2015 Rotation

[TruffleShuffle]

sounds like the secret sauce thing by BP (was it Silver?) which kyle says has been retracted

 

yeah, secret sauce was based on k-rate though. whatever i'm thinking of was based on velocity, not k-rate. plus i don't really understand what they're arguing in that article. yeah, 54% isn't significantly better than a coin flip, but from 2006 to 2009 there were only 28 playoff series. why would you take a formula that you thought might have been significant, based on like 2 decades of results, and then throw it away because it only gets 15 out of 28 right over the course of 4 seasons. maybe the secret sauce was garbage, but i don't see the harm in continuing to study its results, or to incorporate more or different variables in the sauce in trying to find a trend.

[Guest]

It might be better to look at regular season results. There is just too much noise in short series.

[sneakypower]

sounds like the secret sauce thing

http://tvbuzz.beamly.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/7/2014/06/sbtb9a.jpg

[Burt Macklin, FBI]

http://grantland.com/features/mlb-detroit-tigers-oakland-as-rotations/

 

Russell found that regular-season records were a significant predictor of postseason success. In other words, while playoff results are highly variable, they aren’t completely random: In any given five- or seven-game series, the better team can easily lose, but over a large sample of such series, team quality does tend to win out.

 

The next step was to see whether, for the purpose of predicting postseason results, every .600 (or .580, or .560, or .540) team is alike, or whether having good starting pitching adds an extra advantage. Russell examined the first three pitchers who started for each team in each series. He also looked at Game 1 starters only. No indicator of the quality of those starters (strikeout rate, walk rate, home run rate, ground ball rate, linear weights) proved to be a significant predictor of a team’s postseason success, after controlling for that club’s regular-season record.

 

I think the larger issue here is sample size more than anything.

[ChiCubsFan]

I'd like to see the data. Obviously with such a small sample size the difference has to be fairly large to be significant, but did they see any trends?

[Burt Macklin, FBI]

From the click-through article on BP, which is short and definitely worth a read:

 

However we sliced and diced the data, we couldn’t find any evidence that the strength of a team’s top starter alone helped dictate how it would do.

 

Over the years, a number of popular theories purporting to predict playoff success have been proposed and debunked. Do teams that “back into the playoffs” after a September swoon fall to the ones with momentum? No. Are teams that rely on home runs to score at a disadvantage in October? No. Does the quality of a team’s closer, its defense, or its staff’s strikeout rate offer any hints? Not likely.

 

The best predictor of how often a team will win in October is, intuitively enough, how often it’s won on the way there. The correlation between regular-season winning percentage and winning percentage in the playoffs is a healthier .28, which would likely rise even higher if we looked at underlying regular-season performance rather than overall record. A great starter’s contribution is already captured in that regular-season success, and it doesn’t add any extra information to assess it in isolation. While that might disappoint those hoping to peer further into the playoff future, it’s reassuring to know that the strengths that got a team to October will continue to serve it well once it’s there.

[snoodmonger]

From the click-through article on BP, which is short and definitely worth a read:

 

However we sliced and diced the data, we couldn’t find any evidence that the strength of a team’s top starter alone helped dictate how it would do.

 

Over the years, a number of popular theories purporting to predict playoff success have been proposed and debunked. Do teams that “back into the playoffs” after a September swoon fall to the ones with momentum? No. Are teams that rely on home runs to score at a disadvantage in October? No. Does the quality of a team’s closer, its defense, or its staff’s strikeout rate offer any hints? Not likely.

 

The best predictor of how often a team will win in October is, intuitively enough, how often it’s won on the way there. The correlation between regular-season winning percentage and winning percentage in the playoffs is a healthier .28, which would likely rise even higher if we looked at underlying regular-season performance rather than overall record. A great starter’s contribution is already captured in that regular-season success, and it doesn’t add any extra information to assess it in isolation. While that might disappoint those hoping to peer further into the playoff future, it’s reassuring to know that the strengths that got a team to October will continue to serve it well once it’s there.

 

When we lost to LA in the playoffs after having the second (I think) best record in baseball, were there underlying things that inflated our season record and should have suggested we were vulnerable, or were we just unlucky in the post-season? It feels like it was 20 years ago, and I don't have much recollection.

[Guest]

GR deleted his post because he was ashamed to have forgotten Hendricks

[Andy]

When we lost to LA in the playoffs after having the second (I think) best record in baseball, were there underlying things that inflated our season record and should have suggested we were vulnerable, or were we just unlucky in the post-season? It feels like it was 20 years ago, and I don't have much recollection.

No. The Cubs won 97 games and actually underperformed. They were the best team in baseball pretty easily and the fact that they lost 3 in a row to LA was pretty much a fluke.

 

Although my irrational side is still annoyed that we let Milwaukee surge into the playoffs when we would have faced the free-falling Mets if they hadn't.

[Burt Macklin, FBI]

When we lost to LA in the playoffs after having the second (I think) best record in baseball, were there underlying things that inflated our season record and should have suggested we were vulnerable, or were we just unlucky in the post-season? It feels like it was 20 years ago, and I don't have much recollection.

No. The Cubs won 97 games and actually underperformed. They were the best team in baseball pretty easily and the fact that they lost 3 in a row to LA was pretty much a fluke.

 

Although my irrational side is still annoyed that we let Milwaukee surge into the playoffs when we would have faced the free-falling Mets if they hadn't.

 

Pretty much. The Cubs had a +184 run differential. The Red Sox were second at 151, and Philly third at 119. They were absolutely the best team in baseball that year.

[Guest]

I could be wrong but I think that team even ranked fairly highly on the secret sauce too.

 

And in 07 I remember feeling really good because secret sauce loved us and the diamondbacks had a negative run differential.

[Proven Veteran]

I could be wrong but I think that team even ranked fairly highly on the secret sauce too.

 

And in 07 I remember feeling really good because secret sauce loved us and the diamondbacks had a negative run differential.

Yep, those two teams actually annoy me more than 2003. We should have gotten to see a least two more deep runs in the playoffs.

[Hairyducked Idiot]

We could have drafted Strasburg and instead we got Brett Jackson. I hope we never have the best team in baseball again.

[Guest]

We could have drafted Strasburg and instead we got Brett Jackson. I hope we never have the best team in baseball again.

Trout, dummy

[Tracer Bullet]

GR deleted his post because he was ashamed to have forgotten Hendricks

 

Sort of. I was in the midst of editing it when I got a call that quickly identified itself as not going to take "just a second" as the caller told me it would. So I just deleted the post rather than try to fix it.

 

I actually wanted to put Turner and Straily in the rotation, but I'm just not confident we can be that lucky and I'd really like to add McCarthy as I'm hoping Arizona was just stupid. Seems like counting on Turner, Straily, and Hendricks in 2015 is asking a little much. So Max, Arrieta, McCarthy, Turner, Straily with Hendricks at AAA waiting to fill one of the spots that open up when one of the last 3 doesn't pitch well?

[sneakypower]

at this point, i trust Straily and Turner just about as much as i do McCarthy

[weis21]

Lester

Arrieta

Maeda (or McCarthy)

Hendricks

Turner

 

Trade Wood and Jaxon.

 

AAA depth - Wada/Straily/Doubrant. Stretch out Grimm in AAA for additional depth and options.

[Vinestal]

I wouldn't be shocked if it was:

Lester

Arrieta

Turner

Straily

Hendricks

[Tangled Up in Plaid]

 

Scherzer

Lester

Arrieta

Hendricks

Turner/Straily/Doubront/Wada/Anyone but Wood or Jaxon

[Hairyducked Idiot]

We could have drafted Strasburg and instead we got Brett Jackson. I hope we never have the best team in baseball again.

Trout, dummy

 

We didn't employ Harold Reynolds, how would we have known to draft him?

[Guest]

We could have drafted Strasburg and instead we got Brett Jackson. I hope we never have the best team in baseball again.

Trout, dummy

 

We didn't employ Harold Reynolds, how would we have known to draft him?

 

well you said i hope we don't have the best team in baseball, not i hope we have the worst

[Hairyducked Idiot]

We could have drafted Strasburg and instead we got Brett Jackson. I hope we never have the best team in baseball again.

Trout, dummy

 

We didn't employ Harold Reynolds, how would we have known to draft him?

 

well you said i hope we don't have the best team in baseball, not i hope we have the worst

 

If you ain't first, you're last.

[Tangled Up in Plaid]

http://i.imgur.com/Odwp59h.gif

[Little Slide Rooter]

Arrieta, Turner, Hendricks, Wada, Doubront or Straily

 

We get all hot and bothered over Lester rumors only for the Yankees to sign him, and to learn weeks later that we never really had a chance.

 

Jackson to the pen, which makes a hell of a lot more sense then a $22MM bath.

 

Wood traded for something of use.

[Cubswin11]

Arrieta, Turner, Hendricks, Wada, Doubront or Straily

 

We get all hot and bothered over Lester rumors only for the Yankees to sign him, and to learn weeks later that we never really had a chance.

 

Jackson to the pen, which makes a hell of a lot more sense then a $22MM bath.

 

Wood traded for something of use.

If we go this route, which I don't think is unrealistic, what would the payroll look like? $70 million (since we probably aren't signing any significant offensive pieces)?