Good news and bad for teams missing playoffs

The last two teams eliminated this year from playoff contention have two different stories to tell. The Seattle Mariners made a big move up after years of straggling in the AL West. The Milwaukee Brewers made an even bigger move up in the NL Central, but they then made a huge move down, casting themselves as the most unfortunate flops of the regular season.

Ryan Braun's production disappeared during the last weeks of the season, and the Milwaukee Brewers are missing the playoffs after leading the National League Central for much of the year (Johnmaxmena2/Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 4.0 International license).

By BILL PETERSON

Big Leagues in Los Angeles

The playoff races just finished advanced ten clubs to the postseason, and it also eliminated a few. 

The two that lasted the longest before going away were the Seattle Mariners in the American League and the Milwaukee Brewers in the National League. Each, therefore, has a sad story to tell, but the Mariners still can spin the outcome positively, and the Brewers can't.

The Mariners made absolutely no sense signing free agent Robinson Cano for 10 years at $240 million, considering how many holes they had to fill in their offensive lineup. But Cano produced a terrific season (142 OPS-plus, 6.4 WAR), just what the bubblegum card says he'll do, and the Mariners had a chance because of him.

The Mariners began the year making no other big changes in their lineup, though they added Kendrys Morales and Austin Jackson as the year went along. Even with reinforcements, the Mariners actually lost nearly three games of offensive WAR from 2013 (down to 17.2 from 20.1) and the Mariners also declined in the American League rankings in OPS, falling from tenth (.695) to last (.676). They  improved from 12th with 624 runs to 11th with 634 runs.

The Mariners would have been lost without Cano. Baseball-reference.com puts him at 34 Runs Above Average (RAA) in 2014, and there's no one else in that lineup except for Kyle Seager (29 RAA). The Mariners, as a club, are minus-44 RAA.

So, credit Cano for his super-human feat of preventing Seattle's tepid offense from getting worse, but the Mariners wouldn't have climbed without much better pitching behind Felix Hernandez and Hisashi Iwakuma. The Mariners replaced a lot of poor starts from 2013 with better starts this year from James Paxton (120 ERA-plus) and Taijuan Walker (142 ERA-plus). Chris Young (100) and Roenis Elias (95) weren't bad. 

Less heralded than the Cano acquisition last winter was the Mariners' free-agent signing of Fernando Rodney as their closer. But it was no less important. Rodney filled a need with 48 saves. The rest of the bullpen lined up behind him. The Mariners shot up to first in American League ERA (3.17) from 13th (4.31).

The Mariners won only 71 games in 2013, and you can see how much Cano and Rodney brought to their mix, bringing them to 87 wins in 2014. Going forward with the Mariners, we wonder if the good pitching in the middle of their staff this year was a fluke, but we're sure the club's terrible offense isn't. They mattered on the last day of the season for the first time in a while, and they might matter a little more if they can add a bat or two.

The more maddening case is the Brewers, who managed to madden us even though no one actually expected them to climb in a division that sent three other clubs to the playoffs last year. The Brewers don't have a No. 1 starter, and they've never filled the hole left at first base when Prince Fielder departed as a free agent three years ago. Then, the season started, and the Brewers went out 20-7 through April 29 with a 6 1/2-game lead in the NL Central and a 2.59 staff ERA. Halfway through the season, they were still in first place, 49-32 with a 5 1/2-game lead.

The Brewers were baffling. They didn't seem that good, and you knew the Cardinals were hanging around. But the Brewers were solid during the second half of 2013 (42-39), and they did that without Ryan Braun and Francisco Rodriguez. Maybe they were on to something.

They weren't. By the midway point of the season, the Brewers already inflated their staff ERA by a full run to 3.59. Their staff ERA for their second 81 games was 3.75, putting their full-season ERA at 3.67 in a league averaging 3.66.

And their hitting disappeared. First 81 games this year, the Brewers scored 4.6 runs per game and slashed .260/.319/.419 /.738 with 86 homers. Second 81 games, they were 3.5 runs per game, .240/.302 /.374/.676 and 64 homers. They ended up a league average team offensively, averaging right between those extremes overall, but that second half batting dip, combined with pitching that was just average, resulted in the Brewers going 33-48 down the last 81 games.

The bulk of that margin was a horrendous final six weeks of the season, during which the Brewers were 11-25 and they fell like a stone through the standings. That run began as the first-place club with a 2 1/2 game lead, and it ended in third place, eight games out. Braun really vanished down that stretch – splitting .236/.314/.358/.672 with four homers.

So, the Brewers limped in at 82-80, barely knowing what hit them, except that they didn't hit anything. But there's something else worth noting. Take a look at these standings from the National League Central division, counting only the last 81 games of 2013 and the first 81 games of 2014 for each club.

               W  L

St. Louis    92  70

Milwaukee  91  71

Cincinnati   87  75

Pittsburgh   84  78

Chicago      66  96

Turns out, the Brewers had a pretty good year in there. It's just not a year that anyone would recognize, roughly July 2013 through June 2014. But it's a solid year of games showing a club that can put it together for a period of time. It helps a lot if all those games are during the same season. And the problem for the Brewers is that, in each of the last two years, they have stunk up half of their season. Just as they tumbled at the end of 2014, they started 2013 at 32-49 in their first 81 games. In those 162 games during the past two years, the Brewers are 65-97, a last-place team.

This season, in a sense, the Brewers were both a first-place team and a last-place team. In the postseason, they are no place.

AL West: WAR says A's, spring injuries disagree

Looking at the 2013 WAR values for players on the 2014 Opening Day rosters for the clubs of the American League West, the Oakland Athletics would have to be favored. But early injuries are among the reasons the Los Angeles Angels might have a chance.

Oakland Athletics General Manager Billy Beane and his staff have accumulated more high WAR value players than any other club in the game (Brett Farmiloe/Creative Commons Attribution 2.0 Generic license).


By BILL PETERSON
Big Leagues in Los Angeles

Following is a team-by-team look at each team in the American League West entering the 2014 season, listing each team's players who finished in the top 240 among position players and the top 240 pitchers by 2013 WAR.

It is a new season and the slate is wiped clean. In fact, the injuries of spring training already have forced equivocations and commentaries to demonstrate where these lists might steer us wrong. But they are a starting point.

We list each team in the division, giving each club's "top half" position players by 2013 WAR, its "second-level" position players, its top-level pitchers and second-level pitchers. For the top-half position players, we give the player's position and where he ranked at the position across big league baseball in 2013 WAR, then the actual WAR value for the player. For every other category, we give the player's overall 2013 WAR ranking, understanding that pitchers and position players are ranked separately.

More about all of this, including some important clarifications, can be found here. Bear in mind, though, that the 2013 WAR totals for each club only include these top players, and every club will have players with little, no or negative WAR value that actually would drag down its totals.

By the following readings, alone, the Oakland Athletics would be the favorites to win the AL West. However, the world is changing all the time.

Oakland Athletics (49.4 in 2013 WAR)

Top-half position players — 1B: Brandon Moss, 15, 2.2. 2B: Eric Sogard, 15, 2.1. SS: Jed Lowrie, 15, 2.3. 3B: Josh Donaldson, 1, 8.0. RF: Josh Reddick, 11, 2.6. CF: Coco Crisp, 8, 4.3. LF: Craig Gentry, 6, 3.6. Total: seven players, 25.3 WAR.

Second-level players — Nick Punto, IF, 126, 2.2. Derek Norris, C,149. 1.8. Yoenis Cespedes, OF, 155, 1.7. John Jaso, C, 197, 1.1. Stephen Vogt, C, 0.7. Total: Five players, 7.5 WAR.

Top-level pitchers — A.J. Griffin, 73, 2.3. Jarrod Parker, 99, 1.9. Total: two pitchers, 4.2 WAR.

Second-level pitchers — Jim Johnson, 123, 1.5. Ryan Cook, 135, 1.4. Sonny Gray, 146, 1.4. Dan Otero, 148, 1.3. Sean Doolittle, 156, 1.2. Dan Straily, 165, 1.2. Scott Kazmir, 173, 1.1. Luke Gregerson, 214, 0.7. Tommy Milone, 231, 0.6. Total: Nine pitchers, 10.4 WAR.

Take a look at those top-level pitchers. Neither is with the club as it opens the season. Parker is gone for the year with Tommy John surgery, and Griffin is down right now with elbow problems of his own. It's also not sufficiently appreciated that the A's are without Bartolo Colon, who tossed a pretty 5.0 WAR for them in 2013 before signing as a free agent with the New York Mets. Thus, the A's are without their top three starting pitchers from 2013, and two of them aren't coming back this year.

However, the A's have a whopping nine pitchers on that second-level list, and some of them, like Gray, Straily and, maybe, Kazmir, figure to be much more productive in 2014. But pitching depth, which the A's have, is not the same as pitching dominance, which they lack.

On the position side, this club is solid, though not spectacular. The A's have a top-half player at every position except catcher. Of course, catching is a little different, because some clubs (like the A's) will split that position and, therefore, not place a catcher in the top 15. However, Norris, Jaso and Vogt totaled 3.6 WAR in 2013, which is rock solid.

The A's should be the division favorites going into 2014, but their pitching is wobbly at the top levels, and that's where they appear to be the most vulnerable. Their biggest strength is a deep bullpen, which they will need.

Texas Rangers (42.6 in 2013 WAR)

Top-half position players — SS: Elvis Andrus, 4, 4.3. 3B: Adrian Beltre, 6, 5.5. CF: Leonys Martin, 12, 3.4. LF: Shin-Soo Choo, 3, 4.2. Total: Four players, 17.4 WAR.

Second-level players — Alex Rios, OF, 135, 2.1. Prince Fielder, 1B, 158, 1.7. Geovany Soto, C, 172, 1.4. Total: three players, 5.2 WAR.

Top-level pitchers — Yu Darvish, 10, 5.8. Derek Holland, 36, 3.3. Neal Cotts, 59, 2.6. Tanner Scheppers, 74, 2.3. Alexi Ogando, 77, 2.2. Martin Perez, 114, 1.6. Total: six pitchers, 17.8 WAR.

Second-level pitchers — Robbie Ross, 156, 1.2. Jason Frasor, 168, 1.2. Total: two pitchers, 2.4 WAR.

The Rangers are starting the season without their front two starting pitchers from 2013. Darvish is down for a while with neck stiffness, and Holland is out until at least the All-Star break with a microfracture in one knee. And the Rangers can't offset these losses with the kind of pitching depth that Oakland has.

Additionally, the Rangers have disabled Soto and a couple good guys not on this list, lefty Matt Harrison and infielder Jurickson Profar. The Rangers also traded second baseman Ian Kinsler and his 2013 WAR of 5.0 for Fielder and his 1.7 WAR in 2013. If Fielder can bounce back to All-Star level productivity, he will make up the difference for the Rangers losing Kinsler, but that wouldn't be enough to make up for losing Holland.

We'll see how the Rangers patch it together. The suspicion here is that this club has seen better days. However, they do get a little reprieve in that the main division competition, the Oakland Athletics, are dealing with severe depletions among their top-level pitchers.

Los Angeles Angels (36.3 in 2013 WAR)

Top-half position players — 2B: Howie Kendrick, 9, 3.4. CF: Mike Trout, 1, 9.2. Total: two players, 12.6 WAR.

Second-level players — Chris Iannetta, C, 145, 1.9. Erick Aybar, SS, 155, 1.7. Josh Hamilton, OF, 165, 1.5. Albert Pujols, 1B, 169, 1.5. Hank Conger, C, 199, 1.1. J.B. Shuck, OF, 217, 0.9. Total: six players, 8.6 WAR.

Top-level pitchers — Jered Weaver, 29, 3.7. C.J. Wilson, 35, 3.4. Hector Santiago, 55, 2.8. Joe Smith, 103, 1.8. Total: four pitchers, 11.7 WAR.

Second-level pitchers — Dane De La Rosa, 150, 1.3. Garrett Richards, 201, 0.9. Michael Kohn, 231, 0.6. Ernesto Frieri, 239, 0.6. Total: four pitchers, 3.4 WAR.

No club in this division has more legitimate room for improvement than the Angels. First, this club has famously under-performing stars from 2013, like Hamilton and Pujols, both of whom look good this spring. For that matter, Aybar should be much better than 1.7 WAR.

On the pitching side, Weaver is a fascinating case who just keeps going as his velocity declines, and Wilson is about as good of a No. 2 starter as you can find. And take a look at Santiago, ranked 55th among all pitchers in 2013 WAR. If we go through the starting pitchers and say, "OK, the top 30 starters by WAR are No. 1 starters (one for each club), and the next 30 are No. 2 starters ... ," then Santiago shapes up as a legitimate No. 2. He still needs to establish that kind of durability, but the potential is there.

Unlike the three clubs listed above, the Angels broke camp without serious injuries to their pitching staff. This club has started badly for the last two seasons. But, in view of problems facing Oakland, Texas and Seattle concerning the disabled list, the conditions are in place for the Angels to go off on a good start. If the Angels can work up an early lather, they can be the club many thought they would be for the last two years.

Seattle Mariners (35.1 in 2013 WAR)

Top-half position players — 2B: Robinson Cano, 1, 7.6; Nick Franklin, 13, 2.3. 3B: Kyle Seager, 8, 3.9. Total: three players, 13.8 WAR.

Second-level players — Brad Miller, SS, 141, 2.0. Michael Saunders, OF, 180, 1.3. Dustin Ackley, OF, 201, 1.1. Justin Smoak, 1B, 203, 1.1. Total: four players, 5.5 WAR.

Top-level pitchers — Hisashi Iwakuma, 3, 7.0. Felix Hernandez, 13, 5.2. Yoervis Medina, 98, 1.9.  Total: four pitchers, 15.9 WAR.

Second-level pitchers — James Paxton, 173, 1.1. Stephen Pryor, 237, 0.6. Total: two pitchers, 1.7 WAR.

It remains mysterious why the Mariners sprung $240 million over 10 years for Cano when they already might have their second baseman of the next 10 years in Franklin. The Mariners ended up putting Frankin in a shortstop competition with Nick Miller, who ran a nice 2.0 WAR in 76 games last season. Franklin lost, so his 2.3 WAR begins the season at Tacoma.

Iwakuma is down for the first month of the season after a spring training injury, another big blow. The Mariners have some interesting young pitchers, including Paxton.

In total, this is looking like a badly built team with only one decent right-handed hitter, Corey Hart, who didn't play at all last season. The Mariners are a fourth-place team paying Cano $24 million per year, and they would be a fourth-place team without that contract.

Houston Astros (22.2 in 2013 WAR)

Top-half position players — C: Jason Castro, 3, 4.5. Totals: one player, 4.5 WAR.

Second-level players — Matt Dominguez, 3B, 124, 2.2. Dexter Fowler, CF, 133, 2.1. Jose Altuve, 2B, 206, 1.1. Totals: three players, 5.4 WAR.

Top-level pitchers — Jarred Cosart, 62, 2.6. Jesse Crain, 69, 2.4. Brett Oberholzer, 81, 2.1. Scott Feldman, 118, 1.6. Chad Qualls, 107, 1.8. Totals: Five pitchers, 10.5 WAR.

Second-level pitchers — Kevin Chapman, 204, 0.8. Totals: one pitcher, 0.8 WAR.

Three straight years of not even winning 60 games make the Astros the least competent operation of the last 50 years and, unlike the New York Mets of the early 1960s, they're well past being an expansion team.

The Astros have added some meat to their pitching staff with Crain, Feldman and Qualls. But they're still not close to fielding a competitive Major League club.

AL All-Star team not quite ready for WAR

The American League All-Star team playing in Kansas City Tuesday contains great names like Derek Jeter and Prince Fielder. However, according to the WAR metric, neither of these players should be anywhere near the All-Star Game. Indeed, about half of the AL team shouldn't be there, according to WAR.

By BILL PETERSON
Big Leagues in Los Angeles

It's the time of year when vigorous arguments about who should be named to the All-Star teams are in season. That will pass in a couple days.

Today, the All-Star rosters are blown all the way up to 34 players each. A little much, we say. An All-Star team should be the size of a team, which is 25 players.

What's more interesting, though, is who gets selected and why, which raises the old questions. Should the All-Star game be contested among players who are the best so far this year? Or, should the All-Star game be about "stars," which favors players who are enormously popular even if they're not great this year?

We usually end up with teams that answer those questions affirmatively and negatively at the same time. A mixture, if you will. That is, the teams never definitively satisfy anybody.

Our preference here is to have the best players going at the present moment. It helps to summarize the season up to this point, and it also gives us a very clear picture about who really are the top performers right now.

The keepers of the baseball statistics, tireless in search of a single number to measure a player's entire contribution, have come upon several candidates. The most popular, at the moment, is WAR (wins above a replacement-level player). We have used WAR on these pages before, in evaluating the 21st century drafts for the Angels and the Dodgers. We're not entirely sold on WAR, but it raises interesting questions about players when we put questions to it.

Here's an interesting question: How would our All-Star teams look, right now, if they were based almost entirely on WAR? That is, only the players with the highest WARs this year are on the teams. If we use that as the guiding principle, adjusting to the requirements that each position be filled and each team represented, we end up with rosters that only halfway resemble the rosters that will play Tuesday night in Kansas City.

First, we shall use WAR, as calculated on baseball-reference.com, to name 25-man rosters with 15 position players and 10 pitchers each. Next, we will add three hitters and two pitchers for 30-man rosters, then we will add two more hitters and two more pitchers each for 34-man rosters.

In this piece, we look at the American League. For a look at the National League, check here.

Here, now, is the American League pitching staff, chosen by WAR ranking:

Justin Verlander, Detroit (4.3), Chris Sale, Chicago (4.2), Jake Peavy, Chicago (4.1), Matt Harrison, Texas (3.7), Jered Weaver, Angels (2.9), David Price, Tampa Bay (2.7), Hiroki Kuroda, New York (2.6), Jose Quintana, Chicago (2.6), Jim Johnson, Baltimore (2.4), Felix Hernandez, Seattle (1.9).

The first nine pitchers listed are one through nine in the WAR rankings among AL pitchers at the All-Star break. Baltimore's Jason Hammel also has a 2.4 WAR, as does the Angels' C.J. Wilson. But we needed to place a Seattle Mariners player on the All-Star squad and King Felix is their top performer this year at 1.9.

Here, now, is the starting lineup, and the batting order, for the American League WAR Stars:

Leading off in center field is Mike Trout, who has been with the Angels barely more than two months and already has 4.6 WAR, second in the league. He might have to settle for Rookie of the Year, but he should get a legitimate shot at MVP if he keeps this up. Batting second at second base is Robinson Cano of the Yankees, who is third in AL batter WAR at 4.2.

Batting third is Minnesota Twins catcher Joe Mauer. One of the interesting findings in this little study is how much more talent the National League has over the American League when it comes to catchers, particularly on offense. The NL WAR rankings list four catchers among the top 17 batters, and six catchers among the top 28. To find a catcher for the American League, we have to go all the way down to No. 28, where we find Mauer with his 2.1 WAR. At that, Mauer is only a half-time catcher right now -- 37 starts behind the plate, 23 at first base and 14 at designated hitter.

Cleaning up is the designated hitter, Boston's David Ortiz. He's still the Red Sox best hitter with a 2.5 WAR, which ranks 19th in the league. Batting fifth is a really nice player, Oakland right fielder Josh Reddick, running fourth in the league with a 3.6 WAR. The A's picked him up from Boston last winter for Andrew Bailey and Ryan Sweeney.

The No. 6 hitter is Detroit's Austin Jackson, who will play left but regularly plays center. His 3.5 WAR ranks fifth among AL hitters. The seventh hitter, believe it or not, is Toronto first baseman Edwin Encarnacion, who's 3.0 WAR is tied for ninth among AL hitters. Encarnacion is really a DH, but he took 37 starts at first base while Adam Lind missed six weeks, so he qualifies. Remarkably, Encarnacion is way ahead of people like Mark Teixeira and Albert Pujols.

At the bottom of the AL order, we have some defense. The shortstop with the best WAR in the AL is Tampa Bay's Sean Rodriguez, the former Angels farm hand. Rodriguez has a 2.2 WAR, 2.1 of which is for his defense. He bats eighth. Finally, batting ninth, we have Brett Lawrie, the Toronto third baseman who's 5.0 WAR leads all of the American League. Of that WAR, 3.7 is defensively earned. Ever heard of Brett Lawrie? According to WAR, he's the most valuable player in the American League.

Compare this with the real AL starting lineup. The real lineup has five players -- Texas catcher Mike Napoli, Detroit first baseman Prince Fielder, Texas third baseman Adrian Beltre, New York shortstop Derek Jeter and New York center fielder Curtis Granderson -- who don't even make our 34-man AL WAR team. Jeter is clearly a lifetime achievement selection. If he hangs around for another six or seven years, he can be the new Hit King. However, his 0.7 WAR is tied for 86th in the AL with, among others, the great Drew Butera and Lou Marson.

For that matter, our WAR starting lineup includes five players -- Reddick, Jackson, Encarnacion, Rodriguez and Lawrie -- who aren't on the real AL All-Star team at all. That group only includes three of the top five AL players by WAR this year.

Here are the reserves for the 25-man AL WAR squad: Baltimore catcher Matt Wieters (1.7), Cleveland second baseman Jason Kipnis (3.4), Texas outfielder Josh Hamilton (3.2), Cleveland outfielder Shin-Soo Choo (3.0), Chicago outfielder Alex Rios (2.9), and Kansas City outfielder Alex Gordon (2.8).

You might notice that we have only two catchers and believe it really should be three, just in case. If so, then we add Chicago's A.J. Pierzynski, who is all the way down at 47th in AL WAR at 1.5. The player we subtract is Rios, who does have a higher WAR than Gordon. However, we have to keep Gordon because he is our only Royals player.

That's the 25-man AL team, according to WAR. Four of these reserves -- Kipnis, Shin-Soo, Rios/Pierzynski and Gordon -- aren't even on the 34-man real AL team.

Now, we build up to a 30-man team. Assuming we decided to have three catchers on the 25-man team, we now add Rios back in, along with four other players. One of them is Detroit third baseman Miguel Cabrera (3.1). For another, we can pick between Toronto's Jose Bautista and the Angels' Mark Trumbo, who are tied for 11th, with Rios, among AL hitters at 2.9. We'll pick Bautista because he has been doing it longer. Bautista is a starter in the real All-Star Game, but he barely makes the 30-man roster here. The additional pitchers are Hammel and Wilson, who barely missed the 25-man cut. Neither Hammel nor Rios made the real AL All-Star team.

Now, by adding four more players, we get to 34, the same roster size as the real All-Star team. Now, Trumbo makes the team for sure. Kansas City third baseman Mike Moustakas and Seattle shortstop Brendan Ryan, are tied for 15th among AL position players at 2.7 WAR. We're taking Ryan because we like the way he wears the clothes. All of Ryan's WAR is on defense. The added pitchers are Texas right hander Yu Darvish and Oakland right hander Brandon McCarthy, who are tied for 12th among AL pitchers with a 2.3 WAR.

A full 16 players who made the real AL All-Star team do not qualify for the 34-man WAR team. Four of them are relief pitchers -- Ryan Cook of Oakland, Joe Nathan of Texas, Chris Perez of Cleveland, and Tampa Bay's Fernando Rodney. Their combined WAR is 5.4, which means four relief pitchers between them are just a game better than Verlander by himself. Perez has a war of 0.4, ranking 103rd among AL pitchers.

Obviously, big league managers regard relief closers much more highly than does WAR. So do the general imperatives to put on a spectacle. A relief closer is a star, which is a lot different from being a producer.

Among the reserves, the players who made the real AL All-Star team and not the 34-man AL WAR team are Elvis Andrus and Ian Kinsler of Texas, Adam Dunn and Paul Konerko of Chicago, Billy Butler of Kansas City, Asdrubal Cabrera of Cleveland and Adam Jones of Baltimore. According to WAR, Dunn (0.8) and Butler (0.9) don't belong anywhere near the All-Star Game. Kinsler (1.1) isn't much better.

A rather dramatic contrast emerges between the real All-Star teams and the WAR rankings, obviously. Six of the top 10 AL position players by WAR aren't even on the real All-Star team. Players like Lawrie and Kipnis, who have no national profile, are quietly among the league's best players. Likewise, Shin-Soo and Encarnacion, top ten AL players by WAR this year, are not on the All-Star team.

Of the top 20 AL position players by WAR, only eight are playing Tuesday night in Kansas City. Our version of a 34-man team has 17 of those top 20 -- missing three because we had to dip down to find three catchers.

The moral of the story? The All-Star Game is about perception. Baseball people often like to say that perception is reality. WAR advocates would have to disagree. Strongly.

And if you believe WAR, then you believe the team we have named here is better than the AL team playing Tuesday in Kansas City. Do you?