Rosenthal: AL now has six super teams

[dagger]

Six super teams, max five playoff spots ... in 2013. I was bad in math as a kid but I think I can deduce this is bad news for playing meaningful baseball in August. By the way, in a separate tweet, Rosenthal says he'd rank the Jays 7th, which is about the usual for most of the past 20 years. Seventh in a 14-team league. Oh Joy, oh joy.

http://msn.foxsports.com/mlb/story/rati ... a-bay-rays

[satyr9]

Um, actually the math is insanely better, especially if you're willing to think beyond 2012. In a 2 super team league the Jays had to beat out 1/2 to make the playoffs. That meant every year they had to expect that they needed the 2nd best club to make the 4 team playoff.

In a 5 spot league, they have to beat out 2/6 to make a playoff spot (and 1 is TB, which mid to long term isn't super, you slot them with any other well run unsuper team). I'll take needing to catch 1/3 instead of a 1/2 and 1/5 over the long haul any day. Perenially 1/5 is going to flounder every year anyway, if you ranked the top 5 every spring training, I'd hazard a guess that at least 80% of the time at least 1 club falls flat on its face from injury or surprise.

While I don't agree with the premise of the article as an argument for some paradigm shift beyond this season anyway, playing along if there are 5 teams for 5 spots willing to spend far and away above the rest of the AL, that still means in any given year just 1 has to be caught instead of just 1 of 2 (NYY and BOS). The math is so dramatically helpful to the Jays situation it's just blind vitriol to ignore.

[Al_Oliver]

didn't know playoff spots are handed out in January now...

[Randle McMurphy]

Wouldn't be surprised at all if the Jays are better than 2-3 of these teams in the end.

[vaff87]

Wouldn't be surprised at all if the Jays are better than 2-3 of these teams in the end.

I agree with you. I think the Jays are being a little underrated and a couple of those teams are being a little overrated, at the moment.

[satyr9]

There's another component to this and I can't decide if that makes it more or less scary: This spending isn't actually new.

Consider the top 5 AL teams in roughly estimated payroll. This is known deals plus the player's abitration ask plus 0.5 per open spot. These can easily change as there's more signings and trades and arbitration avoidance contracts to give out, but the top 5, except for 1, hasn't gone beyond their traditional spending patterns at all. Below are 3 salary numbers. First is my loosely projected 2012 number. Second is the average (Cot's) payroll of those clubs for the last 5 years, and third is the highest single season payroll that they had in that time:

NYY 2012-209m, 2007-2011avg- 204m, highest2007-2011-213m
BOS 2012-166m, 2007-2011avg-146m, highest2007-2011-168m
LAA 2012-149m, 2007-2011avg-121m, highest2007-2011-141m
DET 2012-131m, 2007-2011avg-118m, highest2007-2011-137m
TEX 2012-119m, 2007-2011avg-72m, highest2007-2011-92m

Bos and NYY aren't going anywhere. In fact BOS with its cost cutting may actually be the highest jumping club of the big 5, which is the danger with those big-ass FA deals. Year 1 is easy, it's how you manage beyond where things get crazy. LAA and DET are right where they've been in peak years before. Detroit may actually be far closer to their average since they've probably already written off however much of VMart's 13m is insured. Tex is the big grower and that 119m doesn't include any of the Yu posting fee. Still the increased spending of 1 club, especially 1 that made the WS two years in a row, shouldn't be what's making everyone discuss the dramatic shift in power in the AL.

BTW, here are the rough calcs for the rest of the AL, just the 2012 numbers:

CHW - 98m
MIN - 98m
TOR - 86m
SEA - 79m
BAL - 76m
CLE - 67m
KC - 64m
TB - 62m
Oak - 44m

[torontoaces04]

MIN - 98m
TOR - 86m

SMH.

[Lateral Quicks]

Just had the misfortune of reading letters in response to Buffery's anti-Jays column in the Sun (was in waiting room, nothing else to do) and the level of ignorance and impatience out there vis-a-vis the Jays is staggering. AA's had the reigns for two years people. Two years! Get a grip.

[Lateral Quicks]

Wouldn't be surprised at all if the Jays are better than 2-3 of these teams in the end.

Concur. I thought they were better than the Rays last year, but obviously the record didn't bear that out.

This year I could see them better than the Rays and Angels. That would be good for the playoffs. Perhaps not the most likely outcome, but certainly not an insignificant chance.

[dballislife]

i love the jays but some of u guys gotta be kidding me thinking of playoffs...det got division locked, we nowhere near texas and yankees, so we gotta be better than 2 of boston, tampa or angels...well the angels got 4 near aces in rotation plus pujols with decent bats around him...rays rotation prob just as good, jays prob have better offense but wont nearly make up for the pitching...even boston with a weaker staff have a better starting rotation, lineup and bullpen then us

[Michael Bradley]

Wouldn't be surprised at all if the Jays are better than 2-3 of these teams in the end.

Agreed. I think the Jays are a lot better than anyone gives them credit for and the upside is there to make a run this season. Whether it happens or not depends on a lot of factors, but things are not nearly as gloomy as some seem to think.

[Wo1verine]

I don't think this team has any shot a contention this year far too many question marks! One of them being the rotation which is going to kill us , imo.

[Avenger]

People need to stop posting nonsense without thinking about it. This happens every year, people get carried away by off season moves and always over estimate how much a team improved by signing big name players. The Angels, Tigers and Rangers are not super teams, they're not even close.

[WpgPage]

With another mid season trade from AA to add a bat in ether LF, 2B, 1B, and one of Rasmus or Gose making it in CF I think this team is very close to the 90 win plateau. Ball parking the 5th playoff spot at 92 wins, and we do have a team that is close to competitive. Next year with the glut of FA top of the line starters that may be the year to spend a bit of money and add a Cain or Hamels to put the team into the playoff picture. Assuming of course that the wheels don't completely fall off this season.

[satyr9]

Since it's most recent, let's just take the Fielder signing as an example of financial cost not being equal to overall improvement.

Consider just this one change. Hill gave the Jays -0.8WAR and was on pace, if he'd stayed, for a -1.0 WAR season and was paid a 5.0m salary. Kelly Johnson, in his terribly small sample size, provided the Jays with 0.8 WAR and was on pace over a full season with the Jays for 3.5 WAR and will make 6.375m next year. So to change from a -1 WAR to a 3.5 WAR player is a massive swing and even if you factor in the overall 0 WAR they got at 2B, it's a 3.5 WAR increase that cost an extra 1.375m from last year. Of course that assumes KJ plays like his small sample in Toronto last year, but he's also given out 3.0WAR /600 PA over his career, so it's an optimistic projection, but not total pie-in-the-sky either.

Compare that to Fielder replacing Martinez in DET. You could argue with Miggy maybe going to 3B that it'll be Fielder for Inge, Inge for bench fodder, and then one more signing for DH over Martinez, so a quick look at both ideas.

Fielder was worth 5.5 WAR last year and Martinez was worth 2.9, giving the Tigers 2.6 WAR upgrade for 23m dollars in 2012 (if insurance covers the full 13m). So the Tigers are teh awesomesizzle 'cause they added 2.5 wins for 5.75m a piece and the Jays are dooooommmed because they added 3.5 wins for less than 400k each. The coverage of each move respectively is commensurate with the cost and has no relation to the potential improvement offered.

How about Inge instead of Martinez if the Miggy to 3B doesn't prove impossible? Inge played less than half the time for -0.4 WAR, but let's just give him the whole year, so -1 WAR plus 5.5 WAR for Fielder and things start looking like it's better for the Tigers. 6.5 WAR from one move is very nice. And the cost is only 23m for Fielder plus Inge's 5.5m on the bench minus the 0.5 for some replacement player Inge is replacing. 28m for 6.5 WAR, assuming Miggy can play 3B without increasing negative defensive value and sustain his offense, 4.3m per and 3 more than the KJ move instead of 1 less.

That's more like it, but now you haven't factored in the loss of Martinez either, a problem that hasn't, as yet (knock on wood), happened to the prospective 2012 Jays. Let's assume in the Tigers plans they know they can acquire a vet DH to replace 1.5 WAR of VMart on the cheap for 1 year.

Now, DET was already a 95 win team, so adding WAR and wins likely costs more and is more valuable (both parts have been discussed often elsewhere), and they have made other moves since the beginning of last season (like Fister), as have the Jays, so it's nowhere close to an even comparison or a complete picture of projecting forward. Also, their status as contenders has no bearing on the fate of the Jays chances next season unless another AL central team blows up huge and DET is competing for the WC. My only point was they're being lauded as if they've completely overhauled what they are as a team and if every part of their plan goes perfect, they'll have bought about 5 wins (6.5 for Inge->Fielder -1.5 for Martinez ->vet DH) for (23m + 5m + vetDH - VMart insurance). Could you argue that all the other moves made by both clubs since opening day of last year amount to an extra 1.5 WAR for the Jays in 2012? I know I would argue that's case and if so it would mean the Jays have actually lessened the gap between the Tigers and themselves competitively even with their monster signing.

[jrsmith]

People need to stop posting nonsense without thinking about it. This happens every year, people get carried away by off season moves and always over estimate how much a team improved by signing big name players. The Angels, Tigers and Rangers are not super teams, they're not even close.

It's true, some people are definitely over-rating those teams but in the end it's just semantics. Those teams all have a big chance of making the playoffs and the jays have solidified 4th place.

Wouldn't be surprised if the jays made the playoffs? Lol, with that starting 5 and Lind batting 4th it would be a shocker.

[Lateral Quicks]

I think the starting 5 is underrated around here. Sure there's a lot of uncertainty, but it's also very young with lots of potential to get significantly better.

Romero has gotten better every single year in the league. He's a beast with terrific work ethic and talent to match.

Morrow has the best stuff on the staff and has some of the best peripherals in the game. Consistency is his issue.

During his 60+ inning audition last year, 21 year old Alvarez had some of the best numbers in the game (1.13 WHIP, 5:1 K:BB). I'm not saying he's going to replicate that over a full season, but he's obviously a keeper - and seriously underrated around here. Consider all the success he's achieved without polished tertiary pitches.

Cecil is one year removed from a decent season and has obviously dropped a lot of weight this offseason. It's possible he's better suited as a lefty specialist out of the pen, but "good Cecil" is worthy of a spot in the rotation on a playoff team.

McGowan is a real question mark, but a worthy gamble considering his stuff and the fact he's in the 5th spot. If he doesn't work out, we have decent options in Litsch and Villanueva to hold the fort before a guy like Hutchison or Deck is ready (which could be as early as the middle of 2012 for both of them, IMO). They can also fill in if/when there are injuries.

It's really not as bad as people are making it out to be, and certainly won't be as bad as last year's Jo-Jo Reyes rotation.

[satyr9]

You forgot Mr. Drabek, who has at least some potential upside.

[Strav]

besides the original post, which I'm sure Dagger was posting to bring on more vitriol against the Jays management/owners (and such a boring broken record Dagger), this thread is a breath of fresh air. Yes, the Jays are currently being underrated while the likes of Detroit/Boston/TB are slightly overrated. We'll be in the fight for the post season due to the wild card expansion more than we ever have over the last decade and a bit.

[Randle McMurphy]

I don't want to see Drabek getting MLB starts again until he proves he's capable of throwing strikes against MILB hitters. Maybe he'll have a good ST, though.

McGowan's stuff looked great in his short stint in September, but he'll have to command like before if he wants to keep a major league starting job.

If neither of those two work out, though, Litsch and Villanueva are fine #5 options.