Alan Harrison’s 10 Bold-ish Predictions Revisited, Unfortunately

The end of the 2014 fantasy baseball season is here. Now it’s time to look back at the bold-ish predictions I made in March to see how I did:

10. Khris Davis will hit 25 homers and steal 15 bases.

In his first full season in the league, Davis triple slashed .244/.299/.457 with 22 homers and four stolen bases. While the power projection was within striking distance, the speed projection was way off. Looking back, I put too much value into Davis’ ability to swipe bases during his time Single-A and Advanced-A. Despite missing out in the prediction, I do like the player and will likely have a bunch of shares in 2015.

0-for-1

9. Justin Ruggiano will go 20/20

Way off. Not even close. Ruggiano couldn’t stay on the field due to injury and was only able to accumulate 250 plate appearances. In that time, he tallied six homers and swiped just two bases. And even though my prediction indicated he would go 20/20 “If he accumulates 500 PAs,” I don’t get credit for this one — unless you tell me otherwise.

0-for-2, woof.

8. Koji Uehara will not be a top-12 closer in 2014

Uehara finished 26-of-31 in save chances with a 2.52 ERA (3.09 FIP) and a 0.92 WHIP. Both his ERA and WHIP were the highest they’ve been since his 2010 season in Baltimore. He struggled as the season wore on, but still managed to finish the season as the 13th ranked relief pitcher in the Yahoo! game (excluding SP/RP eligible arms). However, Dellin Betances, Wade Davis and Joe Smith finished ahead of Uehara, two of which didn’t accumulate enough saves to really consider them a closer. So despite tumbling a bit down the closer totem pole, Uehara finished as the 11th closer in the Y! game and I miss out on this prediction.

0-for-3, woof again.

7. Jacoby Ellsbury will not be a top-15 outfielder in 2014

Ellsbury put forth a fine first season in the Bronx. He stayed healthy, saw a spike in homers (16 – only seven at home, nine on the road, which somewhat surprised me) and swiped 39 bags. He slashed .271/.328/.419, scored 71 runs and knocked in another 70. For his efforts, he finished the season as the 14th best outfielder in Y! game. Like Uehara above, I missed the prediction by one.

0-for-4, this is getting ugly.

6. Everth Cabrera or J.J. Hardy will finish ’14 ranked higher than Jean Segura

Everth Cabrera could only stay healthy enough to play in 90 games (391 PAs), but even when he was on the field, he wasn’t all that good. Cabrera managed to swipe 18 bags, which is where the bulk of his value stems from, but you have to get on base in order to steal them. He slashed just .232/.272/.300 in those 90 games, and his .272 OBP is the lowest its been since he entered the league. I guess his dip in BB% and over aggressive approach at the plate didn’t pay dividends.

Despite losing the power, J.J. Hardy put together a .268/.309/.372 season with nine homers, 56 runs scored and 52 RBI. Hardy’s efforts were good enough to finish ranked higher than Jean Segura in the Y! game. Both short stops finished the season as better values than Segura based on ADP. Segura went from the top SS spot in the Y! game in 2013, to the 21st spot in ‘14. He finished behind SS eligible guys like Brock Holt, Danny Santana, Justin Turner and Jordy Mercer. Nailed It!

1-for-5, on the board!

5. Gerrit Cole will outperform Jose Fernandez

Learning of Jose Fernandez’s injury was arguably the saddest day of the season for me. Unfortunately due to his injury Gerrit Cole (barely, 204) finished higher than Fernandez (220) in the end of season rankings at Y!. Cole finished the season 11-5 in 22 starts with a 3.65 ERA (3.23 FIP) and a 17.2% K-BB%. Don’t feel good about taking credit for this, but I guess I have to…

2-for-6

4. Ryan Braun, Khris Davis and Carlos Gomez will combine to go 80/50

I thought this prediction was bold-ish but the commenters gave some heat for it. Braun’s dip in production was clearly the culprit here. He finished with just 19 homers and 11 stolen bases in 135 games, about half of what he produced in 2012. Khris Davis didn’t steal many bags either (4), but he smacked 22 homers and pulled his weight for the purpose of this exercise. Carlos Gomez strung together another great season, hitting 23 long balls, swiping 34 bases and going 20/30 for the second consecutive year. He’s good at baseball, folks. All said and done though, the trio went just 64/49 and I miss out on another.

2-for-7

3. Two of Javier Baez, George Springer and Gregory Polanco combine to go 40/30

Each of these rookies got hot for a period of time after their call to the league. But not enough to pair with another to go 40/30. In fact, all three together (Baez 9/5, Springer 20/5 and Polanco 7/14) failed to reach the 40/30 mark. Ouch.

2-for-8

2. Jason Heyward and Justin Upton will combine to go 50/25

Alright, so maybe the 27 homer season for Jason Heyward is the outlier here. In 253 games since then, Heyward has only hit 26 homers. (Going to look deeper at this during the offseason). So Heyward’s 11/20 with Upton’s 29/8 only get me to 40/28. Short on the power and another one in the loss column for me.

2-for-9

1. David Price will not be a top-20 starting pitcher in ‘14

Nope. He definitely finished as a top-20 starting pitcher this season. He finished 15-12 with a 3.26 ERA (2.78 FIP) and a 23.1% K-BB% in 34 starts between Tampa Bay and Detroit. Price finished as Yahoo’s ninth best starting pitcher. I’m apparently bad at this.

2-for-10

Bonus Prediction: Billy Hamilton adjusts fairly well to the bigs, steals 50+ bags with a .315+ OBP.

Hamilton did swipe 56 bags, but only managed to get on base at a .296 clip. Another prediction I got half right.

Had a real tough go around with the predictions this year due to injury and rookies. I plan on wording my predictions a bit more carefully next season and plan to leave the rookies out of it – it’s pretty hard to project the call-ups without knowing exactly when they will get their chance. All-in-all, 2-for-10 is not good, the Mendoza Line for predictions. So, fire away…





In addition to contributing to the RotoGraphs blog, you can find Alan at his own site, TheFantasyFix.com and follow his nonsense on Twitter @TheFantasyFix.

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Rob
9 years ago

Take a look at some of the other bold predictions revisited. Compared to your peers you are pretty good at this.