FanGraphs WAR projection comparison by team paints an awful outlook on the 2020 Colorado Rockies

The Colorado Rockies only finished one game out of last place in the NL West standings in 2019 after having to go to game 163 with the Dodgers in 2018 to decide the NL West Champion. As the calendar flips to 2020 here in the coming days, they look to be a long ways away from the 2018 season.

Although it was expected this offseason since the team said it would likely happen back in October, the Colorado Rockies have, essentially, not done a thing to improve their 2020 outlook this offseason.

Thus far this offseason, they have extended reliever Scott Oberg, reportedly signed Drew Butera to a MiLB deal, and signed a few others to MiLB deals. That’s it.

That’s part of the reason why they are viewed so poorly by 2020 projections: they have not done anything to improve on their 2019 numbers.

At catcher, they are projected to be 29th in the majors with a 0.4 WAR. That is actually being generous to the Rockies catching squad considering that they combined for a -1.6 fWAR in 2019. The Texas Rangers are the only team projected to be worse at catcher.

The Rockies are also projected for 2nd to last at first base with a 0.2 WAR and, again, only the Rangers are projected to be worse. Even at second base, the Rockies are projected to only be 24th with a 1.3 WAR.

Another second-to-last place projection comes in left field with a 0.4 WAR. Part of this is because they have David Dahl slated as the starting left fielder and they project him with less than 500 plate appearances from left field. The Rockies are in 29th for yet another position, as they are projected to have a 0.0 WAR in center field.

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They rank 18th in the right field position with 1.6 WAR and Charlie Blackmon providing 1.7 of that (they have Raimel Tapia playing RF occasionally at a -0.1 WAR clip).

They also rank 18th in starting pitching and 21st in relief pitching projections.

As you may expect, the only positions in which the Rockies are projected in the top half of baseball are third base (5th) and shortstop (7th). Essentially, at least by projections, the Rockies would be no better than the top three worst teams in the sport if not for Nolan Arenado and Trevor Story.

Even with them, as a team overall, they are 24th in WAR, which is second worst to the Giants in the NL West and only third to the Giants and Marlins in the National League. FanGraphs also projects Arenado and Story to be 32.6 percent of the Rockies total WAR.

As a result, Vegas currently has the Rockies over/under number at 75.5 wins. That would still be a 4-5 game improvement on the 2019 season. Luckily, for the Rockies, the Giants have gotten worse this offseason (e.g. losing Madison Bumgarner) but the D’Backs (signing Bumgarner, Kole Calhoun, Stephen Vogt, and Junior Guerra) and Padres (trading for Tommy Pham, Jurickson Profar, Trent Grisham, Zach Davies, and signing Drew Pomeranz) have gotten better.

With that, the Rockies could find that their inactivity could haunt them in the near future.