The Final Standings As of March

For what it's worth, below are Baseball Prospectus's projections for the 2012 season.

Keep in mind that projections are not predictions. They are derived by aggregating the expected performances of each individual player and his projected playing time. Each player projection is a meld of his past performance and the experiences of players like them in the next year of their career.

BP runs a million season simulations and averages them for the numbers you see here.

NL East

Atlanta Braves            88  74  .543

Philadelphia Phillies    88  74  .543

Miami Marlins              87  75  .537

Washington Nationals 83  79  .512

New York Mets            78  84  .481

NL Central

St. Louis Cardinals      88  74  .543

Milwaukee Brewers    86  76  .531

Cincinnati Reds          85  77  .525

Chicago Cubs              74  88  .457

Pittsburgh Pirates      72  90  .444

Houston Astros          62  100 .383

NL West

San Francisco Giants     86  76  .531

Arizona Diamondbacks  85  77  .525

Colorado Rockies           80  82  .494

San Diego Padres           79  83  .488

Los Angeles Dodgers      78  84  .481

AL East

New York Yankees           93  69  .543

Boston Red Sox              88  74  .543

Tampa Bay Rays              86  76  .525

Toronto Blue Jays           77  85  .474

Baltimore Orioles            73  89  .451

AL Central

Detroit Tigers          85  77  .519

Cleveland Indians     80  82  .494

Chicago White Sox   78  84  .481

Minnesota Twins      73  89  .451

Kansas City Royals    67  95  .414

AL West

Texas Rangers          99  63  .611

Los Angeles Angels   88  74  .543

Oakland A's               73  89  .451

Seattle Mariners       70  92  .432

The Texas projection shocks me, particularly losing C.J. Wilson and expecting a decline in performance from Josh Hamilton and perhaps some of the rest of the rotation. BP foresees big things from Japanese import Yu Darvish and the Texas offense, which it projects to outscore the Angels by 207 runs.


On the other end of the spectrum, it's hard to overstate how little the projection thinks of Houston. To lose 100 games, teams usually experience multiple breakdowns, injuries and unexpected bad play. This projection says the Astros will lose 100 if all goes according to plan. That means a bad season in Houston could mean 110 losses.


The projection sees the Yankees and Red Sox both crushing the ball, but New York doing a much better job of run prevention. (Andy Pettite's return makes little difference in that equation.) It also projects that the Blue Jays' pitching is even more odious than the Orioles', but less putrid than both the Twins' and Royals'. The system has little reverence for the AL Central in general.


With the departure of Roy Oswalt and serious regression from Vance Worley, BP sees the Phillies' rotation as a three-man All-Star Team. It rates the Giants' pitching staff as 19 runs superior, though that may all be ballpark.


These standings suggest rock-'em, sock-'em, top-to-bottom slugfests in the NL East and West, and a three-way dogfight in the NL Central. Not so much in the AL, where the projections, like the Watergate reporters, follow the money.
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