Monday, April 7, 2008
April Expectations
Thanks to yesterday's 2-0 victory over the Rays, the Yankees evened their record at 3-3. I didn't get to see the game although I listened to it while driving and it sounded like some fine pitching was done by Chien-Ming Wang, Joba Chamberlain, and Mariano Rivera. While relying on John Sterling for insight into the game is probably risky, he made it sound like Wang was working his slider in well which helped him fan 6 in 6 innings, a very high number for the Wanger.One thing this series has showed me so far is that the computers may have been onto something. Tampa can play. Jason Bartlett seems like a big upgrade at short and B.J. Upton looks to have the makings of a great defensive CF. I'll be interested to see what kind of pitching they get out of the back of their rotation on a consistent level but other than that they're looking pretty tough.
When the season starts we all dream of lots of wins and minimal losses so a 3-3 start probably seems a little disappointing, especially at home. Is it though? Using Bill James's log5 method for predicting a team's wins/losses and the average results of our Diamond Mind projection blowout, here's a look at what we should have expected the Yankees to do so far compared to what they've actually done as well as a look through the games of April 28, which are part of a pretty rough stretch of 18 of 20 games on the road (at least partially thanks to a visit by the Pope).
| Date | Road | Home | log5 W | log5 L | Act W | Act L |
| 4/1 | BlueJays | Yankees | 0.6 | 0.4 | 1 | 0 |
| 4/2 | BlueJays | Yankees | 1.2 | 0.8 | 1 | 1 |
| 4/3 | BlueJays | Yankees | 1.8 | 1.2 | 2 | 1 |
| 4/4 | Rays | Yankees | 2.4 | 1.6 | 2 | 2 |
| 4/5 | Rays | Yankees | 3.0 | 2.0 | 2 | 3 |
| 4/6 | Rays | Yankees | 3.7 | 2.3 | 3 | 3 |
| 4/7 | Rays | Yankees | 4.3 | 2.7 | ||
| 4/8 | Yankees | Royals | 4.9 | 3.1 | ||
| 4/9 | Yankees | Royals | 5.5 | 3.5 | ||
| 4/10 | Yankees | Royals | 6.1 | 3.9 | ||
| 4/11 | Yankees | RedSox | 6.6 | 4.4 | ||
| 4/12 | Yankees | RedSox | 7.0 | 5.0 | ||
| 4/13 | Yankees | RedSox | 7.5 | 5.5 | ||
| 4/14 | Yankees | Rays | 8.0 | 6.0 | ||
| 4/15 | Yankees | Rays | 8.6 | 6.4 | ||
| 4/16 | RedSox | Yankees | 9.1 | 6.9 | ||
| 4/17 | RedSox | Yankees | 9.7 | 7.3 | ||
| 4/18 | Yankees | Orioles | 10.3 | 7.7 | ||
| 4/19 | Yankees | Orioles | 11.0 | 8.0 | ||
| 4/20 | Yankees | Orioles | 11.6 | 8.4 | ||
| 4/22 | Yankees | WhiteSox | 12.2 | 8.8 | ||
| 4/23 | Yankees | WhiteSox | 12.8 | 9.2 | ||
| 4/24 | Yankees | WhiteSox | 13.4 | 9.6 | ||
| 4/25 | Yankees | Indians | 13.9 | 10.1 | ||
| 4/26 | Yankees | Indians | 14.4 | 10.6 | ||
| 4/27 | Yankees | Indians | 14.9 | 11.1 | ||
| 4/28 | Yankees | Indians | 15.4 | 11.6 |
If the Yankees can pull of the win today they're right about where they should be after seven games according to log5 and the pre-season projections. Whether Mike Mussina is up to it or not is the big question. So far the Yankee offense has been MIA although it's too soon to be overly concerned about that in my opinion. These numbers tell me what yup has been saying in the comments is about right. We should probably be happy if the Yankees tread water over the rest of April and get through the month around .500 or a little better.
Page 1 of 1 pages: