is good and going to be very good, but he definitely doesn’t deserve the David Wright money that he’s asking for (yet, at least). Manny Acta is one of the smartest managers around though.

There’s another bet that is possible. It involves “clutch” hitting. One can bet on “clutch” hitting in 2008 by specifying a group of “clutch” players and a group of “choke” players, as well as a situation (ex. after the 7^th inning and tied, or whatever). At the end of the year the groups are compared. Whichever one had better relative performance (via batting average) in the given situation wins. There are 2-1 odds, though, against there being a difference. If you’re 67% sure that you can hand-pick player(s) and they’ll be more “clutch” than your hand-picked “chokers” then let me know. It can even be one “clutch” guy vs. a bunch of “chokers” or whatever. Derek Jeter vs. A-Rod with the game on the line? David Ortiz vs. Neifi Perez, Eduardo Perez, all of the Perez’s? The stipulations need to be approved (can’t define clutch as when an NL guy hits against a bad pitcher or an AL guy hits against a good pitcher and have the groups be NL and AL guys, etc.) but if you believe “clutch” exists, you should be able to point it out.

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