Colorado Rockies: PECOTA doesn’t have a good outlook on the team

Thursday was “PECOTA day” as PECOTA numbers, which is the system that Baseball Prospectus uses for predictions for teams and players, were released and their predictions for the Colorado Rockies were not very favorable.

PECOTA’s predictions for the Colorado Rockies says that they are going to be a 85-77 team, which would be good enough for second place in the National League West. However, that would not be good enough for either of the two Wild Card spots, as they would be out of a spot by one game.

This would be a drop of six wins for the Rockies in 2019 but if you look further, it is actually exactly the same as last year. If you take a look at the Rockies run differential and Pythagorean win/loss record, the Rockies should have been a 85-78 team. Without their Game 163 loss, they should have been an 85-77 team.

It should be noted, though, that PECOTA only has one team with 90+ wins, in the Los Angeles Dodgers at 95. PECOTA also only has 3 teams below .500 in the NL, as they have the Marlins at 65-97, the Padres at 75-87, and the Giants at 71-91.

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If you look at the Rockies individual stats, there are also some interesting numbers. On the offensive front, they have Nolan Arenado dropping below 100 RBI for the first time in a full season in his major league career. They also have Ian Desmond on the bench and Raimel Tapia in the starting outfield for the Rockies (which may be something that some Rockies fans are wishing for).

On the pitching front, they foresee a rebound season from Jon Gray, as they have him going 10-5 with a 3.45 ERA in 24 starts and a rebound season from each Bryan Shaw, Chris Rusin, and Jake McGee. They all had ERA’s of 5.93 or higher in 2018 but each of them are below 5.00 in 2019, by their predictions. Rusin is the lowest of the trio as they predict that he will have a 3.95 ERA. They also see German Marquez improving to 12-6 with a half run drop in ERA from 3.77 to 3.27.

However, they see significant regressions in the, arguably, three best pitchers for the Rockies down the stretch last season. They see Kyle Freeland regressing to 11-8 and an increase in ERA by more than a run, at 4.07. They also have relievers Seunghwan Oh pitching to an ERA north of 4.50 and Scott Oberg‘s ERA increasing by well more than a run to 3.77.

You can check out their full player predictions here, as you may find some other interesting numbers in there.

Personally, I think that the Rockies best shot at the playoffs is the NL West given that teams like the Cardinals, Reds, Phillies, Mets, and Nationals have either improved this offseason and/or are expected to play better than they did last year (e.g the Nationals) so there will be a lot of teams in the hunt for the Wild Card.

If PECOTA predictions to have any semblance of truth by the end of the season, that will reign true.