Will Hot Finishes Bring Joy to 2039

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RonCo
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Will Hot Finishes Bring Joy to 2039

Post by RonCo » Tue May 28, 2019 4:11 pm

I often say that young teams get better as the year goes along, and if that’s true (which in general it is), then it’s not a long shot to say that late season success is an indicator of what the following year might look like. With that, I looked at each team that registered sub-.500 records, and took in their records in August and September.

Of these teams, four had winning records in that span (And three others--Atlantic City, New Orleans, and Hawaii were either .500 or a half-game off the pace).

Let’s take a look at those four teams, shall we?

Wichita 35-24 (72 wins)
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Lost in the Sun Belt battles, is that the Wichita Aviators finished on a huge run. I mean, that 35-24 pace translates to 96 wins across an entire season. No one, of course, should be projecting that kind of number for the Aviators in 2039. But they won 72 games this year—does that finish carry good portents?

On first glance, the Aviators are not particularly young. They average 28.44 years of age, second oldest to California. However, looking at their roster suggests that a good chunk of the core of their team—specifically including key pitchers, are very, very young. Assuming those guys return, and Stu can swap out the veteran journeymen he’s using as stop-gaps, it seems wise to suggest they’ll do better next year. No, again, not 96 wins better. But a .500 season isn’t outside the realm of possibility.

Montreal 29-25 (75 wins)
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At 27.4 years of age, the Blazers are in the upper third of age when you look at them as a team, but much of that is in aging pitching—and in fact, if you were to get rid of 35-year-old Chris Adkins (which one assumes is going to happen), and 31-yo Jermain Clayton (which might happen, too), you’d see that average age plummet. Bottom line is that a vast majority of guys contributing to Montreal’s pitching numbers ad 22-25 years old. So, yeah. One can expect them to progress. The bats register in at a younger 26.4 years. Even more telling is that two of their most important bats (Juan Santana and Kevin MacKeith) are babes in the woods. Only one key guy is on the wrong side of 30.

Montreal’s 29-22 Fall record translates to 87 wins. Again, I’m not sure you’ll see that kind of shift here without some additional surgery, but the idea of them moving from 75 to maybe 82-83 isn’t a real stretch.

Vancouver 28-25 (68 wins)
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Wow. I had no idea Vancouver had a winning record over the last two months of the year. Note to self: pay more attention to what Taylor is doing.

Of more interest in regard to the point of this article is that Vancouver did not finish the season with any pitcher on the roster who was over 28 years old. So, yeah, better they should get. The offense is a mixed bag. They had a lot of at bats from older players, but those older players didn’t produce much of anything. And their top WAR producers were 22 and 23 (Rashardo Menne III and Michinaga Narita). No one else had over one WAR. They have to get better by pure regression, right? I mean, you can go replace most of these other guys and guarantee to get better.

Call this argument a glass half-full. The Mounties won 68 games this year. If just the pitching grows up, perhaps that goes to 72? If the GM’s surgery on the offensive end just bumps the non-performers by a half-WAR each, maybe that gets them to 74-76. Hard to call. It does seem that pure age-based development will make this team better, but it’s hard to tell how much.


Omaha 28-26 (75 wins)
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My Heartland nemesis is always dangerous, as much because Justin will go make things happen at the flip of a switch. At 25.6, the Hawks were the third-youngest team in the league at the end of this season. Their batters registered in at 24.6, pitchers 25.7. Other than 32-year-old Pavel Bure, Omaha had no player on its roster who was older than 28. In other words, they’re pretty much on a set-it-and-forget-it mode. And yeah, that Fall record would just them from 74 wins to 87 wins. Depending on injuries (calling Carso Stoller) I could see that.

The only thing to pay attention to is that slugger Emilio Morales is 28, so probably not next year, but the season after you start looking for sings that the power tool might be lagging. But this isn’t an article about 2040. There are a lot of people who would love to have that problem.


SUMMARY

At the end of the day, I’mnot sure what this will mean, but if you believe in the “aging up” concept, then I think you’d be hard pressed to say any of these four teams won’t get better in 2039.

Time will tell, though.

The year is long and (to steal a now-worn-out phrase) winter is coming.
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Re: Will Hot Finishes Bring Joy to 2039

Post by StormZ_23 » Tue May 28, 2019 4:39 pm

I had no idea we had a winning record over the last two months either. I knew we played better as a few pitchers got better over the course of the season. As for my hitting, Menne underwhelmed but still played well and Narita, a rule 5 pick who played played in less than 60 games, had the second most WAR out of all my hitters. That's all you need to know to characterize my hitters.
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Re: Will Hot Finishes Bring Joy to 2039

Post by RonCo » Tue May 28, 2019 4:45 pm

StormZ_23 wrote:
Tue May 28, 2019 4:39 pm
I had no idea we had a winning record over the last two months either. I knew we played better as a few pitchers got better over the course of the season. As for my hitting, Menne underwhelmed but still played well and Narita, a rule 5 pick who played played in less than 60 games, had the second most WAR out of all my hitters. That's all you need to know to characterize my hitters.
Yes. The Mountie offense was offensive in many ways. Though as a plug-in Rule 5 guy, Narita is actually a nice little find, especially if you can keep hitting him against LHP as often as possible. Good defense, a little pop even without average. Very good base-runner. He at least can fill a spot while you work on getting positive value in other places.
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Re: Will Hot Finishes Bring Joy to 2039

Post by jleddy » Tue May 28, 2019 5:54 pm

RonCo wrote:
Tue May 28, 2019 4:11 pm
The year is long and (to steal a now-worn-out phrase) winter is coming.
You know nothing, Ron Co.
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Re: Will Hot Finishes Bring Joy to 2039

Post by RonCo » Tue May 28, 2019 6:04 pm

jleddy wrote:
Tue May 28, 2019 5:54 pm
You know nothing, Ron Co.
Clearly you'll fit in quite well around here.
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Re: Will Hot Finishes Bring Joy to 2039

Post by Bumstead » Wed May 29, 2019 7:38 am

Boise won its last 5 games. Talk about a hot finish!

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Re: Will Hot Finishes Bring Joy to 2039

Post by crobillard » Fri May 31, 2019 9:37 am

jleddy wrote:
Tue May 28, 2019 5:54 pm
RonCo wrote:
Tue May 28, 2019 4:11 pm
The year is long and (to steal a now-worn-out phrase) winter is coming.
You know nothing, Ron Co.
Such an underrated post.

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