2014 MLB Thread & Pissing Match

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Getting it starting...

http://deadspin.com/the-milwaukee-brewers-adopted-stray-dog-is-the-best-do-1529649707

[GGGG]

I think this story might be the best story to come out of the Brewers all year.  They aren't going to be very good and the farm system is horrendous.  I think Melvin probably has two more years left...perhaps just this year.

[tower912]

Go, Tigers!    Pretty sure the Cubs WS drought continues.    LAD have the best team money can buy, but can they play as a team?   Jeter's farewell tour adds an interesting element to the Yankee's.   Does it galvanize them? 

[wadesworld]

I think this story might be the best story to come out of the Brewers all year.  They aren't going to be very good and the farm system is horrendous.  I think Melvin probably has two more years left...perhaps just this year.

We will see.  They will not be a playoff team, but I'm hoping they are better than last year.  If the rotation can stay relatively healthy they should be.  Big if though.  The offense will be worse but I think the pitching is much better.  1B, 2B, and LF will be iffy if you ask me.  Don't think Kris Davis and Scooter Gennett can produce every day like he did at the end of the season.  1B we just signed a bunch of washed up dudes who are going to hit a couple bombs and strike out quite a bit.

[MerrittsMustache]

Go, Tigers!    Pretty sure the Cubs WS drought continues.    LAD have the best team money can buy, but can they play as a team?   Jeter's farewell tour adds an interesting element to the Yankee's.   Does it galvanize them? 

Really going out on a limb with that one 

Ricketts thinks the Cubs could be a playoff team this year...despite adding no player of significance to a 96-loss team. Maybe Renteria is worth 25-30 wins.

[MUfan12]

I think this story might be the best story to come out of the Brewers all year.  They aren't going to be very good and the farm system is horrendous.  I think Melvin probably has two more years left...perhaps just this year.

Their inability to draft and develop pitching is what will do him in. Also, he hired a guy in Roenicke whose managerial style is almost the opposite of how Melvin wants to build a team. RRR wants to play good defense, and manufacture runs. Melvin wants guys with pop, and they'll find a spot for them later.

They might be competitive if the rotation performs well, but I'm not holding my breath.

[🏀]

First half of the season will be bland. Second half after Bryant and Baez call-ups will be something.

Looking forward to watching Jose Abreu. Could be something here.

[tower912]

Really going out on a limb with that one 

Ricketts thinks the Cubs could be a playoff team this year...despite adding no player of significance to a 96-loss team. Maybe Renteria is worth 25-30 wins.

Yeah, I know.   Was going for a humorous aside.   

[Benny B]

We will see.  They will not be a playoff team, but I'm hoping they are better than last year.  If the rotation can stay relatively healthy they should be.  Big if though.  The offense will be worse but I think the pitching is much better.  1B, 2B, and LF will be iffy if you ask me.  Don't think Kris Davis and Scooter Gennett can produce every day like he did at the end of the season.  1B we just signed a bunch of washed up dudes who are going to hit a couple bombs and strike out quite a bit.

Brewers will win 94 games if Garza stays healthy all year.  For every three days he's on the DL, subtract one win.

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Brewers will win 94 games if Garza stays healthy all year.  For every three days he's on the DL, subtract one win.

[akmarq]

If the Mariners finally crack .500 there may be an even bigger parade in Seattle this year.

I thought the Hart signing was great (almost no money committed) and they've made all the right fringe moves. Still probably tops out as a 90 win team but the youth and talent are in place moving forward.

Mostly just happy to have a non-Felix player to cheer for.

[NavinRJohnson]

Brewers will win 94 games if Garza stays healthy all year.  For every three days he's on the DL, subtract one win.

Yikes. They will be far more competitive this season. They'll score runs and rotation will be good enough for them to hang around, but 94 wins? No way.

[brandx]

Brewers will win 94 games if Garza stays healthy all year.  For every three days he's on the DL, subtract one win.

Wow. A dreamer. I do think the Brewers will be in the hunt for a playoff spot though. I would guess closer to 86-88 wins if they stay healthy. Offense will be very good and pitching will at least be average this year. Last year they were minus Braun + possibly the worst offensive production from 1B in baseball history - at least if you are going by WAR. This year, you'll still get low OBP, but could get 35 HRs and90 RBI from 1st basemen.

But as someone said, the minor league system sucks. the entire scouting staff needs to be shown the door.

[MerrittsMustache]

Brewers will win 94 games if Garza stays healthy all year.  For every three days he's on the DL, subtract one win.

The Brewers will be trying to move Garza by the 2015 deadline. He's a very talented innings eater but there's a reason why he just joined his fifth team at age 30.

[wadesworld]

Brewers will win 94 games if Garza stays healthy all year.  For every three days he's on the DL, subtract one win.

Just out of curiosity, how do you come up with that math?  For every 3 days that a pitcher who will pitch once every 5 days is on the DL we should subtract an entire win from their predicted win total?  The Brewers are not going to win every day Garza's on the bump, and they aren't going to lose every day his replacement pitches, but even if that were the case, that'd be 1 loss for every 5 days on the DL.

[WI inferiority Complexes]

For what it's worth (which isn't a ton), PECOTA predictions have the Brewers at even .500, the White Sox at 76-86 and Cubs at 72-90.  The Dodgers are predicted to have the best record in the NL (98-64), and Tampa Bay is predicted to have the best AL record (89-73).

Milwaukee's interesting.  I know it's illogical and silly to eliminate one month when reviewing a season, but, if you took away May from last season, (when the Brewers went 7-21), they would have been a .500 team.

[akmarq]

Fangraphs uses a combination of Zips and Streamer for their projections:
Brewers win 78 games
Cubs win 63 games
White Sox win 73 games
Mariners project 81-81
Dodgers win 91 (a full 3 games more than the second place Cardinals and Red Sox).

NL Central is tough to figure out this year. Cardinals still ought to have the division, but the Reds and Pirates are serious question marks. I think the Brewers are pretty clearly a notch below those two teams, but with injuries or some surprising performances they could easily be in the conversation for 2nd in the division. I just don't see the wild cards coming out of the Central this year with the Dodgers, Giants, Nationals, and Braves all looking like strong contenders.

[brandx]

Fangraphs uses a combination of Zips and Streamer for their projections:
Brewers win 78 games
Cubs win 63 games
White Sox win 73 games
Mariners project 81-81
Dodgers win 91 (a full 3 games more than the second place Cardinals and Red Sox).

NL Central is tough to figure out this year. Cardinals still ought to have the division, but the Reds and Pirates are serious question marks. I think the Brewers are pretty clearly a notch below those two teams, but with injuries or some surprising performances they could easily be in the conversation for 2nd in the division. I just don't see the wild cards coming out of the Central this year with the Dodgers, Giants, Nationals, and Braves all looking like strong contenders.

Terrible prediction. Last year 9 teams won more than 91 games, 8 in 2012, 6 in '11, etc., etc. Averages around 7 per year going back quite a ways.

Any system predicting the best team in either league will win only 91 games is wrong. Period. Flawed statistically.

[Spotcheck Billy]

 

[akmarq]

Pirates aren't in the same division.

Huh? The Pirates are more certainly in the NL Central. I'm saying the NL central breaks down to:
Tier 1: Cardinals
Tier 2: Pirates and Reds
Tier 3: Brewers
Tier 4: Cubs

With the most flexibility between tiers 2-3 and 3-4 (if the Brewers under perform and the Cubs over perform).

Apologies if something else in the post was unclear.

[chapman]

Hank is probably one of our best prospects.  Lots of stray dogs in the perennial #30 farm system.

[akmarq]

Terrible prediction. Last year 9 teams won more than 91 games, 8 in 2012, 6 in '11, etc., etc. Averages around 7 per year going back quite a ways.

Any system predicting the best team in either league will win only 91 games is wrong. Period. Flawed statistically.

Here's a rough summery of the methodology:
We’ve then taken those individual player forecasts and summed the totals at the team level in order to forecast an expected Win-Loss record for the remainder of the season. First, the forecasted totals for each team are put through the BaseRuns formula — generally regarded as the best model for estimating run scoring — which produces expected runs scored and expected runs allowed totals. Then, those RS/RA numbers were put through the PythagenPat calculation, which is a more accurate version of the well known pythagorean expected record, and that turns expected runs scored and runs allowed into expected wins and losses.


The outcome of a baseball game is a binary event (W or L) and so the actual results of games show a lot more deviation from the mean than the projections do. Almost all forecasting systems are using projected runs scored (based on individual batter projections) and projected runs allowed (based on individual pitcher projections) and running them through the Pythagorean Wins formula mentioned above. That formula is built from decades of data and predicts wins based on runs scored and allowed.

The point isn't to 'call' the number of wins that will actually happen (since that isn't possible beyond speculation), it's to present the expected records of teams relative to each other were every player to perform as projected (player projections are usually based on the last 4 years of performance). Take some time and poke around Fangraphs - it's a fantastic site and will teach can teach you a lot about both stats and baseball.

http://www.fangraphs.com/blogs/introducing-fangraphs-depth-charts-and-standings/

[brandx]

I recognize where the stats come from - I've been a fan of sabremetrics for 30 years. But sometimes they tend to be very conservative in that they don't account for outliers and try to bring everything back to the middle. Looks like that was the case with the predicted records. I think any system that doesn't account for any team to win more than 91 games has some inherent flaws.

I use several of these sites to help in developing my player projections. I like baseballhq.com the best.

[akmarq]

I recognize where the stats come from - I've been a fan of sabremetrics for 30 years. But sometimes they tend to be very conservative in that they don't account for outliers and try to bring everything back to the middle. Looks like that was the case with the predicted records. I think any system that doesn't account for any team to win more than 91 games has some inherent flaws.

I use several of these sites to help in developing my player projections. I like baseballhq.com the best.

I think the crux of our different evaluations lies in your use of prediction vs. projection. Those were projected results, not predictive: something that I didn't do a good enough job making clear. The model doesn't predict that the Dodgers win 91 games, it just extrapolates individual projections to that win total.

I'll check out baseballhq tonight - always interested in finding new sources for articles.

The real takeaway is that the Dodgers look really good. A three game lead in projected win total is quite the margin.

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I'm using baseballhq for the first season this year