1) Erick Aybar ends the season as the #2 shortstop on player rater, 2nd only to Reyes. Aybar is currently #10, Reyes isn't anywhere near the top (injured, obviously). Even if you throw out the Reyes caveat, Aybar will need a strong second half to make this prediction come true.
2) Sal Perez hits .300 with 20 home runs and 90 RBIs. Not the worst prediction here as Perez is hitting .303 (with a slightly high BABIP), but he's not on pace to reach those power numbers. He'd need 16 HRs in the 2nd half, and 60 RBI. Been a solid fantasy option, though.
3) R. A. Dickey wins 20 games. Not completely out of the question, but 13 Ws in the 2nd half is exceedingly unlikely. No one in the AL has more than 11 in the first half. Dickey has turned it around lately but it won't be enough to get him 20 wins.
4) Ichiro Suzuki matches his career high and hits 15 home runs. If Kate gets 10 HRs from Ichiro in the 2nd half I imagine she'll be ecstatic. Probably not gonna happen. Luke got Lance Berkman from Kate for him. Berkman has been terrible so far for Luke.
5) Mike Trout will beat his 2012 roto numbers in at least 2 out of 5 categories. Hard to compare where Trout is now relative to last year, as he missed April of 2012. It shouldn't be hard at all for him to beat last year's numbers in RBI (51 so far, 87 last year). He's on track to fall well behind last year's numbers in Rs, HRs, and SBs, unless he manages to get substantially more PAs in the 2nd half than he has so far. His average and BABIP are down slightly from last year, but barring a run of HRs or SBs, this is probably the category where he has the best chance to make Luke's prediction come true.
BONUS (fake) prediction: Aaron Hicks' roto line this year - .327 AVG, 130 runs, 31 home runs, 84 RBIs, 50 steals. Everyone can now proceed to laugh at Luke.
Overall, looks like 0/5 so far, with a shot at 1/5 if Trout pulls it out.
Andrew:
1) Jon Lester returns to form, and finishes in the top 5 for Cy Young voting. At first Lester made Andrew look really smart, but he's slid backwards a lot in his last 7-8 starts. He's maintained the 3.3 BB/9 that Andrew hoped for, but his K/9 has been stuck in the low 7s. If he gets turned around in the 2nd half there's an off-chance he slides into the top 5 in Cy Young voting but it would have to be quite a campaign.
2) Glen Perkins finishes in the top 3 RP, by player rater. This could actually happen. Perkins is currently the #3 true reliever by player rater (you can toss out Iwakuma, who is starting). Perkins is just a hair ahead of Mariano, so it could change easily, but I'm giving this to Andrew right now.
3) Justin Smoak finishes the season as a top 10 option at 1B. Oh god, no.
4) Alex Gordon hits 40+ HR+SB. Only 25% of the way there so far. Not gonna happen.
5) Jake Arrieta finishes the year as the highest rated Baltimore SP by Player Rater. If only Andrew had guessed Chris Tillman (and not dropped him). It wouldn't be hard to be the top Baltimore SP this year, but Arrieta doesn't register right now. Struggling in AAA. Not gonna get this one.
Overall: On track for 1/5, but loses a point for the Justin Smoak prediction.
1. Ivan Nova makes good on his promising 2012 and is the #3 SP on the Yankees, just behind Kuroda. Has not been the case so far this year, and while he's been better, he doesn't have a spot in the rotation right at this moment and it seems unlikely that he's their #3 by the end of the year.
2. Mark Reynolds returns to form and hits 30 home runs. Absolutely possible as he's sitting at 14, but only hitting 5 in May and 1 so far in June is worrisome, and his overall numbers look a whole lot like last year's right now. He's about as streaky a hitter as they come, so the 2nd half could go in a lot of different directions. Right now it's a maybe.
3. Edwin Encarnacion comes close to repeating his 2012 and outproduces either Albert Pujols or Prince Fielder to be a top two first baseman in the league. #2 on player rater, and well ahead of both Fielder and Pujols. Looking good.
4. Carlos Santana is the clear cut, #1 catcher. No good so far, with him well behind Mauer and Napoli. It'll be hard to unseat Mauer in the 2nd half of the year. Santana has definitely been a solid fantasy catcher, though.
5. Bruce Rondon gets the Tigers closer job by May 1, if not soon, and gets 30 saves over the course of the season and strikes out 80 batters. Can't rule out him closing games for the Tigers by the end of the season, but no chance of him reaching those stats.
Other slightly crazy predictions:
Alex Cobb...becomes the #2 starter on the Rays. Cobb made good on this for Bill in the first half, but the rest of Cobb's season is up in the air after being hit in the head with a line drive.
Brett Gardner or Coco Crisp outperform Michael Bourn. Bill should have used this one above, as he would be on target even if he wrote AND instead of OR.
Overall: 1/5 so far, with a solid chance at 2/5 if Reynolds keeps hitting.
1) Casey Janssen doesn't get more than 5 saves this season, while Frieri grabs 40 and is a top 3 closer this year. Hard to claim credit on this one. The crux of the prediction was that Frieri was going to have a better season than many people though. He has, but not quite as good as I'd predicted, and Janssen has been even better.
2) JJ Hardy gets 600 ABs, hits 30 HR, and has a batting average greater than .270. This could actually fall my way, and all it would take would be for hardy to hold his current pace with a slight uptick in his batting average. He's hit .265 in 306 ABs, with 15 HR. He's been a fantastic, and inexpensive, fantasy shortstop and allowed me trade Elvis Andrus away for a nice return.
3) Joe Mauer misses enough of the season with various ailments to cause him to be just shy of qualifying for the batting title...which he would have won handily with his .340 batting average. Mauer is hitting .332...with a BABIP well above his career average and league norms. He hasn't missed any time, but IS 3rd in the running for the batting title so far. I don't think I'm gonna get this one.
4) Miguel Cabrera wins the batting title instead, and leads the league in HRs again. He misses out on the Triple Crown, as he finishes behind Prince Fielder in RBI. Projecting Fielder to beat Cabrera in RBI was foolish. Ignoring the 100 point difference in their batting averages, it's hard to compete for RBI with a guy who keeps clearing the bases in front of your at-bats. Not gonna happen.
5) Jason Hammel, Jarrod Parker, and Tommy Milone are all in the top 10 in voting for the Cy Young award, but none of them have a particularly strong campaign for the award as Hammel only wins 10 games, Parker doesn't get a ton of Ks, and no one knows who Tommy Milone is. David Price wins it instead. This, in a nutshell, is why my team has been so terrible this year. A projection of David Price winning the Cy Young seemed perfectly reasonable, and even that is not possibly happening. None of these guys will be sniffing the Cy Young award this year.
2) JJ Hardy gets 600 ABs, hits 30 HR, and has a batting average greater than .270. This could actually fall my way, and all it would take would be for hardy to hold his current pace with a slight uptick in his batting average. He's hit .265 in 306 ABs, with 15 HR. He's been a fantastic, and inexpensive, fantasy shortstop and allowed me trade Elvis Andrus away for a nice return.
3) Joe Mauer misses enough of the season with various ailments to cause him to be just shy of qualifying for the batting title...which he would have won handily with his .340 batting average. Mauer is hitting .332...with a BABIP well above his career average and league norms. He hasn't missed any time, but IS 3rd in the running for the batting title so far. I don't think I'm gonna get this one.
4) Miguel Cabrera wins the batting title instead, and leads the league in HRs again. He misses out on the Triple Crown, as he finishes behind Prince Fielder in RBI. Projecting Fielder to beat Cabrera in RBI was foolish. Ignoring the 100 point difference in their batting averages, it's hard to compete for RBI with a guy who keeps clearing the bases in front of your at-bats. Not gonna happen.
5) Jason Hammel, Jarrod Parker, and Tommy Milone are all in the top 10 in voting for the Cy Young award, but none of them have a particularly strong campaign for the award as Hammel only wins 10 games, Parker doesn't get a ton of Ks, and no one knows who Tommy Milone is. David Price wins it instead. This, in a nutshell, is why my team has been so terrible this year. A projection of David Price winning the Cy Young seemed perfectly reasonable, and even that is not possibly happening. None of these guys will be sniffing the Cy Young award this year.
Overall: I'm gonna give myself Hardy for now, and say I'm 1/5.
Anyone want to make any bold predictions for the 2nd half? Smoak for MVP?
6 comments:
Iwakuma wins the Cy Young!
I actually like Trout's chances best in HRs for getting that 2nd category. He's on pace for 26-27 right now, and his HR/FB rate is down to 14.8% compared to last year's 21.6%. Last year's number was probably higher than his "true skill," but his career rate is 18.2%. Assuming his current contact rate and FB% don't change, he'll hit 92-93 fly balls the rest of the way, and will need a HR/FB% of 19.5%. Pretty high, but doable. His HR/FB average distance is basically identicaly to 2012, and he's on pace to get a crap-ton more doubles and triples than he had last year. So he's still hitting the ball hard.
As for trying to score 73 runs in these final 83 games, well that comes down in large part to Mr. Pujols. Trout's gotten on base at about the same clip as last year, but nobody has been there to drive him in. Pujols hit much, much better during the final 139 games of 2012 than he has so far in 2013.
But who knows. Maybe Pujols lied about his age and he's actually 38 right now and is just falling off that aging curve cliff.
Also, Smoak is now the #17 1st baseman and climbing fast. In the last month he's hitting .320 with 5 HR. Of course, since he was so terrible he was cut month's ago, that gives Andrew little solace, I'm sure.
Maybe Smoak will be next year's Chris Davis. Haha.
Actually, I was kind of on the right track with Ichiro. He's hitting home runs at a significantly higher rate this year, he's just not getting enough plate appearances. His .0175 HR/PA this year is his highest since 2005, the year he hit 15. It's possible that he would be almost on his way toward fulfilling my prediction if only Girardi had put him at the top of the order all season.
After reaching base on 10 consecutive plate appearances, Mike Trout's average is up to .331! That means one of my bold predictions is on pace for truth!
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