An organization in turmoil, the Mets nonetheless have the assets to make the turnaround on a short time frame. It’s hard not to like the new management in place, and a new stadium in that market with those resources – the pain can’t continue can it?

Present Talent – 78.33 (t-16th)

Mets Season Preview

Future Talent – 65.00 (t-26th)

Mets Top 10 Prospects

Financial Resources – 76.54 (18th)
Baseball Operations – 72.50 (t-16th)

Overall Rating – 75.79 (21st)

New York Met fandom, self-mutilation be thy name. There’s something about following a team that hasn’t won in a while that turns you against them in a strange way. Doom and gloom settle in, and cynicism abounds. New GM? Ah, he’ll screw it up. New manager? Well he’s not a true Met. New pitchers on the cheap? Yeah, they’ll be injured by May. New stadium? Oh, doesn’t matter if the team sucks. Money to fund one of the most expensive rosters in the game? Yeah, but for how long?

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The boom or bust cycle in Florida isn’t currently coming up roses. Will they find revitalization on the backs of their young players once again?

Major League Talent – 77.22 (19th)

Marlins Season Preview

Minor League Talent – 75.00 (t-20th)

Marlins Top 10 Prospects

Financial Resources – 62.00 (30th)
Baseball Operations – 79.44 (17th)

Overall Rating – 72.88 (27th)

Some may quibble with this ranking for the Marlins, and maybe even point to some hardware and the team’s penchant for collecting young talent quickly. The problem with that line of reasoning is that the hardware wasn’t earned so recently any more, and the young talent coming up in the pipelines right now isn’t as elite as it has been in the past.

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Looking back to last season, it’s easy to be struck with the embarrassment of riches that was the crop of rookie talent. Particularly in the National League, where Mike Stanton and Jason Heyward gave us tantalizing glimpses into the future, it seemed that youth ruled the day. Some have even hung the moniker “Year of the Rookie” on 2010. Have they done so appropriately?

If we cull the list of first-year position players to those that put in more than 150 At-Bats and put up better than a 105 OPS+, we’ve got a list of rookies that outperformed the general playing field enough to raise eyebrows. The players that stepped forward last year – other than Stanton and Heyward – were Carlos Santana, Logan Morrison, Danny Valencia, Ike Davis, Jon Jay and Pedro Alvarez. Though the list is a little uneven, even the worst of the group could easily become strong regulars on good teams.

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Two men, one position. The spring training meme is at least as old as spring training itself, and yet is it a really real thing? If we believe in the merits of large sample sizes – and we do here – why would we forget that approach when the teams head south for spring? Perhaps this idea of the positional battle is overblown.

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FanGraphs was well represented at the MIT Sloan Sports Analytics Conference, as this intrepid reporter trailed Daves Appelman and Cameron through the halls of the Boston Convention and Exposition Center in Boston this weekend. Unfortunately, baseball in general was not as well represented as it could have been. Maybe that’s not surprising for a conference started by Daryl Morey, GM of the Rockets, and scheduled during the beginning of spring training.

The baseball highlight of the conference – other than some question-spawning research projects about featuring eight starting pitchers or refining pitch-type values – was the Baseball Analytics panel. On the panel, moderated by SBN baseball editor Rob Neyer, were Sportvision Director of Baseball Products Greg Moore, Red Sox Director of Baseball Information Services Tom Tippett, San Diego Padres Vice President of Strategy and Business Analysis John Abbamondi, Arizona Diamondbacks Scout Joe Bohringer, and noted Author and Roustabout Jonah Keri. Strong group.

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Revamping a flagging team doesn’t happen in one offseason, especially an offseason spent discovering new and unhappy things about the owners’ finances. The ‘Sandyball’ era in New York has started, as Sandy Alderson got the old gang together and made wholesale changes in how the Mets are run. The new question is, ‘how long will it take for the new organizational philosophy to take hold?’ And can a team that made no obvious fundamental changes to the roster will their way to a different fortune in a new season?

The Starting Nine
SS Jose Reyes ^
CF Angel Pagan ^
3B David Wright
RF Carlos Beltran ^
LF Jason Bay
1B Ike Davis *
2B Brad Emaus / Luis Castillo ^
C Josh Thole *

* denotes left-handed hitter; ^ denotes switch-hitter

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Of the 41 seasons the Padres have enjoyed, last season may have been the most painful. Finding new ways to show the standings would only serve to find new ways to visually represent the excruciatingly painful time that was last September in San Diego. But if you’re a sucker for punishment, Chris Spurlock at Beyond the Box Score obliges. Now that the team has finally traded away their slugging first baseman and lost their (only?) big bat, they are in rebuild mode, right? Maybe, except that we’ve had that thought before.

The Starting Nine
RF Will Venable* / Aaron Cunningham
2B Orlando Hudson
3B Chase Headley^
LF Ryan Ludwick
1B Brad Hawpe* / Jorge Cantu
CF Cameron Maybin
SS Jason Bartlett
C Nick Hundley

*lefty batter, ^switch-hitter

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Fifty-six years in San Francisco and one World Series title. Most Giants fans are probably set for another fifty-six years, and for some it’s time to get greedy. Unfortunately, despite some fundamental flaws that existed even during their improbable title run, the team did little over the offseason to inspire confidence. Can their mix of flawed veteran position players and elite starting pitching fuel another run?

The Starting Nine

CF Andres Torres
2B Freddy Sanchez
1B Aubrey Huff
C Buster Posey
3B Pablo Sandoval
RF Cody Ross
LF Pat Burrell / Mark DeRosa
SS Miguel Tejada

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Earlier in the week, we looked at pitchers that performed, eh, just about as expected. Now it’s time to look at the batters, though we lack the same sort of luck-neutralized all-encompassing stat like FIP with which we can go to battle.

Ah, but do we? So much of our analysis of a batter’s state of ‘luck’ does stem from one statistic. All hail the mighty BABIP.

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It takes a little luck to be a real-life All-Star, or to win yourself some individual hardware. Both Cy Young winners outperformed their FIPs by a nice clip last season. Felix Hernandez (2.27 ERA, 3.04 FIP) and Roy Halladay (2.44 ERA, 3.01 FIP) also did this despite owning career ERAs and FIPs that were much closer together. Fantasy baseball sleeper lists are rife with those that underperformed their FIPs – Francisco Liriano (3.62 ERA, 2.66 FIP) and Yovani Gallardo (3.84 ERA, 3.02 FIP) might feature prominently.

But what about the players that suffered through a season of incredibly neutral luck? Should we not celebrate them somehow? They somehow managed to flip a coin a hundred times and get fifty tails. That seems worth… something.

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