So recently the Yahoo! sports team of experts put together their predictions for the upcoming year. You can read them at http://sports.yahoo.com/mlb/news?slug=ys-standingspredictions032708&prov=yhoo&type=lgns and I suggest you do.
I agree with most of them. I think they underrate the Tigers even though their bullpen is bad, and their prediction of the AL West is...
Wait, what? The Mariners will win 87, 89, or 91 games? That's worth a second look. The Yahoo! experts seem to think that the Mariners, having won 88 games last year and adding Erik Bedard, will be just fine this year. I see a few things wrong with this:
1) I don't buy into the continued success of teams that allow more runs than they score. The Diamondbacks are an exception to this case, since another year benefits pretty much every single member of their young team. The Mariners though will lose something with a year. Richie Sexson, Raul Ibanez, and Ichiro Suzuki will most likely lose a step with a year, and Adrian Beltre is getting there too. The Pythagorean Win/Loss, which tells you what a team should have probably come out to as far as records, tells you whether a team got a bit lucky or not. The Mariners' 2007 Runs Scored: Runs Allowed was 794:813, giving them a Pythagorean record of 79-83. This tells us that they got a bit lucky. Their wins were close, and their losses were beatings.
2) In acquiring Erik Bedard, they gave up their potential #3 hitter in Adam Jones (and set-up man George Sherrill, but I'll let that slide for now). Jones is expected to be a superstar soon enough, and the Mariners desperately needed his offensive output. Jones is predicted by Baseball Prospectus to come out with a .274/334/440 line, with 23 home runs and 12 stolen bases, and a 23.5 VORP (Value over Replacement Player.) In his stead, the team is platooned by Brad Wilkerson (VORP of 4.8) and Wladamir Balentien (VORP of -.08 [yes thats negative.]) They added a great pitcher, while giving up a great hitter. It's good for the Mariners, but not overwhelmingly.
3) I found this little tidbit particularly interesting: "no team has two potentially better pitchers." I usually like Jeff Passan, but he's saying in this sentence that no team has two pitchers who have the potential to be better than Erik Bedard and Felix Hernandez (Combined projected VORP of 75.7.) Off the top of my head, I came up with a few teams:
Mets: Johan Santana/Pedro Martinez (86.6)
Diamondbacks: Brandon Webb/Dan Haren (97.7)
Padres: Jake Peavy/Chris Young (73.8)
Indians: CC Sabathia/Fausto Carmona (81.0)
Rays: Scott Kazmir/James Shields (80.2)
Red Sox: Josh Beckett/Daisuke Matsuzaka (76.7)
Reds: Aaron Harang/Bronson Arroyo (70.6)
That's what I came up with on my own, and I left off the Dodgers, Brewers, Cubs, and Giants to keep things from getting too ridiculous. A lot of teams have two great pitchers, so this isn't unique to the fightin Mariners.
Don't believe it folks. I'm making a prediction here that the Mariners finish no more than three games above .500 at the end of the season, regardless of injuries.
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2 comments:
Man I hope so! You know how I feel about the importance of pitching so when I started looking at the M's rotation, my tummy began to 'urt. I would be interested in your opinion on their bullpen. I've always hated Carlos Silva in an AdamKennedy kind of way and the idea of seeing more of him bugs me too.
Carlos Silva is a bum. He'll give up 4 runs in 7 innings every time--nothing special. Their bullpen is good, especially with lights out closer JJ Puyz but they did give up George Sherill, who was their primary set up man.
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