Dayn Perry's Power Rankings

[anemic offense]

Wow...I mean just wow....this guy is stupid (but I think we've already declared that about this guy numerous times on this board, possibly the dumbest sports writer in a national media outlet).

 

http://msn.foxsports.com/mlb/powerRankings

 

On a side note, does anyone else think this "AL is way better than the NL" stuff that is purveying in the sports media is stupid and unfounded, too? Personally, I'm tired of seeing it and hearing of it.

 

I said Perry was an idiot once and many here were asking why. I hope those same people wonder no more.

[Danny82]

i wouldn't put the tigers so high, but i don't know what's so terrible about his predictions. the cubs are a 90 loss team w/o wood and prior.

 

No, they're not. Not even close. We didn't have Wood and Prior for most of last year, and we didn't lose 90, and we're better this year.

 

you gotta be kidding me. they lost 83 last year when the two of them combined for 37 starts. you really think that if they started ZERO that the cubs wouldn't lose seven more games?

 

with this offense (and the fact that their replacements would be rusch/williams/hill/marshall) the cubs could lose 95-100 w/o those guys.

 

Even without Prior and Wood all year, the Cubs are nowhere near a 100 loss team.

 

For a frame of reference, no one in the entire NL lost more than 95 games last year.

[Soul]

Without Prior and Wood all year though? I could definitely see ranking us #22 in that case. Not sure we would lose 100 games, but we would definitely have a very shaky season barring some kind of miracle. We need those two, and it doesn't shock me in the least to see dire predictions in the wake of both being on the DL.

[anemic offense]

i wouldn't put the tigers so high, but i don't know what's so terrible about his predictions. the cubs are a 90 loss team w/o wood and prior.

 

No, they're not. Not even close. We didn't have Wood and Prior for most of last year, and we didn't lose 90, and we're better this year.

 

you gotta be kidding me. they lost 83 last year when the two of them combined for 37 starts. you really think that if they started ZERO that the cubs wouldn't lose seven more games?

 

with this offense (and the fact that their replacements would be rusch/williams/hill/marshall) the cubs could lose 95-100 w/o those guys.

 

Wow, that's JUST as ridiculous. This team had a TON of things go wrong last year in addition to their injuries. LF was a disaster for half a season, the bullpen was abysmal, LT faded, Nomah went down, Patterson was terrible, we had the worst 1-2 hitters in the entire major leagues, our bench didnt produce, and Aram missed some time. With the exceptions of Z, Lee, Barrett, and Dempster (and maybe Rusch) most everyting that could go wrong did, to the tune of winning obly 79 games.

 

Now if you can honestly sit here and profess this team didn't AT LEAST address most of the areas of concern your delusional. So some of the moves aren't great, but most are upgrades. A full season of Murton is an upgrade, Eyre and Howry should be upgrades, Pierre is a HUGE upgrade over Patterson (at least what we got last year), Cedeno (IMO) will be better than Neifi last year, our bench should be a little better (not by much). With all of these upgrades, nobody in their RIGHT mind can predict a 95 loss season. It's ridiculous. I guess it could happen, if Prior misses the entire season, Lee goes down, Aram goes down, Murton can't hit, our bullpen is worse than last year, Barrett goes down. Then again, I suppose the Cardinals could lose Pujols, Mulder, Carpernter, Izzy, Edmonds, and all their offseason moves prove fruitless, hell maybe they'll lose 95 games too. But trying to predict such an onslaught of injuries and ineffectiveness is nothing less than absurd. One just can't assume that degree of misfortune.

[stitchface]

assuming this team is the same aside from those two, I don't see them worth 17 wins last year. Additionally the Cubs had miserable luck last year. I don't think 100 wins is likely even without those two. I don't think Perry's article is really that bad. The Cardinals won 100 games the last two years and haven't lost that much. #5 seems quite reasonable.

[abuck1220]

 

Wow, that's JUST as ridiculous. This team had a TON of things go wrong last year in addition to their injuries. LF was a disaster for half a season, the bullpen was abysmal, LT faded, Nomah went down, Patterson was terrible, we had the worst 1-2 hitters in the entire major leagues, our bench didnt produce, and Aram missed some time. With the exceptions of Z, Lee, Barrett, and Dempster (and maybe Rusch) most everyting that could go wrong did, to the tune of winning obly 79 games.

 

Now if you can honestly sit here and profess this team didn't AT LEAST address most of the areas of concern your delusional. So some of the moves aren't great, but most are upgrades. A full season of Murton is an upgrade, Eyre and Howry should be upgrades, Pierre is a HUGE upgrade over Patterson (at least what we got last year), Cedeno (IMO) will be better than Neifi last year, our bench should be a little better (not by much). With all of these upgrades, nobody in their RIGHT mind can predict a 95 loss season. It's ridiculous. I guess it could happen, if Prior misses the entire season, Lee goes down, Aram goes down, Murton can't hit, our bullpen is worse than last year, Barrett goes down. Then again, I suppose the Cardinals could lose Pujols, Mulder, Carpernter, Izzy, Edmonds, and all their offseason moves prove fruitless, hell maybe they'll lose 95 games too. But trying to predict such an onslaught of injuries and ineffectiveness is nothing less than absurd. One just can't assume that degree of misfortune.

 

thanks for the insults (regardless of they were spelled correctly or not).

 

the article said that the cubs were a 90 loss team w/o prior and wood. i agreed. in fact, i think they could be a 95 loss team if they don't have either of those guys. they lost 83 last year (w/ those guys making 37 combined starts). i don't know how it's 'ridiculous' to say that if they made ZERO the cubs would lose a mere seven (or twelve) more games. in fact, to say that the idea that a prior and wood-less team could lose 90 games is ridiculous is, in itself, ridiculous.

[abuck1220]

i wouldn't put the tigers so high, but i don't know what's so terrible about his predictions. the cubs are a 90 loss team w/o wood and prior.

 

No, they're not. Not even close. We didn't have Wood and Prior for most of last year, and we didn't lose 90, and we're better this year.

 

you gotta be kidding me. they lost 83 last year when the two of them combined for 37 starts. you really think that if they started ZERO that the cubs wouldn't lose seven more games?

 

with this offense (and the fact that their replacements would be rusch/williams/hill/marshall) the cubs could lose 95-100 w/o those guys.

 

Even without Prior and Wood all year, the Cubs are nowhere near a 100 loss team.

 

For a frame of reference, no one in the entire NL lost more than 95 games last year.

 

well, not many teams had a back end of a rotation as bad as maddux, rusch, williams, and marshall could be.

 

they probably wouldn't lose 100 w/o prior and wood, but it'd be a miracle if they lost less than 92-95.

[Jehrico]

i wouldn't put the tigers so high, but i don't know what's so terrible about his predictions. the cubs are a 90 loss team w/o wood and prior.

 

No, they're not. Not even close. We didn't have Wood and Prior for most of last year, and we didn't lose 90, and we're better this year.

 

you gotta be kidding me. they lost 83 last year when the two of them combined for 37 starts. you really think that if they started ZERO that the cubs wouldn't lose seven more games?

 

with this offense (and the fact that their replacements would be rusch/williams/hill/marshall) the cubs could lose 95-100 w/o those guys.

 

Even without Prior and Wood all year, the Cubs are nowhere near a 100 loss team.

 

For a frame of reference, no one in the entire NL lost more than 95 games last year.

 

well, not many teams had a back end of a rotation as bad as maddux, rusch, williams, and marshall could be.

 

they probably wouldn't lose 100 w/o prior and wood, but it'd be a miracle if they lost less than 92-95.

 

It'd be a culmination of alot of things going wrong for them to lose 90 without them. Miller will be back in the rotation probably around late April or early May. Their win-loss record was worse last year than it should be if you judge by runs scored vs runs allowed. The offense, while still severely lacking, is better. The bullpen, is much improved. You point to the possibility that Murton and Cedeno might fail, hence your pessimism. Murton's worst case scenario would still be better than the garbage we got from Holla/Dubose/Gerut/Lawton last year. If Cedeno fails, then we're stuck with Neifi, which is a wash with last year. Our staff is better without Prior and Wood than it was without them last year. There's no reason to expect this team could lose 90 games. Everything went wrong last year and they still were in the running for .500 until the last week, and we're better this year, whether Wood or Prior make that many starts or not. What we need Wood and Prior for are to win the division, we won't do that without them.

[anemic offense]

 

Wow, that's JUST as ridiculous. This team had a TON of things go wrong last year in addition to their injuries. LF was a disaster for half a season, the bullpen was abysmal, LT faded, Nomah went down, Patterson was terrible, we had the worst 1-2 hitters in the entire major leagues, our bench didnt produce, and Aram missed some time. With the exceptions of Z, Lee, Barrett, and Dempster (and maybe Rusch) most everyting that could go wrong did, to the tune of winning obly 79 games.

 

Now if you can honestly sit here and profess this team didn't AT LEAST address most of the areas of concern your delusional. So some of the moves aren't great, but most are upgrades. A full season of Murton is an upgrade, Eyre and Howry should be upgrades, Pierre is a HUGE upgrade over Patterson (at least what we got last year), Cedeno (IMO) will be better than Neifi last year, our bench should be a little better (not by much). With all of these upgrades, nobody in their RIGHT mind can predict a 95 loss season. It's ridiculous. I guess it could happen, if Prior misses the entire season, Lee goes down, Aram goes down, Murton can't hit, our bullpen is worse than last year, Barrett goes down. Then again, I suppose the Cardinals could lose Pujols, Mulder, Carpernter, Izzy, Edmonds, and all their offseason moves prove fruitless, hell maybe they'll lose 95 games too. But trying to predict such an onslaught of injuries and ineffectiveness is nothing less than absurd. One just can't assume that degree of misfortune.

 

thanks for the insults (regardless of they were spelled correctly or not).

 

the article said that the cubs were a 90 loss team w/o prior and wood. i agreed. in fact, i think they could be a 95 loss team if they don't have either of those guys. they lost 83 last year (w/ those guys making 37 combined starts). i don't know how it's 'ridiculous' to say that if they made ZERO the cubs would lose a mere seven (or twelve) more games. in fact, to say that the idea that a prior and wood-less team could lose 90 games is ridiculous is, in itself, ridiculous.

 

Again you're missing the point! Sure the team lost 83 games last year, but its ridiculous to say all the team's futility was generated solely by our pitcher's absences. Now I don't discredit the amount of games a healthy Prior and Wood are worth. What I do find mind-boggling, is how the improvements in other areas of the team aren't factored into the win total.

 

The improvements this team has made should be worth AT LEAST 7 games (and I'm being ultra conservative here). So if the Cubs don't have Prior and Wood for the whole season (assuming other huge disasters don't occur), this team shouldn't lose 95, or even 90 games. At worst I'd say 83-87. Then again, I didn't think we would have encountered all the misfortunes and poor performances (outside of Wood and Prior) we saw last year either.

[anemic offense]

thanks for the insults (regardless of they were spelled correctly or not).

 

BTW, I wasn't trying to insult you, I was simply targeting your post (sorry if it came across as otherwise.

 

Oh, and the insults WERE spelled correctly. :D

[anemic offense]

i wouldn't put the tigers so high, but i don't know what's so terrible about his predictions. the cubs are a 90 loss team w/o wood and prior.

 

No, they're not. Not even close. We didn't have Wood and Prior for most of last year, and we didn't lose 90, and we're better this year.

 

you gotta be kidding me. they lost 83 last year when the two of them combined for 37 starts. you really think that if they started ZERO that the cubs wouldn't lose seven more games?

 

with this offense (and the fact that their replacements would be rusch/williams/hill/marshall) the cubs could lose 95-100 w/o those guys.

 

Even without Prior and Wood all year, the Cubs are nowhere near a 100 loss team.

 

For a frame of reference, no one in the entire NL lost more than 95 games last year.

 

well, not many teams had a back end of a rotation as bad as maddux, rusch, williams, and marshall could be.

 

they probably wouldn't lose 100 w/o prior and wood, but it'd be a miracle if they lost less than 92-95.

 

It'd be a culmination of alot of things going wrong for them to lose 90 without them. Miller will be back in the rotation probably around late April or early May. Their win-loss record was worse last year than it should be if you judge by runs scored vs runs allowed. The offense, while still severely lacking, is better. The bullpen, is much improved. You point to the possibility that Murton and Cedeno might fail, hence your pessimism. Murton's worst case scenario would still be better than the garbage we got from Holla/Dubose/Gerut/Lawton last year. If Cedeno fails, then we're stuck with Neifi, which is a wash with last year. Our staff is better without Prior and Wood than it was without them last year. There's no reason to expect this team could lose 90 games. Everything went wrong last year and they still were in the running for .500 until the last week, and we're better this year, whether Wood or Prior make that many starts or not. What we need Wood and Prior for are to win the division, we won't do that without them.

 

Good post. That's what I was trying to convey earlier.

[abuck1220]

where did this woe is me, everything that could have went wrong did theory come from?

 

barrett and neifi had career years. lee hit 60+ points above his career average. ramirez (when healthy) was better than his career #'s. dempster had been mediocre at best before catching fire last year. ohman, wuertz, novoa all exceeded expectations. murton, while he was up, played amazingly well.

 

quit acting like the only reason the cubs fared so poorly last year was because they were sooooo terribly burdened w/ bad luck.

[stitchface]

the word is ridiculous. 7 wins added this year? Not sure about that.

[abuck1220]

also, you guys seem to be assuming that everything that went right for the cubs last year (cedeno, murton, lee, ramirez, dempster, ohman, wuertz) wasn't a fluke, but everything that went poorly last season (expected W/L, injuries, pierre's performance) was just the result of bad luck and will reverse course this year.

[abuck1220]

 

The improvements this team has made should be worth AT LEAST 7 games (and I'm being ultra conservative here). So if the Cubs don't have Prior and Wood for the whole season (assuming other huge disasters don't occur), this team shouldn't lose 95, or even 90 games. At worst I'd say 83-87. Then again, I didn't think we would have encountered all the misfortunes and poor performances (outside of Wood and Prior) we saw last year either.

 

so you're saying that group A (jones, pierre, eyre, howry, rusch and marshall) are not only as good as group B (burnitz, corey, remlinger, hawkins, prior and wood), but are SEVEN WINS BETTER?

 

now who's being ridiculous?

[Warpticon]

Quoth Dan:

 

Of course, Gonzalez has failed to adapt to the Triple-A level despite repeated attempts.

 

Adrian Gonzalez at AAA last year: .338/.399/.561

[Jehrico]

 

The improvements this team has made should be worth AT LEAST 7 games (and I'm being ultra conservative here). So if the Cubs don't have Prior and Wood for the whole season (assuming other huge disasters don't occur), this team shouldn't lose 95, or even 90 games. At worst I'd say 83-87. Then again, I didn't think we would have encountered all the misfortunes and poor performances (outside of Wood and Prior) we saw last year either.

 

so you're saying that group A (jones, pierre, eyre, howry, rusch and marshall) are not only as good as group B (burnitz, corey, remlinger, hawkins, prior and wood), but are SEVEN WINS BETTER?

 

now who's being ridiculous?

 

I don't see where anyone is writing that.

 

Back to the argument, if you're confident in your prediction that we're a 90 loss club, then let's make a wager. If they lose 90 games this year, I'll buy you a year of premium. If we're .500 or above, you owe me a year of premium. Anything in the middle, and no one owes anything.

[XZero771679666304]

 

The improvements this team has made should be worth AT LEAST 7 games (and I'm being ultra conservative here). So if the Cubs don't have Prior and Wood for the whole season (assuming other huge disasters don't occur), this team shouldn't lose 95, or even 90 games. At worst I'd say 83-87. Then again, I didn't think we would have encountered all the misfortunes and poor performances (outside of Wood and Prior) we saw last year either.

 

so you're saying that group A (jones, pierre, eyre, howry, rusch and marshall) are not only as good as group B (burnitz, corey, remlinger, hawkins, prior and wood), but are SEVEN WINS BETTER?

 

now who's being ridiculous?

 

Do you remember how bad the bullpen was last year, how many games it cost us? Yes, the bullpen additions make us 5-7 wins better. Also, having Pierre leading off (even if he repeats his 2005 numbers) is a HUGE boon to the offense, and will add runs.

 

Murton > Holla/Gerut/Lawton

Jones +/> Burnitz

Pierre >>>>>> CPatt

Howry/Williamson/Eyre/Dempster >>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>Remlinger/Wuertz/Novoa/Hawkins

2006 bench > 2005 bench

 

 

Wuertz and Ohman will not have nearly as much pressure on them, and the contrast between last year's pen and this on could not be more stark. Not only that, but if Wood and Prior do not return, Guzman, Williams and Miller will be waiting in the wings all year, not Mitre, Koronka & Co.

 

Will Lee regress? Most probably. To his pre-2005 numbers? Probably not. Plus, I don't think Ramirez will miss a month again (as he is in the best shape he has been in with the Cubs), and his added offense will probably negate Lee's decline over the course of a full season. Walker probably won't miss a month again, either. And we can't forget Macias won't be the primary PH anymore, which will make a difference.

 

I think the pessimist's probable scenario is that Wood/Prior give 2/3 of the combined innings they pitches last year. Even given that, We would likely have a rotation of Zambrano/Maddux/Rusch/Williams/Guzman or Zambrano/Maddux/Rusch/Miller/Guzman or Williams for most of the year (Marshall will make a maximum of 3 starts, IMO). Both are repectable rotations, not great, but not bad. Combine that with the offensive and bullpen improvements, even if we had to go the whole year in that scenario, no way do we lose 90 games. No freaking way.

 

In order to lose 90+, Wood and Prior would have to miss nearly the whole year, Pierre would have to regress again, and Lee or Ramirez would have to miss significant time, and Dempster would have to fall apart.

 

And even if Dempster fell apart, we have an ex-closer in Williamson, who unlike Hawkins, was very good in that role.

 

I think in the worst probable scenario, the Cubs lose 82-87 games.

[abuck1220]

 

The improvements this team has made should be worth AT LEAST 7 games (and I'm being ultra conservative here). So if the Cubs don't have Prior and Wood for the whole season (assuming other huge disasters don't occur), this team shouldn't lose 95, or even 90 games. At worst I'd say 83-87. Then again, I didn't think we would have encountered all the misfortunes and poor performances (outside of Wood and Prior) we saw last year either.

 

so you're saying that group A (jones, pierre, eyre, howry, rusch and marshall) are not only as good as group B (burnitz, corey, remlinger, hawkins, prior and wood), but are SEVEN WINS BETTER?

 

now who's being ridiculous?

 

I don't see where anyone is writing that.

 

Back to the argument, if you're confident in your prediction that we're a 90 loss club, then let's make a wager. If they lose 90 games this year, I'll buy you a year of premium. If we're .500 or above, you owe me a year of premium. Anything in the middle, and no one owes anything.

 

dude, have you even read my posts? i said they were a 90 loss team IF PRIOR AND WOOD MISS THE WHOLE SEASON.

[abuck1220]

 

Even given that, We would likely have a rotation of Zambrano/Maddux/Rusch/Williams/Guzman or Zambrano/Maddux/Rusch/Miller/Guzman or Williams for most of the year (Marshall will make a maximum of 3 starts, IMO). Both are repectable rotations, not great, but not bad. Combine that with the offensive and bullpen improvements, even if we had to go the whole year in that scenario, no way do we lose 90 games. No freaking way.

 

I think in the worst probable scenario, the Cubs lose 82-87 games.

 

those rotations are bad. i think we're going to have to agree to disagree, b/c those rotations are terrible (unless guzman experiences NO growing pains and is able to throw 180 injury free innings).

 

the cubs lost 83 last year w/ prior and wood making 37 starts. if they make ZERO this year, i don't see how the cubs' worst case scenario for them in 2006 can be losing 83 again. jones, eyre, pierre, and howry aren't big enough upgrades to counter the loss of 37 starts from two great starting pitchers.

[anemic offense]

the word is ridiculous. 7 wins added this year? Not sure about that.

 

Thanks for the spell check :lol: .

[Drew Doughty]

 

Even given that, We would likely have a rotation of Zambrano/Maddux/Rusch/Williams/Guzman or Zambrano/Maddux/Rusch/Miller/Guzman or Williams for most of the year (Marshall will make a maximum of 3 starts, IMO). Both are repectable rotations, not great, but not bad. Combine that with the offensive and bullpen improvements, even if we had to go the whole year in that scenario, no way do we lose 90 games. No freaking way.

 

I think in the worst probable scenario, the Cubs lose 82-87 games.

 

those rotations are bad. i think we're going to have to agree to disagree, b/c those rotations are terrible (unless guzman experiences NO growing pains and is able to throw 180 injury free innings).

 

the cubs lost 83 last year w/ prior and wood making 37 starts. if they make ZERO this year, i don't see how the cubs' worst case scenario for them in 2006 can be losing 83 again. jones, eyre, pierre, and howry aren't big enough upgrades to counter the loss of 37 starts from two great starting pitchers.

 

Yeah, but they're upgrades. I don't know how this team is worse than last year in any likely scenario.

[Jehrico]

 

The improvements this team has made should be worth AT LEAST 7 games (and I'm being ultra conservative here). So if the Cubs don't have Prior and Wood for the whole season (assuming other huge disasters don't occur), this team shouldn't lose 95, or even 90 games. At worst I'd say 83-87. Then again, I didn't think we would have encountered all the misfortunes and poor performances (outside of Wood and Prior) we saw last year either.

 

so you're saying that group A (jones, pierre, eyre, howry, rusch and marshall) are not only as good as group B (burnitz, corey, remlinger, hawkins, prior and wood), but are SEVEN WINS BETTER?

 

now who's being ridiculous?

 

I don't see where anyone is writing that.

 

Back to the argument, if you're confident in your prediction that we're a 90 loss club, then let's make a wager. If they lose 90 games this year, I'll buy you a year of premium. If we're .500 or above, you owe me a year of premium. Anything in the middle, and no one owes anything.

 

dude, have you even read my posts? i said they were a 90 loss team IF PRIOR AND WOOD MISS THE WHOLE SEASON.

 

Yes, I read it, and I still think you're delusional. However, neither are going to miss the whole season, so it'd be a stupid thing to bet on. We got 37 starts out of them last year, but most of those starts by Wood were not Wood quality starts. Prior was only himself about half of his starts. We got what, maybe 12-15 quality starts out of them? They're 37 starts weren't any better last year than what we could reasonably expect out of Miller/Marshall/Guzman/whoever else picks up the slack this year. Add to that that we should have won more than we did last year, we didn't lose 90 last year, and the whole team is improved as a whole, 90 losses, with or without Wood and Prior isn't going to happen.

[abuck1220]

once again, you guys are assuming that everything that went wrong last year was merely bad luck and will reverse itself this year. and everything that went right was not a fluke and will repeat itself.

 

wood and prior missing the whole season won't likely happen, so this argument is pretty meaningless. you may disagree w/ me that missing your #2 and #3 starter for the entire season will cost you seven games, but it's going too far to say that this makes me delusional.

 

and i realize that the team has made upgrades. but i don't think the improvement added thru jones, pierre, howry, eyre, mabry, pagan, and bynum are that substantial, especially when you consider the possible/probable regression of guys like lee.

[anemic offense]

 

The improvements this team has made should be worth AT LEAST 7 games (and I'm being ultra conservative here). So if the Cubs don't have Prior and Wood for the whole season (assuming other huge disasters don't occur), this team shouldn't lose 95, or even 90 games. At worst I'd say 83-87. Then again, I didn't think we would have encountered all the misfortunes and poor performances (outside of Wood and Prior) we saw last year either.

 

so you're saying that group A (jones, pierre, eyre, howry, rusch and marshall) are not only as good as group B (burnitz, corey, remlinger, hawkins, prior and wood), but are SEVEN WINS BETTER?

 

now who's being ridiculous?

 

XZero did a superb job of rating the upgrades, but this is how I'd rate this team in comparison to last year's team.

 

Pierre - Huge upgrade over Patterson

Murton - Huge upgrade over LFers from last year

Jones - About the same (albeit in different areas) as Burny

Lee - Slight regression. He DID fix a hole in his swing, therefore I'm not expecting it to be sifnificant.

Aram - About the same as last year, maybe a little better. An entire year of his production should help immmensely.

Barrett - Same as last year.

Cedeno - I expect an improvement over Neifi, although this is far from certain. For arguments sake I'll say he'll give equal offensive production (which shouldn't be hard to do)

2B - It all depends on who gets the most playing time. However I'd think it would be comparabel to last year's production.

 

On the overall for offensive production, we've got roughly 4 washes, 1 slight regression (more BA than anything else), one slight improvement (give more ARam), and huge two upgrades. More importantly, we FINALLY have guys who are capable of scoring runs for our big boppers. This unit pry won't be in the top 4 in RS in the NL, but they should score considerably more than last year. Thus this year's offensive team should be much improved. I'd expect this lineup to be worth at least an exta 5 wins.

 

Dempster - Might not have quite the season of last year, but I don't think his performance was a fluke. Should be about the same with maybe a slight regression.

Eyre - Should be a huge upgrade over last year's performers

Howry - Another upgrade over last year.

Rest of pen - I think they'll be better as well but I'll be conservative and say a wash.

 

Although the bullpen is often the biggest crapshoot in all of sports, I can't imagine the pen being as bad as it was last year. It looks as though we'll finally have some competent setup men capable of getting the games to Dempster. This should be worth at least 3-4 games (and that's being conservative with all the games they blew for us last year) and possibly more depending on the rest of the pen.

 

Zambrano - I expect a slight improvement over last year. Won't have the uncharcteristic meltdowns he experienced last season. With an improved offesne/bullpen he'll win 20 games.

Rusch - I think he'll be competent, but if anyone played out of his mind last year it was him. I expect a moderate regression.

Maddux - Supposedly he's in better shape, but I'm not expecting that to have a lot of bearing on his performance. He should be about the same as he was last year.

Marshall - I think he'll be better than Mitre and company. But for argument's sake I'll say a wash.

Jerome/Guzman - One of these guys will emerge for good and give us what Jerome gave us last year.

 

Assuming Prior and Wood make absolutely ZERO starts this year, I think the staff will at least be pretty comparable to what we got in their absense last year. Prior's loss would be huge, but I don't think Wood's loss would hurt us all that much (I don't think he's pitched all that well since the 2003 playoffs). For now, I'll assume the loss of these two (mainly Prior) will account for an 8 game loss (could be more could be less).

 

Adding up the extra wins/losses, and this year's team would figure to be about a wash with last year's team with Prior and Wood absent (and I'm being conservatively pessimistic). Being estimations aren't perfect, I'll say the margin of error is a +- 4 games, which would put the win total between 75 and 83 wins.

 

Although you may disagree with what I have above I don't think it can be labeled ridiculous. If anything, I think I was fairly conservative.