All we need for playoffs is Alvarez & Lawrie play like 2011

[baulderdash77]

If Lawrie & Alvarez produce at last year's levels for a full season we will improve by 78 runs on a net basis. That should put us in the thick of the playoff race. In fact we should be right there for either wildcard spot.

Let me explain how. Last year the Jays scored -12 net runs. Over the past 5 years to be a top 10 team the numbers are very consistent - 88.5 wins and +58 runs scored. Average playoff teams have averaged 92.7 wins and +102 runs in that time.

So the goal to squeak into the playoffs is another 70 net runs or 114 to be solidly into the playoffs.

I think we're a lot closer than everyone thinks based on 2 things- a full season of Brett Lawrie and a full season of Henderson Alvarez.

Lets assume everything else stays the same but we put Brett's 2011 production over 650 AB and displace the other 3B from last year. Then lets assume that Alvarez produces the same rate but he displaces the 20 starts by Jo Jo Reyes and see where that gets us.

In 2011 Brett had 171 PA and created 36 runs - .21 per PA. The guys that he's replacing AB's with (Nix, McDonald, Woodward & E5) created 45 runs in their 479 PA (I allocated 136 PA from E5 to make the numbers work. Over 650 PA Brett would produce 137 runs. Brett's production over 650 PA would increase the offense by 55 runs on a net basis.

In 2011 Alvarez had 10 starts had a 3.55 ERA. Jo-Jo Reyes had 20 starts with a 5.40 ERA and he gave up 66 runs in those starts. If Alvarez gives us 30 starts and everything else stays the same, just displacing Jo Jo he would save us 23 runs.

So if everything else nets the same- improved bullpen, any other improvements to the batting lineup or starting lineup. That is to say that everything else is a put and take on a net basis. If Brett & Henderson produce at last year's levels for a full season we will improve by 78 runs on a net basis and we should be in playoff position.

[Schad]

Couple things. First, the bar is likely to be higher than 89 wins; fifth took 90 wins a year ago, and with the moves made by the Angels and Rangers, we're likely looking at 91+ this season. Second, to get an expected record of 91 wins, you're looking at a run differential of around +90...teams certainly pop up with better-than-expected records, but that's really the target, rather than hoping to outperform our expected win-loss total.

Third, and most importantly, having Lawrie play like that over 650 PAs is an utterly massive ask. He would need to sustain a wOBA that would have ranked in the top five in all of baseball for a full season; great though he might be, that's a lot to expect from a 22 year old.

[dagger]

It would also be more plausible if Colby Rasmus hit better than the .173 he did in spring training.

[baulderdash77]

You have to go back 7 years to find a season where you needed >90 wins to get the 2nd wild card. So 88.5 wins has been good enough in most years to do that.

I'm not expecting Lawrie to perform like he did all season last year, hoping for it certainly. But if he did we would be right in there.

In reality you're probably looking at a small regression for Lawrie & even Romero. There are other improvements that will happen though too like Johnson over Aaron Hill, Thames over Rivera, the bullpen being much better on paper, Rasmus returning to form.

It's not out of the realm of possibility that we could get that 2nd wildcard.

[baulderdash77]

Another way to look at it- what was the wins of the 3rd place wild card team the past 10 years. You only have to be 1 win higher than the 3rd place team to make the playoffs.

Here's where they were: 86, 88, 86, 88, 88, 89, 88, 89, 86, 93!

The 2nd wildcard race is would have been by teams in the 88-90 range almost every year. I would thing that we're going to see that again.

[Schad]

You have to go back 7 years to find a season where you needed >90 wins to get the 2nd wild card. So 88.5 wins has been good enough in most years to do that.

But if you go back those seven years, to a point at which the American League was quite top-heavy, as it is right now, you'll see a stretch of years where 90+ wins was a commonplace benchmark for fifth. Again, it took 90 wins last year -- after the collapse of the Red Sox, no less -- after which a team that wasn't in that pack added arguably the best player in baseball, and we're looking at displacing at least one of the teams up there. It would take an unexpected underperformance from two of the current big six for the bar to drop as low as 89 wins.

I'm not expecting Lawrie to perform like he did all season last year, hoping for it certainly. But if he did we would be right in there.

In reality you're probably looking at a small regression for Lawrie & even Romero. There are other improvements that will happen though too like Johnson over Aaron Hill, Thames over Rivera, the bullpen being much better on paper, Rasmus returning to form.

It's not out of the realm of possibility that we could get that 2nd wildcard.

It's not out of the realm of possibility, no. But for it to happen, we need more than one or two players performing at a high level (even if that level is that of a top five hitter in baseball); we need two of Lind, Johnson and Rasmus to rebound, Lawrie to play well, all of our starters to perform capably (we cannot afford 100+ IP wasted while we try to find someone who can hack it, let alone the 190 given to Jo-Jo and Drabek), and it wouldn't hurt if a couple of the top teams had major injury woes. It is a big ask.

[baulderdash77]

That's a fair comment. The AL probably has 5 really good teams, then the Blue Jays, then a bunch of sub .500 teams.

[Kaizen]

I am beginning to think Rasmus is the guy we had last year and this spring. I have low expectations for him.

[Relentless88]

I am beginning to think Rasmus is the guy we had last year and this spring. I have low expectations for him.

At least we have contingency plans in Gose and Marisnick in place if Rasmus completely flops again.

This board is too pessimistic. The Jays will win one of the wildcards.

[There There]

I am beginning to think Rasmus is the guy we had last year and this spring. I have low expectations for him.

At least we have contingency plans in Gose and Marisnick in place if Rasmus completely flops again.

Neither will be contingencies this year.

Marisnick's ETA is likely 2014 at the earliest, and that is aggressive, since he'd be going A-AA-AAA over the course of this year and next.

Gose could be a regular by mid next season if everything goes right... that said, if the team is playing meaningful games in September, he could be a nice piece off the bench in September for pinch running and late game defensive substitutions

And all that said, I actually don't get the pessismism in this city regarding Rasmus. Sure he looked awful over two months last year, but this guy was very very good prior to that in St. Louis. I have little doubt that he will be closer to his St. Louis level of productivity

[righteous015]

I am beginning to think Rasmus is the guy we had last year and this spring. I have low expectations for him.

At least we have contingency plans in Gose and Marisnick in place if Rasmus completely flops again.

This board is too pessimistic. The Jays will win one of the wildcards.

Yeah, hopefully as the season goes by, this board doesn't turn into the Raptors board. I've come to hate that board just cuz of all the pessimism and lack of intelligent comments. Rather stay here.

[Hendrix]

I don't think we are going to get all that difference from just Lawrie, and Alverez. However, there are quite a few positions where we stand to see a difference, and when you aggregate them all it could very well turn into a very positive run differential.

Last year we got....

~125 games or so of Rajai Davis, and Patterson putting up a combined 0 WAR in CF. Rasmus has averaged 3WAR per 600 PA's the last 3 years, so we should see an improvment here.

104 games of Aaron Hill putting up -0.8 WAR at second. Kelly Johnson averages 3.2 WAR / 600 PA's in his career, so we should see some improvment here.

119 games of a mash of EE, Nix, and Johny Mac is turning into Lawrie. Huge improvment.

Rauch's -0.6 WAR has been turned into Santos who has averaged 1.3 WAR /year. The rest of the pen should be better as well.

Also, outside of Romero last year (and Alverez's 60 innings), the next lowest SP's ERA's were 4.66, 4.72, 4.73, and 5.15. That's kind of sad for 4 out of your best 5. However, this year I think it's quite plausable to have 3 pitchers put up ERA's in the 3's, while putting in a significant amount of innings.

Obviously everything this year isn't going to go perfect. But there's quite a few areas where we should see improvment. I mean, I'm not putting up players best year WAR's here, I'm talking mostly about averages, and there is a lot of signigicant differences between those averages, and the production we got last year from positions.

[kavan]

Now lets factor we dont need 93 wins. We just need to make sure that for us to win and content we cannot be too many of those 93 wins. If we do a good job of playing good ball against clubs that are ahead of us we really only need about 87 wins because if we win 6 more games against wild card contenders or division rivals they have 6 less wins. So I think we can make it more competitive. So we dont need to shoot for a crazy number of wins just not let other teams beat up on us as often as we did last year.

[Relentless88]

I am beginning to think Rasmus is the guy we had last year and this spring. I have low expectations for him.

At least we have contingency plans in Gose and Marisnick in place if Rasmus completely flops again.

Neither will be contingencies this year.

Marisnick's ETA is likely 2014 at the earliest, and that is aggressive, since he'd be going A-AA-AAA over the course of this year and next.

Gose could be a regular by mid next season if everything goes right... that said, if the team is playing meaningful games in September, he could be a nice piece off the bench in September for pinch running and late game defensive substitutions

And all that said, I actually don't get the pessismism in this city regarding Rasmus. Sure he looked awful over two months last year, but this guy was very very good prior to that in St. Louis. I have little doubt that he will be closer to his St. Louis level of productivity

Yeah, I think we stick with Rasmus for this year. But if AA decides he's not in the future, then Gose could come up. I doubt they put Davis out there long term, especially if we're in the playoff race.

[Schad]

Now lets factor we dont need 93 wins. We just need to make sure that for us to win and content we cannot be too many of those 93 wins. If we do a good job of playing good ball against clubs that are ahead of us we really only need about 87 wins because if we win 6 more games against wild card contenders or division rivals they have 6 less wins. So I think we can make it more competitive. So we dont need to shoot for a crazy number of wins just not let other teams beat up on us as often as we did last year.

Well, if we're winning six more games against the Wild Card contenders overall, that means we have six more wins, and they have an average of one less; not enough alone to get us there. If we win six more against each Wild Card contending team, then the specifics really don't matter because we probably won 110 games.

[Homer Jay]

That's a fair comment. The AL probably has 5 really good teams, then the Blue Jays, then a bunch of sub .500 teams.

I would put Yankees-Angels-Rangers at the top. 94 wins

Next level is Rays-Sox. 90 wins

Then I have Jays-Tigers. 86 wins

Indians at 81 wins.

Then everybody else below .500

[Hendrix]

Why the Tigers at 86 wins?

They play 1/3 of their season against mostly meh teams. They won 95 games last year. And Verlander, Cabrera, Avila, Peralta, and Fielder are some pretty nice big guns to have.

[Dr. Nick]

screw the stats. lets just hope that come september, we're within 2-3 games of a wildcard spot and enjoy being in the race and playing meaningful games! Anything can happen.

[Tyrone Slothrop]

Why the Tigers at 86 wins?

They play 1/3 of their season against mostly meh teams. They won 95 games last year. And Verlander, Cabrera, Avila, Peralta, and Fielder are some pretty nice big guns to have.

Their infield defence is going to be historically bad. It will definitely cost them a few wins, and I don't expect Verlander to put up quite the same numbers (A .236 BABIP is extremely unlikely with Cabrera at third). But I agree with you about the scheduling issue. I think they'll be somewhere between 91 and 94 wins. But I think the Jays should be able to beat them in their season series.