I don’t know why it looks like the Phillies “have no chance” against teams with a higher WAR, especially since there are only two teams with a value significantly higher. WAR just tries to assign a relative value to players on a scale against other players that also matches up to team performance.

Is there a win total for a team consisting solely of replacement-level players, such that you can add it to each team’s WAR to project each team’s actual total wins?

An underlying assumption in calculating team WAR is that the whole equals the sum of its parts, i.e., that team WAR is a linear function of individual WARs. I doubt that this is true, since it does not consider the synergistic effects of various player combinations.

For example, in constructing a lineup, the WAR total may be higher with a lineup of 9 sluggers than with a lineup combining guys with high OBPs and others with high slugging percentages, but the latter lineup may actually be better at producing runs.

For another example, a team filled with defensive stars at every position has more value behind ground-ball pitchers than behind high-strikeout pitchers; yet, simply adding individual WARS together would not reflect accurately the run-prevention capabilities of different defensive alignments.

Just brainstorming here.

I wonder…did the projection for Shane include his move to the 7 spot? Do injuries (Raul, Lidge, Romero) have much of an impact on these projections? Does the number for Polly factor in his new teammates?

Thanks again, PN, for putting these together. A very nice series of posts!

This is why I don’t like it when people count on WAR alone to decide a teams worth or talent , because they make it look like the Phillies have no chance against teams with significantly larger WAR projections, and that’s really not a completely accurate way to look at things.

I appreciate all the effort you have put into this projects, but it freaking KILLS ME when it ends up leading to more whining from Phillies fans about just how much “better” the Yankees and Red Sox supposedly are. Even the Braves and Rockies have higher WAR projections than us!

I just hope that people will understand that WAR is only ONE way of indicating how good a team is, and that they will be smart enough to look at other factors as well.