Stats Geek snarks again

Brian O'Neill has another snarky Stats Geek essay for the Post-Gazette. He argues that the Pirates won't win another 75 games this year because the offense won't score enough runs. He then handicaps the odds that the 2004 Pirates will have improved hitting at each position. The evidence doesn't fully support his arguments that the Pirates will lose so many games.

Go read the article for yourself. To recap, he concedes that the Bucs will be the same at catcher, until Kendall is traded. Then it's likely we'll be worse. Score: -1. He bitches about the Simon signing but has no strong case that this year's mix of Simon and Wilson will be weaker than last year's mix of Simon, Wilson, and Stairs. Even, keeping the score: -1. Second base will be an upgrade no matter what happens. Plus, making the score: Even. The Stats Geek suggests that Jack Wilson will be the same hitter that he was in 2003. Well, maybe, but even PECOTA considers his breakout chance (25%) greater than his collapse chance (20%). Being 25 has a lot to do with that. We're cautiously optimistic, esp. if Jack wins the second spot in the batting order, though that looks less likely with the strong performance of the second basemen and Wilson's recent fit of suckiness at the plate. Score: Still even. At third, Stynes's career numbers suggest he'll replace Aramis Ramirez's 2003 numbers as a Pirate. Score: Even. Outfield: Even though I think the Bay/Wilson mix will replace Brian Giles, let's be conservative and say there's no way anyone replaces Brian Giles. Score: -1. Tike Redman was an upgrade over Lofton last year, and he'll be even better this year. Score: Even. Raul Mondesi is a Reggie Sanders clone. Score: Even. Last year's bench was Matt Stairs and the 600 OPS Sextet. That should be easy to beat, especially if Randall Simon or Craig Wilson emerges as the King of the Pine. But let's call it even to be safe.

Following Brian O'Neill's analysis - which I think is conservative - we still come out with an offense that is more equal than better or worse. The only huge negative the Pirates might experience is at catcher, and that's assuming that Kendall is dealt for a package that includes the no-hit veteran catcher he'd replace on some other team. But that's not certain. Why bring in and play an old man if Cota could handle that role? And why play that sucker at the expense of Craig A. Wilson? If Kendall's departure leads to a mix of Wilson and Osik Cota, that may be no worse than what we got from the position in 2003. Finally, with all the youth around diamond, the chance of an unexpectedly good breakout season at some random position is greater than the chance of an unexpectedly bad collapse season. We can play it safe and call it even.

Run scoring, of course, is only half the game. Run prevention is the other half. We can't argue that diminished run scoring will result in fewer wins unless we prove that run prevention will remain the same or get worse. So let's look at the staff. The combination of Kip Wells and Josh Fogg should be as good as the same combination last year. Ryan Vogelsong looks like a big improvement over Jeff D'Amico. Oliver Perez can't be worse than he was last year. For as long as he stays with the team, this year's vintage of Kris Benson should do as well as last year's version of Jeff Suppan. Burnett and Vanbenschoten are wildcards, but they should at least equal the performances of Brian Meadows and Salomon Torres if they are called upon to make 12 starts each. Williams, Beimel, and Boehringer do not appear to be in line to suck up so many high-leverage innings in 2004. Mesa and the new guys may not be much better, but it would be diffficult to be much worse. It's hard to argue that this year's pitching staff will be appreciably worse than last year's pitching staff. Even if Wells can't repeat his 2003 performance, there's enough net positive in the likely improvement offered by the other young pitchers to make up for that. Wells isn't going to suck; that's not likely at all.

Maybe Brian O'Neill will take this up in next week's column. Since he failed to convince us that it is likely that the 2004 offense will be significantly worse than the 2003 offense, he has some work to do on the bullpen if he hopes to salvage his claim that the Pirates have little hope of 75 wins.

All that said, it's good to keep expectations low. The lower they are going into the season, the greater the odds the Pirates exceed expectations. In sports as in politics, exceeding expectations is the surest way to generate that enthusiasm which gives a contender momentum.