Brewers Predictions 2013

[Warning Track Power]

Despite that prediction...a playoff spot is still a possibility for the Brewers. The team has a much wider band of probability than normal, depending on their pitching. 90 wins wouldn't shock me...neither would 70.

I agree with a majority of this post, I just don't agree with the Brewers low end prediction. Even if the rotation implodes, the worst I can see the Brewers being with this offense is a 77 win team. If the rotation pitches to its talent level, I could very easily see a 91 win team. Given the 14 win differential, the Brewers definitely have a wide range in what they could be. I for one feel like they will split the difference and be more towards the good hence the 86 win prediction I made earlier.

[SoCal Brew Crew Fan]

It would take more than just the starters imploding to get the low end. Regressions and/or aging among the position players like Hart, Ramirez or Gomez are certainly a possibility. Weakness in the starters feeding into a suspect bullpen that gets Macha-ed out. The division getting stronger at the bottom end with the Cubs a little better and the Astros gone. The NL in general will be stronger this year. Again, not predicting it...it just wouldn't shock me to see a rough year.

 

I'm not going to spend too much time defending the bear case (just acknowledging it exists). Being a negative Nelly is bad for my psyche...and I am genuinely excited and interested in this year's team.

[Warning Track Power]

It would take more than just the starters imploding to get the low end. Regressions and/or aging among the position players like Hart, Ramirez or Gomez are certainly a possibility. Weakness in the starters feeding into a suspect bullpen that gets Macha-ed out. The division getting stronger at the bottom end with the Cubs a little better and the Astros gone. The NL in general will be stronger this year. Again, not predicting it...it just wouldn't shock me to see a rough year.

 

I'm not going to spend too much time defending the bear case (just acknowledging it exists). Being a negative Nelly is bad for my psyche...and I am genuinely excited and interested in this year's team.

I hear you SoCal, I just don't think the type of aging/regression you speak of is likely or possible. Hart & Ramirez would have to regress to a point not seen in their careers for this to be a 70 win team. I don't think Hart is a good candidate for this yet as he is only going to be 31 and it is doubtful Ramirez will fall completely off the cliff even at 35.

 

Injuries for sure could make this a 70 win team, but even with career worst seasons from everyone in the lineup, I still think this is a 75 win team at rock bottom.

[monty57]

Baseball Prospectus projects the Brewers to go 78-84

 

http://www.baseballprospectus.com/fantasy/dc/index.php

 

A "complete implosion" by the starters would certainly lead to a pretty poor season. I don't think our worst case scenario is 77 wins... that's the low end of our "expected performance."

 

As Ennder and others have said, this season has a high variance due to an untested and untouted starting rotation. I believe we're probably around a .500 "talent level" team. If our starting pitchers don't play well, it will be a long season fighting with the Cubs for last place. If they prove that the second half of last season was no fluke, we could be in the playoffs.

 

The optimist in me wants to believe this is a playoff team, while the realist in me knows not to expect it.

[trwi7]

Diamondbacks with a better record than the Braves and the Astros not losing at least 105 is pretty ballsy and pretty inaccurate imo.

[Warning Track Power]

Baseball Prospectus projects the Brewers to go 78-84

 

http://www.baseballprospectus.com/fantasy/dc/index.php

 

A "complete implosion" by the starters would certainly lead to a pretty poor season. I don't think our worst case scenario is 77 wins... that's the low end of our "expected performance."

84 wins gets you into the playoffs this year in the NL as the second Wild Card if they are right (Cards or Diamondbacks). That would shock me. As I see it right now, the Nationals, Braves, Dodgers, Giants are 90+ win teams, with the Reds, Cardinals, Brewers, Phillies, Diamondbacks and maybe the Pirates fighting for 85-90 wins themselves.

[Ennder]

Cairo has us at 78 wins too. Keep in mind that is under the assumption that we have the 3rd worst pitching in the NL and 8th most allowed runs including the AL. The projection system is already projecting the pitching to be awful. Projections hate young guys in general and I'm sure it is fleshing out innings with minor league guys at 5+ ERA each.

 

Also these are heavily regressed so there will always be teams that beat the projections. I'm not sure I'd feel safe projecting the Braves or Giants for 90 wins. The Giants had a historic hot streak late in the season to reach it last year and the Braves are a weaker team than they were last year.

 

I looked into Cairo since it is free.

 

138 IP of Rogers at a 5.58 ERA and 80 IP of Stinsen at a 5.18, 140 innings of Peralta at a 4.64 look to be the main culprits for the bad pitching. Henderson and Narveson adding another 155 IP of 4.35ish ERA. It actually liked Fiers and Estrada to be sub 4 ERA. Best ERA it projected was Axford and that was a 3.41. SO yeah if we have multiple guys over a 5 ERA, a huge chunk of our innings from mid 4 ERA guys and nobody else takes a step up we will only win 78.

[pitchleague]

knowing a lot can change in spring training . . . .

 

Record: 85-76 (1 rainout that won't be made up--I think I predict this every year)

Finish: 2nd, but no wild card, finish 6 out of WC

All Stars: Braun, Weeks, Aoki

Surprises: Mike Gonzalez, Tom Gorzellany, heck the entire bullpen. Hunter Morris, too.

Disappointments: A-Ram, Segura (relatively speaking), Narveson

World Series: Nationals vs. Tigers, who lose another one.

[Warning Track Power]

Also these are heavily regressed so there will always be teams that beat the projections. I'm not sure I'd feel safe projecting the Braves or Giants for 90 wins. The Giants had a historic hot streak late in the season to reach it last year and the Braves are a weaker team than they were last year.

While I agree with you about feeling "safe" picking the Giants or the Braves to win 90 (I don't feel safe, but I am more than 50-50 they will) your prediction of 85 wins for the Brewers in the thread earlier means you must be pretty down on both the Giants and Braves. Just in my view:

 

The Giants have averaged 90 wins for four years running now and they now have arguably the best lineup of those 4 years to match with their outstanding staff. Improvements by the Dodgers could limit their 90 win potential, but I think those could be matched by Arizona's potential downgrade.

 

The Braves on the other hand have a lineup on par with or better than the Brewers and have a bullpen and starting rotation much stronger than the Brewers. Going into the season, I think the Braves are significantly better than the Brewers. This isn't to say the Brewers young SP won't be as good as they were late in 2012, just that the Braves SP are more known quantities going into 2013 and are good.

 

I am definitely not trying to be a downer here, I just think you may be understimating the Giants and Braves.

[Ennder]

I don't really care for the Braves rotation. Hudson is always an injury risk and he is showing signs of age. Medlen's year seems completely unsustainable. Minor is erratic at best. Maholm has had back to back decent years but the peripherals don't support it. Teheran is a completely untested rookie. Their bullpen is definitely better than the Brewers though. Like their worst RP is probably better than our best~.

 

I don't think the Giants have a good lineup and the Diamondbacks have a better team this year than they did last year by at least 3 wins.

[ewitkows]

I think we are going to struggle out of the gate with Corey out and Aram is usually a slow starter. Not sure what to expect out of the pitching staff. I think we end up in the 78-80 win range

[Ennder]

I think we are going to struggle out of the gate with Corey out and Aram is usually a slow starter. Not sure what to expect out of the pitching staff. I think we end up in the 78-80 win range

 

That could very reasonably happen. Usually young SP have the advantage the first few times a team faces them, I think we have to hope that they come out strong and carry us early.

[pogokat]

Record 83-79

Division: 3rd

All Stars: Braun, Axford

Surprises: Marco throws 200 quality innings, Morris winds up getting 300 ab's

Disappointments: the aging core starts spending a lot of time on the dl, with Hart, Weeks, and Ramirez missing at least a month apiece, Fiers falls apart, and Rogers washes back out to sea

World Series: Laa over La in an all laa la world series

[SenatorShriv]

Record: 83-79

Division: 3rd

All Stars: Braun, Weeks

Surprises: Weeks, Segura, Olmsted

Disappointments: Aoki, Fiers, Hart

 

If Weeks stays healthy he always has the potential to have a big year, but I think that staying healthy and hitting like we know he can would qualify as a surprise.

 

I've got an uneasy feeling about Aoki and Hart matching past numbers.

 

I just think that there will be a lot of ups and downs / inconsistent performances from our starting pitchers. We've got a lot of guys who are more than capable of throwing 7 solid innings one night and then getting shelled the next. Hard to put together a playoff season with that.

 

edit: Should have added that I like Olmsted's chances of succeeding in the bullpen. Melvin seems to hit with these scrap heap hard throwers pretty regularly.

[RobDeer 45]

Man I'm having a hard time trying to make a prediction because there is so much up in the air with the rotation. I feel a safe call is 85 wins. I can see that swinging either way by 5. I guess I take 85 wins because it's in the middle for me. I'm not sure that gets us anywhere but hopefully it keeps baseball interesting until late in the year.

[Fear The Chorizo]

Record 86-76 (2nd wildcard)

Division 2nd (Reds win)

All stars - Braun, Weeks, Gallardo

Surprises - Narveson, Gomez, Axford

Disappointments - 1B (Hart and everyone replacing him), Fiers

World series - flip a coin (Al) vs flip a coin (NL)

 

The Reds are the class of the NL central, but they have warts. The Cardinals arguably have more question marks with their rotation than the Brewers currently do with Carpenter out and other injury question marks with Garcia and Miller. Not having the Astros around to beat on for 17ish games and facing decent Cub pitching will make things more difficult to pad win totals within the division, though.

 

I see some of the young Brewer starters solidifying the rotation, and there's enough rotation depth and flexibility to keep the bullpen from burning out. Offense will be solid, and overall this will be a very entertaining season for the Brewers.

[TooLiveBrew]

Man I'm having a hard time trying to make a prediction because there is so much up in the air with the rotation. I feel a safe call is 85 wins. I can see that swinging either way by 5. I guess I take 85 wins because it's in the middle for me. I'm not sure that gets us anywhere but hopefully it keeps baseball interesting until late in the year.

This is exactly how I feel.

 

As for the other stuff --

 

All-Stars: Braun, Gallardo, Lucroy

Disappointments: Hart, Estrada, Ramírez, Fiers

Surprises: Bianchi, Bullpen, Khrush Davis, Green, Schafer

World Series: Braves/Nats v. Angels/Rangers

 

Disappointments: I think Hart is going to re-injure himself, and Ramírez will as well (paired with slightly less gaudy offense). Fiers won't be terrible, but will not replicate his '12 numbers; thinking more like a 4.50 ERA.

 

Surprises: In short, I think these younger hitters will get PAs & begin to show what they can do. Schafer's defense alone is going to 'wow' your casual Brewers fan. Kintzler is one guy in particular in the bullpen that could surprise, now that he's healthy again. Overall in the 'pen, there appears to be a good number of guys with big upside. I didn't include Peralta in this category, since success in the bigs wouldn't be that surprising imo.

[jjkoestler]

Record: 77-85

Division: 3rd (Reds, Pirates, Brewers, Cards, Cubs)

All Stars: Braun (Luc puts up all star numbers but get snubbed due to Posey and Neck Tattoo)

Disappointments: Hart (Injured), Starting pitching not named Yo,

Surprises: The bullpen, Weeks

World Series: Nats over Blue Jays

[RightFieldCoder]

Record: 77-85

Division: 4th (Cards, Reds, Pirates, Brewers, Cubs)

All Stars: Bruan

Disappointments: Pitching, RRR

Surprises: We trade none of our players because we are "still in it" at the deadline, By the end of the year the Brewers will be the Pirates whipping boy

World Series: Angels over Dodgers

[Ennder]

We trade none of our players because we are "still in it" at the deadline, By the end of the year the Brewers will be the Pirates whipping boy

 

Hart and Gomez are really the only candidates we have for trading and since Hart is starting the year hurt he likely won't have much value. The Pirates have been about to pass us in the standings for like 5 years now apparently, never happens. They are still a few years away as they have too much junk on the roster and they need that next wave of pitching to show up to have much hope.

[MJLiverock]

Record: 77-85

Division:3/4th (Reds win division by at least 7 games, with Cardinals 2nd and Pirates Brewers in general record )

All Stars: Braun

Disappointments: Rotation in general is very inconsistent and young guys wear down at year end. Offense takes a step back as the guys like Braun,Aoki, Ramirez, Hart and Lucroy can't quite duplicate last year's success and the bench remains terrible.

Surprises: Gomez duplicates last year and Weeks gets back on track.

World Series: Angels over Dodgers

[Outlander]

Record: 86-75

Division: 2nd (Reds) but no playoffs

All Stars: Braun/Ramirez

Disappointments: Aoki, Weeks

Surprises: Henderson, Hart

World Series: Nats over Angels

[Dnye23]

Record: 89-73

Division: 2nd (Reds)

All stars: Braun & Weeks

Surprises: Henderson, Gomez, Estrada

Disappointments: anyone the plays 1B, Fiers (sophomore slump)

World series: Toronto over Detroit

[stoutdude04]

Toronto over Detroit eh?

 

78-84

3rd

All Star : Braun

Surprise : Weeks

Disappointment : Aramis, and Aoki

WS : LAA over Det

[Warning Track Power]

3 pages in. If my count is correct, 31 record predictions and the average is for the Brewers to finish 83-79.