Updated Projections - Game 4 of 162
Still searching for that W
Composition of Projections:
2024 Actuals: 2.5%
Preseason Projections: 97.5%
Another one-run loss, which drops the Astros to 0-4 on the season and 0-2 in one-run games.
Season Projections
Yainer projects to .301/.339/.534. As I pointed out yesterday, he hasn’t hit as a DH, which will be something to look for throughout the season.
Three non-save situations for Hader, though to be fair, yesterday was a tie score in the 9th.
Stress Index
Bear with me on this as it’s a work in progress.
The goal is to capture the stress put on a pitcher, rather than just a number of pitches.
The calculation is really quite simple: Number of pitches x aLI, where aLI is the average leverage index.
Not a bad start from France, as he was unlucky with soft contact.
I was wrong about Abreu being down yesterday, but he’s definitely down today, along with Hader and Scott (in my mind), so that leaves Pressly to close, if needed.
The Game Turned When
Top 9,2 on 2 out, Juan Soto singled to left (Liner). Gleyber Torres scored, moving the Yankees win probability from 46.5% to 81.6% (+35.1%).
Projected Standings and Luck Rankings
Coming in the next few days as data gaps are filled.
Took a peek this morning and while it’s pretty ugly the Astros are not the worst.
More on Friday.
The Home Run Project
Charting the Leverage Index of every Astros home run.
Altuve with a Crawford Box Special.
The Grumpy Ump
New name, same info.
NOTE: OVERALL FAVOR column is changed to reflect Astros only. In other words, a +0.24 in favor of Yankees is reflected as -0.24 here.
Information, except for O/U, courtesy of umpscorecards.com, just presented in a way that is easier for my brain to process.
Stat(s) of the Day
Astros starters are 5th in ERA (2.66) and FIP (3.19), but 17th in xFIP (4.79).
Astros relievers are 24th in ERA (6.89), 30th in FIP (7.40) and 11th in xFIP (4.50).
Astros Projections was founded to avoid overreactions to small sample sizes, but 2.5% into the season my eyes tell me Jose Abreu is lost on the fastball and BaseballSavant agrees, showing Abreu 0 for 7 with 2 strikeouts on fastballs, with an xBA of .113 through 4 games.
He hasn’t been good on anything, but he’s seen 22 four-seamers, on which he’s recorded a Whiff% of 45.5, xBA of .039 and a Hard Hit% of 0.0.
Could it just be a slow start? Absolutely.
Last season on four-seam fastballs Abreu batted .236 and slugged .393 with a 24.3% Whiff rate.
That gulf between Whiff% year over year indicates this is likely a small sample outlier or a cliff from which he will not recover.
Time will tell.
Thanks for reading!