They do not love us: What the projection systems have against the Diamondbacks – AZCentral

Arizona Diamondbacks outfielder Starling Marte laughs while watching spring training against the Oakland Athletics at Salt River Fields at Talking Stick Feb. 23, 2020.(Photo: Michael Chow/The Republic)

Expectations are high in Diamondbacks land. Not only are they coming off an encouraging 85-win season, the team is fresh off an offseason in which it made several high-profile additions. For those wearing the rosiest of glasses, the moves left them dreaming not just about the Diamondbacks reaching the playoffs, but about them chasing down the Los Angeles Dodgers in the National League West.

It is clear not everyone views the Diamondbacks this way in particular, the projection systems in place at Baseball Prospectus and FanGraphs, two of the leading baseball analytics sites on the internet. Not only do they not see the Diamondbacks being much improved from last year, they actually envision them being worse.

Baseball Prospectus PECOTA system sees the Diamondbacks as a 79.8-win team. Similarly, FanGraphs ZiPS projections has them at 79 wins. They are projected by PECOTA to have the eighth-best record in the NL, two spots ahead of ZiPS forecast.

Both sites envision the Diamondbacks once again sitting at home come October while the Dodgers, with an average of 100 wins between the two projections, run away with the division.

They do not love us, Diamondbacks General Manager Mike Hazen said. That is a true statement.

Of course, none of this means the Diamondbacks should cancel the season. Baseball predictions are difficult. This is true for both the computers and the so-called experts. Every year, the projection systems are wrong about a number of teams for a variety of reasons, including unexpected breakouts, injuries, trades, et al. And the systems tend to be conservative in their win-total predictions; most teams that are alive in October outperform their projections, and rare is the club that is projected to win 100 games.

Arizona Diamondbacks second baseman Ketel Marte (4) runs the bases against the Oakland Athletics during spring training at Salt River Fields at Talking Stick Feb. 23, 2020.(Photo: Michael Chow/The Republic)

The Diamondbacks, of course, do not agree with what the projections are saying. And, in some cases, neither do those running the projections. PECOTAs general ambivalence to the Diamondbacks was a topic of discussion within Baseball Prospectus before the projections were released last month, according to Harry Pavlidis, BPs director of research and development.

They were a team that kept popping up, like, Shouldnt they be better? Pavlidis said. Everybody was surprised. That might be a little low.

What the projection systems do, essentially, is look at each players track record, compare it to track records of similar players in baseball history and then spit out a most likely outcome for the upcoming season, taking into account how others before them have aged.

A player who, say, hit well in the minor leagues then did the same for his first two seasons in the majors at ages 23 and 24 would likely be viewed as a safe bet to do it again in Year 3 at age 25.

But the picture can get cloudy when a player is coming off an unexpectedly good year, one that looks like an outlier compared to his past performance. Or when he suddenly performs well in the majors at a more advanced age. Or when a host of other considerations, like home ballpark, division or health, are baked into the equation.

Hazen obviously does not agree with the projections, but he also doesnt seem to have a problem with them. He understands the models that shape them, and, he said, his teams internal projections, which also take into account information that isnt publicly available, use similar methodologies. He said the teams in-house projections are not vastly different from the 79-win seasons expected by PECOTA and ZiPS.

The issue both systems have with the Diamondbacks, essentially, is that they do not envision the team having enough elite players or even an above-average unit within the team.

Arizona Diamondbacks right fielder Kole Calhoun (56) runs back to the dugout after an inning against the Oakland Athletics during spring training at Salt River Fields at Talking Stick Feb. 23, 2020.(Photo: Michael Chow/The Republic)

Thats kind of the story of the projections, said FanGraphs Dan Szymborski, the creator of ZiPS. It kind of has all aspects of the team around average: average rotation, average bullpen, overall an average offense.

According to ZiPS, the Diamondbacks lineup will have one truly valuable player -- second baseman Ketel Marte -- surrounded by a collection of average to slightly above-average regulars. And even Marte isnt projected to be the player he was last year. Marte was worth 7.1 WAR (wins above replacement) per FanGraphs last season; ZiPS projects him at 3.7 this year.

That is normal for star players, however, when it comes to projection systems. They often set the bar so high that the system believes it is unreasonable to expect them to clear it again.

Hazen, of course, sees things playing out differently than the projections.

The two biggest factors for us are probably age and theyre projecting regression for some of our elite players, Hazen said. We would choose to argue with some of that in that our elite players are young, and we believe the guys that theyre dinging for age, theres reasons to believe why they should still (be productive). The aging curve is a curve; there are guys who outperform that consistently.

The Diamondbacks could believe, for example, that new right fielder Kole Calhoun will be better than the 1.1 WAR that PECOTA projects because his numbers from previous years were dragged down by him employing a swing he has since abandoned. Or that Christian Walker has only recently begun to approach his potential and will prove to have a longer shelf life than the mostly anonymous comps PECOTA assigned to him, including Victor Diaz and Jerry Sands.

Each system has things to like about the Diamondbacks. Marte, for one. His new teammate, Starling Marte, is well-liked by PECOTA, as is another offseason addition, Madison Bumgarner.

But the player the systems might like most is right-hander Zac Gallen, who has made only 15 starts in the majors. PECOTA has him as a 2.9-win player despite projecting him for only 137 innings. ZiPS has him at a 2.5 WAR in 148 innings, which Szymborski called a pretty bonkers projection.

But its not enough, apparently, to lift the team as a whole. Of course, this isnt new for the Diamondbacks, who have outplayed the projections fairly significantly in two of the past three seasons and they were on target to do so in 2018 had they not fallen apart in September.

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Outperformance is a tricky thing to bet on, Hazen said. (But) Ive said this a number of times: Dont look at the manager (Torey Lovullo) and his coaching staff and look at bullpen moves on a given day to assess how the manager is doing. To me, look at that. Look at the consistency of outperformance in certain areas that the team has driven year over year.

Pavlidis said there are certain team characteristics that can often lead to outperformance, most of it involving smart deployment of players, including platoons and bullpen management. In recent years, the Diamondbacks also have seemingly done well at getting more than expected out of many of their players. That has been particularly true in the starting rotation, whether it was Zack Godley in 2017, Clay Buchholz in 2018 or Alex Young last year.

Still, for as underwhelming as a 79-win projection might seem, it still does not leave the Diamondbacks too far out of a playoff spot in a clustered National League. They might be well behind the Dodgers, but PECOTA gives them an 18.8 percent chance of winning the wild card.

Right now, the Diamondbacks could break either way, said Pavlidis, who said their projections have roughly a six game margin for error. Theyre close. Theyre kind of on the cusp. If anything, I wouldnt worry if I was a fan. Yeah, we have a shot. The Dodgers are better, but the Dodgers are better than everybody. Can they fight for a wild card? Yeah.

Reach Piecoro at (602) 444-8680 or nick.piecoro@arizonarepublic.com. Follow him on Twitter @nickpiecoro.

At Surprise Stadium:RHP Luke Weaver, who failed to get through the first inning in his first outing of the spring, had another rough opening frame but managed to work into the second on Tuesday night. Weaver gave up two runs in the first on two hits and two walks, throwing 31 pitches. He struck out CF Bubba Starling to open the second and was lifted from the game with his pitch count at 38. Besides putting my fielders to sleep, throwing a bajillion pitches in the first inning, again, and getting my heart rate above the normal limit, I think it went well, Weaver said. I think Im trending up. Weaver said he was happy to see he was again touching the mid-90s with his fastball velocity. He said he feels good, which is no small consideration for a pitcher who missed most of last year with elbow problems. And he said his command issues were mostly due to adrenaline-related mechanical issues that he does not think will be difficult to correct. Im getting a little frustrated out there not putting away guys, letting them stay in the at-bats, Weaver said. We call those kill pitches, those putaway pitches, they arent landing where I want them to. But thats just reps and getting out there and getting it done.

At the plate: After several games in which their offense was nonexistent, the Diamondbacks saw some positive signs in the early innings. In the first, DH Carson Kelly had a lengthy at-bat against Royals RHP Kyle Zimmer that ended with a single to center. RF Kole Calhoun walked and C Stephen Vogt hit a hard line drive to center. The Diamondbacks didnt score, but it was more noise than they had been making in most innings in recent days. They broke through in the second. With two out and nobody on, CF Tim Locastro was a hit by pitch his second already this spring then scored on 3B Domingo Leybas double into the right-field corner. 2B Josh Rojas followed by launching a two-run homer to center field. Calhoun added a solo home run of his own in the fifth, taking former Diamondbacks closer RHP Greg Holland deep.

Extra bases: The game was delayed an hour as police investigated a possible bomb detected by a police-trained dog, who alerted officers to a vehicle parked outside the stadium. 1B Jake Lamb committed an error in the third inning, failing to find the bag at first while taking the throw from Leyba.

Wednesdays game: Diamondbacks LHP Madison Bumgarner vs. Indians RHP Aaron Civale, 1:10 p.m., Salt River Fields.

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They do not love us: What the projection systems have against the Diamondbacks - AZCentral