2014 MLB win totals - ny yanks

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[h=2]New York Yankees: UNDER 86.5 wins[/h] Yes, the Yankees bought a bunch of 30-plus players who probably won’t look too hot at the end of their contracts. Again. Still, let’s not be too cynical about these offseason pickups. Assuming he stays upright for a full season, Jacoby Ellsbury will give the Yanks terrific speed while augmenting their outfield defense, and Yankee Stadium’s short porch could invite a bit of a power spike, even if that spike falls a bit short of Ellsbury’s still-inexplicable 32-homer binge in 2011. Brian McCann could wind up being one of the biggest upgrades for any team at any position, as he’ll bring his lefty power, strong batting eye, and excellent defense to a roster slot that featured Chris Stewart and a bag of wet noodles in 2013. Carlos Beltran carries the biggest performance risk of the three as he approaches his 37th birthday, but he too could get a boost from Yankee Stadium’s friendly dimensions. Meanwhile, Masahiro Tanaka comes with some risk due to an increase in competition and all the innings already on his pitching odometer at age 25 … but things would have to go pretty badly for him to match the level of spookiness Phil Hughes delivered last year. Credit Brian Cashman for recognizing that the Yankees won 85 games last year, but also allowed more runs than they scored, thus profiling more like a sub-.500 ball club in need of a major overhaul than a true contender.
The problem is that spending more than $400 million on those four free agents still doesn’t make the Yankees the World Series contenders they’re hoping to again become. Frankly, looking at this roster, it’s hard not to wonder if the Yanks can even hit 85 wins again. Derek Jeter and Mark Teixeira will be back, but Jeter turns 40 in June and might not have much left in the tank, while Teixeira has admitted that the injured wrist that cost him most of last year won’t be 100 percent for a while, assuming it ever gets there this year. Losing Robinson Cano, of course, subtracts the team’s best player from the roster, and Brian Roberts is simply too old and injury-prone at this stage to expect much from him in 2014. Don’t sleep on Mariano Rivera’s absence, either. While the amount of pomp and circumstance thrown his way last year exceeded his value on the field, Rivera was still a very good relief pitcher whose loss will force others to occupy more high-leverage roles. David Robertson may be a fine closer, but expecting the newly signed Matt Thornton to handle a key setup role is likely asking too much, and the young power arms elsewhere in the pen have talent, but also carry plenty of risk.

The Yankees could be a pretty good team this year, and may even make it to Labor Day still on the fringes of the wild-card race. But I don’t see 87 wins here, due to what could be the worst infield in baseball and a bullpen that brings up more questions than a true contender should have to answer.
 

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from joe peta:

Restated Runs Scored: 616


Restated Runs Allowed: 702
Expected Wins based on Restated RS/RA 71.3
Actual Wins 85
Ladies and gentlemen, I present to you the luckiest team I have ever come across in my examination of MLB teams over the last decade – the 2013 New York Yankees.
This isn’t a total surprise to baseball observers. The Yankees actually allowed more runs than they scored last year so many fans knew, like the 2012 Orioles, the 2013 Yankees were lucky to have finished above .500, based on their run differential (650 Runs Scored/671 Runs Allowed.) But what people don’t realize is how lucky New York was to have achieved the actual run differential that they did. It should have been much worse. In other words, if the Yankees produced exactly the same output that they did last year, they should expect to win about 71 games. That’s the baseline from which to evaluate marginal changes.
So what changes were made? Well, from the 71 win-talent team their best hitter, by far, Robinson Cano departed via free-agency. Their second best pitcher, Andy Pettitte, who allowed runs at a well-below-AL-average rate (3.74 ERA) over 30 starts and nearly 200 innings retired. And, of course, the 2014 Yankees will be without the services of the greatest reliever of all time, Mariano Rivera, who merely departed with a 2.04 ERA in 2013.
Take away those contributors from the 2013 Yankees and before you make any improvements, you’re starting with the third worst team in all of baseball. Only the Marlins and Astros will be starting from a lower based before marginal improvements.
The Yankees, of course, did make improvements to their roster. Jacoby Ellsbury and Carlos Beltran will join Brett Gardner in the outfield, and Brian McCann equipped with an apparent tailor-made swing for Yankee Stadium represents a vast upgrade at catcher. Derek Jeter and Mark Teixeira figure to get more than 136 combined plate appearances they managed last year. (Sub-.200 batting average, plate appearances it should be noted.) But third base (Scott Sizemore) and second base (Brian Roberts) are still injury-plagued black holes, Teixeira hasn’t been an offensive force since 2009, Alfonzo Soriano (.254 BA/.305 OBP/.487 SLG 2011-2013) is a tenuous solution at DH in a league where DH’s rake (.263/.338/.428 over last three years.) In Soriano’s case, the power has been there, but he’ll be 38 this year and his on-base skills are never coming back to league average.
From the runs allowed perspective, my projection system, which takes age and continuity into effect, essentially broke down when I input all the aged newcomers. It simply projects to be awful. There’s a lot of excitement at the Steinbrenner Complex in Tampa surrounding the arrival of Masahiro Tanaka in camp. The excitement is based on Tanaka’s Cliff Lee-like control of the strike zone during his time in Japan. However, if he has a rookie campaign anything short of Yu Darvish, Tanaka’s going to have trouble improving on the run-suppression results of Andy Pettitte last year. And that’s the thing about cluster luck – Tanaka may post a better walk rate, higher strike out rate, and even induce more ground balls than Pettitte did in 2013, yet still give up more runs.
Finally, there’s the case of C.C. Sabathia. I don’t ever relish reporting on the projected demise of a former Cy Young Award winner, but right now, I’m far more bearish on his prospects this year than any other projection system. My model sees a player who has lost control of the strike zone at the same time he’s losing a significant amount of velocity. In short, it’s the Tim Lincecum, Roy Halladay, Dan Haren, etc. formula. I don’t really want to be right on this particular element of the projection, but going forward I have the once-elite Sabathia residing in a far more modest 4.00+ ERA neighborhood.
With the entire starting lineup on the wrong side of 30, except Scott Sizemore, and at age 29 he’s just barely a ‘youngster’, the Yankees are fielding an unprecedented lineup in terms of average age. Unprecedented in baseball, and maybe even all of sports, that is. However, the concept of throwing together a bunch of aging former stars has been tried in other art forms.
Be warned Yankees fans, Last Vegas was a critical and box-office flop.
Oddsmakers’ expectations: Everyone from baseball insiders to bettors with Las Vegas-based leanings like to make fun of the perceived-less-than-sharp markets that come out of the Reno-based Atlantis Casino, the first shop to post total wins over/under markets on MLB teams. As we’ll see as this series goes on however, I foresee the Atlantis having a smaller forecasting error at the end of the year than any other oddsmaker. The Yankees market is a perfect example. The Atlantis opened them at 83 ½ games. The LVH in Las Vegas, which has always functioned as the official line for my preview series opened them at 85 ½ while most other sportsbooks have since drifted the line higher. My New York-based bookmaker, as well as the overseas gold-standard, Pinnacle Sports has them listed at 87 wins with a slight discount on the under side of the bet.
As you might guess from my preview, I strongly liked the under . . . in Reno. At the current market of 87 wins, an under bet on the Yankees is not only my strongest play this year, it ranks at least as strong as last year’s top-conviction plays, and eventual easy winners, under Toronto and over Cleveland.

2014 Outlook:
79-83 – Fifth in AL East
704 Runs Scored 722 Runs Allowed
 

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"The Yankees are fielding an unprecedented lineup in terms of average age. Unprecedented in baseball, and maybe even all of sports, that is."

somebody agrees, under 87 now -160
 

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