Citizens Bank is more than just a bank. It’s a blog, where you can go to have opinions, advice, and analysis chucked into your gut like a bag full of coins. Coins, as we all know, are the “blunt instruments” of currency, and nobody wields them more accurately than The Citizens Bankers. Jon makes up one half of the team over there; feel free to check him out or his cohort Pat on their site or via Twitter (@JNes12). They pretty much define the term “righteous dudes.” Today, Jon takes a look at something we fail to oblige quite often on TBOH: the truth.
Where Do The Phillies Really Rank?
by Jon of The Citizens Bankers
What’s up, this is Jon from The Citizens Bankers. There are a few storylines in Spring Training this year. We have Chase Utley’s knee (Panic time), Domonic Brown’s magical fractured hand, and the emergence of Ben Francisco and John Mayberry Jr.
Oh yeah, and this. Cliff Lee could literally have my future children. But that is another story.
This post is going to be about where the Phillies really rank this year. This is an interesting question. Of course, your first inclination would be either #1 or #2 only behind the Boston Red Sox. In reality, there is no way to project rankings for the 2011 season. With all the roster moves (Adrian Gonzalez and Carl Crawford to Boston, Cliff Lee to Philadelphia, Jayson Werth to Washington, etc), it is almost impossible to concretely project rankings for 2011. I found this out while doing some research. I wanted to see where the Phillies really ranked using concrete data and numbers.
You will be surprised at what I found.
I decided to factor in the rankings in 4 areas (weighted differently), plus a projected year in 2011. Here is how the rankings were weighted:
Offense (Total team wOBA)
40%
Starting Pitching (Total starter WHIP)
30%
Defense (Total team UZR)
20%
Bullpen (Total bullpen WHIP)
10%
I then took the average ranking and re-ranked the teams 1-30. I did this for 2008, 2009, and 2010. For 2011, I made a projected ranking based on the trends. After that, I took all 4 rankings and weighted them like this:
2011 (Projected) 25%
2010 50%
2009 20%
2008 5%
To figure out a teams rating, I summed the above, and subtracted it from 100. Here were the results:
Here is a better look:
1 95.85 NYY
2 95.4 MIN
3 94.4 TAM
4 94.35 TEX
5 93.6 CIN
6 92.9 PHI
7 92.35 SF
8 89.35 ATL
9 89.25 BOS
10 89.05 OAK
11 88.95 COL
12 88.3 DET
13 86.7 TOR
14 85.55 STL
15 85.4 ARI
16 85.25 SEA
17 83.4 LAD
18 82.8 SD
19 82.75 CWS
20 82.4 MIL
21 82.2 LAA
22 79.45 FLA
23 77.7 CHC
24 77 WAS
25 76.05 NYM
26 74.2 HOU
27 73.9 BAL
28 73.35 KC
29 72.95 CLE
30 71.7 PIT
As you can see, these rankings are not perfect. If you take away one thing from these rankings, it is that the Phillies are not in a league of their own this year. Sure, the addition of Cliff Lee could potentially make the best rotation in the history of baseball, but there are many question marks in other areas. How will Chase Utley perform, given his knee problems? Can Jimmy Rollins return to his old form? Can Ryan Howard have another big year? Can they stay healthy? All question marks aside, the Phillies have the best chance to win the World Series in 2011 than any other year in their history. Get ready Phillies fans; this is shaping up to be the most fun you will have watching baseball, and it will only get funner.
Signing out,
The Citizens Bankers