[h=2]2015 American League East Preview[/h] Joe Peta
The AL East annually seems to make a mockery of that relationship.
In 2012 the Orioles won 93 games, finished 2[SUP]nd[/SUP] in the division and captured a Wild Card berth, despite only outscoring their opponents by 7 runs while the 3[SUP]rd[/SUP] place, 90-win Rays outscored their opponents by 120 runs. In 2013, the Yankees were 8 games over .500 despite being outscored by 21 runs over the course of the season. Last year it was more of the same. Despite playing worse overall baseball (-31 run differential) than just ten teams in all of Major League Baseball, only 12 teams won more games than New York. But this story isn’t about the Yankees, it’s about one of those teams that outplayed them yet gave up on its season well before NFL football kicked-off.
With five games to go in the 2014 season, the Tampa Bay Rays lost their 81[SUP]st[/SUP] game putting to end their incredible run of six straight over-.500 seasons that began with a World Series berth in 2008. That’s a streak only the Yankees and the Cardinals can better over that time. At the time of that 81[SUP]st[/SUP] loss however, while the Rays were five games under .500, they had outscored their opponents by 12 runs – and even that clue at over-.500 talent doesn’t tell the story of their performance level last year.
Here are the AVG/OBP/SLG splits for two pitching staffs in last year’s American League East and for comparison the MLB Average:
Team A: .231/.300/.362 <-- opposing hitters vs. Team A’s pitching staff
Team B: .241/.308/.382 <-- opposing hitters vs. Team B’s pitching staff
League Avg. .247/.314/.386
It’s pretty clear, I think, which pitching staff you’d rather have. Remember, the average pitching staff faces more than 6,100 batters a year, so a 10 point difference in batting average and 20 point difference in slugging is substantial. (Note that Team A is better than Team B, by more than Team B is better than the MLB average.) Sure enough, the difference in the two teams’ success was evident by season’s end. The Baltimore Orioles surrendered less runs than all but 4 teams in baseball and advanced to the ALCS while the Tampa Bay Rays languished under .500 and ranked 13[SUP]th[/SUP] in runs allowed.
Except Team A was Tampa and Team B was the Orioles.
Let’s decipher those results. The Rays staff was among the five best staffs in baseball at limiting hits, keeping batters from reaching base in any manner, and limiting power on the hits they did give up. Yet opposing teams only needed 2.07 hits, on average, to produce a run, and as a result of that efficiency, the Rays finished a just-above-average 13[SUP]th[/SUP] in runs allowed. (For Baltimore’s opponents it was 2.26 hits for each run.) In short, the Rays were subject to negative cluster luck. They gave up hits and baserunners at a well-below league-average rate yet their opponents converted those opportunities into near-league average runs.
Sadly, for Rays fans, Tampa’s negative cluster luck wasn’t limited to their time in the field. At the plate, league-average sequencing would have resulted in 21 more runs scored which, combined with the 33 fewer runs they should have given up while pitching, comes to a whopping 53 run improvement in their expected run differential versus actual. That’s about 6 wins of better production than results. (As league-wide scoring goes lower and lower, 9 runs is closer to equaling a win, as opposed to the old benchmark of 10 runs.)
There are other distorting factors as well. Even based on its actual runs scored and runs allowed, Tampa had negative Pythag luck of 2 wins, while the Orioles gained two wins. Put it all together and I see two similar looking upper-80s wins teams in vastly different clothing – in the case of the Orioles a beautiful 97-win Italian suit with the Rays a 77-win hoodie. In truth they were very similar teams at the end of last year, even if no one saw it that way. The question for this preview series is, given the off-season changes, aren’t they very different now?
I don’t think so. For Tampa, the trade of versatile Ben Zobrist is a real loss, having been shipped to Oakland, but elsewhere in the lineup the Rays could very well score more runs in 2015 despite the high-profile departure of Will Myers. Look, I think the Rays sold very low on the 23 year-old Myers, but we’re talking about marginal changes off an 87-win base that I believe the Rays played to last year. Myers and his abysmal 2015 Slugging Percentage of .320, will be replaced, and most likely improved upon by a combination of production from the high-profile youngster they picked up in the Myers trade, Steven Souza, and increased plate appearances from last year’s quiet breakout star, Kevin Kiermaier. The Rays lineup is very balanced and while James Loney doesn’t provide the type of pop you’d like from a first baseman, as the league is no longer filled with two dozen mashing first basemen, it’s no longer the competitive disadvantage it may have been just three years ago.
On the mound, David Price is forever gone, but he only made 23 starts last year, and it’s not just his starts that will be replaced this year. Along with Price, Jeremy Hellickson, and Erik Bedard have departed too. Here are their 2014 results:
Starts RA*
Price: 23 3.59
Bedard: 15 5.47
Hellickson: 13 4.95
Total 51 4.33
(* RA is total, not just earned, runs allowed)
Replacing David Price is impossible, but improving on 51 starts of 4.33 RA performance is not. With good reason, everyone is talking about the Indians rotation as possibly challenging the Mariners as best in the AL, but the sleeper starting five, which I project to be just as good as the Indians, is Tampa’s anchored by the quartet of Cobb, Archer, Odorizzi, and Smyly.
This one is going to be very fun to watch this year. The Rays are the most undervalued and overlooked team in baseball this year. To wit: Vegas has the Rays comfortably in last place in the AL East with a total wins market of 79 ½ wins (and reduced juice on the over.) Needless to say, I love the over. This is my highest-conviction play of the pre-season.
AL East Preview
Bill James’ Pythagorean Theorem states that there is a very tight relationship between a team’s run differential over the course of the year and its season-ending win total. For instance, teams that don’t outscore their opponents are not over-.500 caliber teams, and therefore their ability to win more than 81 games is discounted, should it happen. The opposite side of the coin is true as well. Of course, in 2015 this relationship is so well-known that casual fans – in all four major sports – often cite unsustainable performances based on point, run, or goal differential when looking at league standings.The AL East annually seems to make a mockery of that relationship.
In 2012 the Orioles won 93 games, finished 2[SUP]nd[/SUP] in the division and captured a Wild Card berth, despite only outscoring their opponents by 7 runs while the 3[SUP]rd[/SUP] place, 90-win Rays outscored their opponents by 120 runs. In 2013, the Yankees were 8 games over .500 despite being outscored by 21 runs over the course of the season. Last year it was more of the same. Despite playing worse overall baseball (-31 run differential) than just ten teams in all of Major League Baseball, only 12 teams won more games than New York. But this story isn’t about the Yankees, it’s about one of those teams that outplayed them yet gave up on its season well before NFL football kicked-off.
With five games to go in the 2014 season, the Tampa Bay Rays lost their 81[SUP]st[/SUP] game putting to end their incredible run of six straight over-.500 seasons that began with a World Series berth in 2008. That’s a streak only the Yankees and the Cardinals can better over that time. At the time of that 81[SUP]st[/SUP] loss however, while the Rays were five games under .500, they had outscored their opponents by 12 runs – and even that clue at over-.500 talent doesn’t tell the story of their performance level last year.
Here are the AVG/OBP/SLG splits for two pitching staffs in last year’s American League East and for comparison the MLB Average:
Team A: .231/.300/.362 <-- opposing hitters vs. Team A’s pitching staff
Team B: .241/.308/.382 <-- opposing hitters vs. Team B’s pitching staff
League Avg. .247/.314/.386
It’s pretty clear, I think, which pitching staff you’d rather have. Remember, the average pitching staff faces more than 6,100 batters a year, so a 10 point difference in batting average and 20 point difference in slugging is substantial. (Note that Team A is better than Team B, by more than Team B is better than the MLB average.) Sure enough, the difference in the two teams’ success was evident by season’s end. The Baltimore Orioles surrendered less runs than all but 4 teams in baseball and advanced to the ALCS while the Tampa Bay Rays languished under .500 and ranked 13[SUP]th[/SUP] in runs allowed.
Except Team A was Tampa and Team B was the Orioles.
Let’s decipher those results. The Rays staff was among the five best staffs in baseball at limiting hits, keeping batters from reaching base in any manner, and limiting power on the hits they did give up. Yet opposing teams only needed 2.07 hits, on average, to produce a run, and as a result of that efficiency, the Rays finished a just-above-average 13[SUP]th[/SUP] in runs allowed. (For Baltimore’s opponents it was 2.26 hits for each run.) In short, the Rays were subject to negative cluster luck. They gave up hits and baserunners at a well-below league-average rate yet their opponents converted those opportunities into near-league average runs.
Sadly, for Rays fans, Tampa’s negative cluster luck wasn’t limited to their time in the field. At the plate, league-average sequencing would have resulted in 21 more runs scored which, combined with the 33 fewer runs they should have given up while pitching, comes to a whopping 53 run improvement in their expected run differential versus actual. That’s about 6 wins of better production than results. (As league-wide scoring goes lower and lower, 9 runs is closer to equaling a win, as opposed to the old benchmark of 10 runs.)
There are other distorting factors as well. Even based on its actual runs scored and runs allowed, Tampa had negative Pythag luck of 2 wins, while the Orioles gained two wins. Put it all together and I see two similar looking upper-80s wins teams in vastly different clothing – in the case of the Orioles a beautiful 97-win Italian suit with the Rays a 77-win hoodie. In truth they were very similar teams at the end of last year, even if no one saw it that way. The question for this preview series is, given the off-season changes, aren’t they very different now?
I don’t think so. For Tampa, the trade of versatile Ben Zobrist is a real loss, having been shipped to Oakland, but elsewhere in the lineup the Rays could very well score more runs in 2015 despite the high-profile departure of Will Myers. Look, I think the Rays sold very low on the 23 year-old Myers, but we’re talking about marginal changes off an 87-win base that I believe the Rays played to last year. Myers and his abysmal 2015 Slugging Percentage of .320, will be replaced, and most likely improved upon by a combination of production from the high-profile youngster they picked up in the Myers trade, Steven Souza, and increased plate appearances from last year’s quiet breakout star, Kevin Kiermaier. The Rays lineup is very balanced and while James Loney doesn’t provide the type of pop you’d like from a first baseman, as the league is no longer filled with two dozen mashing first basemen, it’s no longer the competitive disadvantage it may have been just three years ago.
On the mound, David Price is forever gone, but he only made 23 starts last year, and it’s not just his starts that will be replaced this year. Along with Price, Jeremy Hellickson, and Erik Bedard have departed too. Here are their 2014 results:
Starts RA*
Price: 23 3.59
Bedard: 15 5.47
Hellickson: 13 4.95
Total 51 4.33
(* RA is total, not just earned, runs allowed)
Replacing David Price is impossible, but improving on 51 starts of 4.33 RA performance is not. With good reason, everyone is talking about the Indians rotation as possibly challenging the Mariners as best in the AL, but the sleeper starting five, which I project to be just as good as the Indians, is Tampa’s anchored by the quartet of Cobb, Archer, Odorizzi, and Smyly.
This one is going to be very fun to watch this year. The Rays are the most undervalued and overlooked team in baseball this year. To wit: Vegas has the Rays comfortably in last place in the AL East with a total wins market of 79 ½ wins (and reduced juice on the over.) Needless to say, I love the over. This is my highest-conviction play of the pre-season.
2015 Outlook:
87-75 – First in AL East
642 Runs Scored 589 Runs Allowed