Astros Off to Fast Start
What if I told you Houston leads MLB in batters fWAR?
After an inauspicious first two games, the Astros righted the ship and took the final two from the Angels and then swept the Red Sox at Daikin with surprising bats and excellent starting pitching from Lance McCullers, Jr. and Hunter Brown.
How surprising have the Astros bats been? Well, they lead MLB in batters’ fWAR.
Now THAT is surprising.
A while back, I posited that Yordan could make up to a 10-game difference if he was healthy. So far, that looks closer to true than hyperbole, and it could even be an understatement if he continues at this pace.
Next up, 10 games in 11 days on a roadie to Sacramento, Colorado, and Seattle (4 games), with the day off coming between Colorado and Seattle on April 9, which will be the last off day until April 23.
Updated Projections
Just 4.3% of the way through the season, all projections should be taken with a grain of salt.
As an illustration of how our rolling projections work, let’s take a look at a comparison of Altuve’s preseason projection and his current projection.
Jose’s hot early start has added 3 points to his projected average, 8 points to OBP and slug, and 16 points to his OPS.
An early home run bumps his current projection to 23, while his projected RBI remain at 68.
These projections are currently weighted 95.7% to preseason projections and 4.3% to actual season results.
The plan is to look at hot or cold players during the season to see how the season affects their updated projections as it goes on.
Quality Starts
The Astros have won both of their quality starts, but the problem (again, it’s early) is that they aren’t getting many.
Last season, the Astros won over 70% of their quality starts and less than 40% of games when they didn’t get a quality start.
It’s early, but they will fail if they only get 29% quality starts, a pace of 46 on the season.
Early Peak at Win Shares
I’ll pretty this up as the season moves along and put a chart to it, but wanted to share this early look at Win Shares for Houston.
Astros Expected Wins
From 0 to 106 in 6 games (getting shutout in game 1 means they were projected to go 0-162 after 1 game).
Early-season volatility is crazy. At this stage, this is nothing but laying the groundwork for a 162-game slog.
AL West Expected Wins
An early look at the AL West expected wins lines up this way: Astros, Rangers, Mariners, Angels, A’s.
Subjectively, that matches up with the early results for me.
Thanks for reading!