With the start of the baseball season approaching fast (11 days away), baseball stat geeks all across America are thumbing through the 2008 Bill James Handbook (which came out last November) in preparation for being able to drop this type of knowledge on their other stat geek buddies:
David Ortiz' OPS (1.153) in the second half of the season, while he was battling a knee injury, was 0.67 points higher than the next highest American League player (Carlos Pena, 1.066). And for those who thought Ortiz was having a down season, he was 0.01 points behind AL MVP Alex Rodriguez in OPS for the season (1.130-1.129).
The next time any of these type of guys see a girl at a bar, it will be their first time.
Anyways, James is viewed as the statistical God of the Baseball Universe. With that in mind, I want to take a look at his projections for the upcoming 2008 season, specifically the starting pitchers. Hopefully, James and his band of merry nerdy men are underestimating the success of the starting staff of the Boston Red Sox. If not, the Sox are in trouble this season.
Last season, Boston's top 4 starters, Josh Beckett (20), Tim Wakefield (17), Dice-K (15) and Curt Schilling (9) combined for 61 wins (which was about two-thirds of the number of wins for the team). This year, James has projected that Beckett and Dice-K will tie for the staff lead in wins at 14, then comes Wakefield (11) and Lester (10), combining for 50 wins. If that happens, there is no way the Red Sox will come close to the 96 wins they had as a club a year ago, and they will be hard pressed to make a return trip to the postseason.
I think (and hope) that the number of wins this year for the four starters will be higher than 50. It's a pretty safe bet that Beckett (barring injury) would win more than 14 games. Would it be a surprise if he won 20, or more, for the second consecutive year - not really. I also have a feeling, based on Lester's increased strength and being farther removed from his battle with Cancer, that he will have a very good year, certainly better than what James' predicts (10-10, 4.02 ERA).
In my opinion, the starting staff needs to be better overall than they were a year ago, as I feel the bullpen (especially Hideki Okajima) will be hard pressed to repeat their success from a year ago.
The Music Note of the Week comes from Alison Krauss and Robert Plant's album - Raising Sand.
Yes, the album is five months old, but it's relatively new to me. Not a bad album, has several good songs that have been getting radio play (Killing the Blues, Gone, Gone, Gone, Please Read the Letter, Fortune Teller). It sucks that Krauss and Plant are going on tour through the end of June, as it's delaying a possible reunion tour for Led Zeppelin.
Too bad, as Led Zeppelin showed how good their live performances will be last December with their performance in London, specifically the song, Kazmir. Jason Bonham nails this song and starts going nuts around the 6:45 mark.
Finally my wife, Lisa, will be celebrating the 10th anniversary of her 25th birthday this coming Sunday (March 16th). So happy birthday, Lisa. She shares her birthday with Wolfgang Van Halen, who'll be 17 on Sunday, so happy birthday to Wolfie as well.
As I told you this past Tuesday, everything in the Universe can be tied back to the mightly Van Halen.
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