Turning Up the Baseball Spice, and my 2021 MLB Season Predictions

Today, I'm writing about some off-topic baseball stuff, so don't attempt to tie this to my music.  This is my personal opinions on baseball, and that alone.  Anyways, for those that are open-minded, feel free to read on.  If you're not open to my different baseball opinions, I'll advise you to please stop reading now.

Anyways, as I was monitoring the MLB Network and scouring their twitter for Top 10 lists, rankings, and players to vote, I decided to take the time to vote in my free time to rank players.  Of course, my votes turned out to bring out the Scovilles, as baseball Twitter was not nearly ready for my opinions on who's good or not, and some trolls even harassed and yelled me just for having different opinions.  

To the haters, I'll say: F#@! THAT NOISE!  

And now, going to the spicy take alert in: 3....2......1.....

About to drop you some hot sauce.  Here is one of my favorite songs.  Beastie Boys ft. Nas, "Too Many Rappers," from the Beastie Boys' album, Hot Sauce Committee Part Two.

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The Spiciest Take In Baseball.......?

It's my belief that the best players make other players better around them, and the best players succeed both in the regular and the postseason.  The problem with baseball Twitter is that they are too stubborn to listen to unconventional takes, and their baseball discourse is too much in the black and white, and we need to see more of the gray area.

I feel like there is a legitimate reason to pick a bone with Mike Trout, even though I know most of you will disagree, because you guys will just point to his advanced metrics and WAR numbers.  The dispute is not if he is a superstar.  He is.  But, let me just say, he, to me, is overrated, and the fact that virtually everyone thinks him to be a no doubt the best center fielder in the game speaks volumes as to how overrated a player he truly is, especially considering he has never truly mattered in playoff baseball.  

Just some of the stuff for you guys to think about, these numbers from Mike Trout that you may not know about (Postseason batting courtesy of Baseball-Reference, and Clutch stats via Fangraphs):

Mike Trout has only been in one postseason in 2014, and he went 1 for 12 against the Kansas City Royals, and he went up against pitchers such as Danny Duffy, Jason Vargas, and Jason Frasor.  Your vaunted "G.O.A.T." couldn't get multiple hits against Ned Yost and the 2014 Kansas City Royals.  The Angels didn't even get to the 2020 postseason, where the top half of the league basically made the playoffs.  

Legends win titles.  Superstars are supposed to get their teams at least kind of far in the playoffs.  I know what you'll say.  "What about Ted Williams, Barry Bonds, Ken Griffey Jr., or Ty Cobb?"  Well, very good players are great on average.  Great players can excel in the most specific circumstances.  Situational baseball IS important, and in the playoffs, you need very good players and a strong team to come through.  There is something as an empty stats guy on a bad team, and that guy would be the type of guy who hits a homer when his team is down 8-1 to pad his numbers, but strikes out when his team needs one run with the game is on the line in the 9th inning.  

You may argue that a player only gets 4 or 5 at-bats, but he can still make those at-bats count, and he can still try to play well in the field on defense.  Defense is the other half of the game.  Great players can rise to the occasion.  

Let's put it this way.  It would be an asinine argument to have crowned James Harden from 2017-2020 as the "G.O.A.T.," because we all know LeBron James is better.  Even though Harden led the league in Win Shares and PER for years, his lack of playoff success exposes the flaws of his game and the teams he played on.   

In basketball, we know better than just to read a linear weights metric or any kind of all inclusive metric straight off, because they all have flaws in some way or another.  But in baseball, WAR is treated as infallible, when it is a metric created by humans who don't understand that baseball can be a game that can be won in different ways, especially in the postseason.  Thus, those human elements have to be included in the discussion of who the best player is.  Mike Trout fails in the human elements of the discussion, because there is a stark dissonance between his individual success and his team success.  Thus, you need to raise questions, not double down on answers said by a flawed metric.

So no, I don't consider Mike Trout the G.O.A.T., your precious WAR statistic is not infallible, because it is a theoretical metric created by man.  While Trout is still technically a "superstar," and I won't debate that because he is a superstar, but he is not the G.O.A.T, and he's got a long way to go before he arrives in that discussion along the likes of Hank Aaron, Willie Mays, Jackie Robinson, Bob Gibson, and others.  As for the center fielder rankings, I'd have preferred if they were to have put Mookie Betts in that list, because I'd have put Betts over Trout, because Betts has won, and also has consistently played well in both the regular and post season.  

You can keep your regular season numbers' guy (Trout).  If he is, that's cool.  Trout is very, very good at baseball.  That, I won't argue with.  He may be your favorite player, but he's not my favorite player.  But I'll stick to my old baseball favorites of Lou Brock, Bob Gibson, Stan Musial, Albert Pujols, and Ozzie Smith (great players who are in the Hall of Fame and who also won titles).  Also, some of my favorites, Rickey Henderson, another guy who was great and significantly impacted the postseason.

If you hated my soapbox, then my baseball opinions aren't for you.  Just know that I'm a fan of both great players and winning.  The St. Louis Cardinals have the second most titles in MLB baseball history, second to the New York Yankees.  So before you decide to get all up in my grill, I'm saying, I have a right to my opinion, and it's kind of a valid argument. 

The naysayers may say argue, that clutch rankings like David Eckstein better than Mike Trout.  So what?  Eckstein WAS clutch.  He was terrific in the postseason, and he had a very good hitting approach to the plate.  He'd wear pitchers out, and he'd make them go through a ton of pitches, and he'd find ways to get on base.  He produced in critical moments in the World Series.  That's why he was the World Series MVP.  He rose to the occasion.  Eckstein was very good for the Angels and the Cards.  I enjoyed watching him play.  So please, don't knock Eckstein.  He was a good player in his own right.

I'll go ahead and cut to the chase.  My prediction is that Mike Trout and the Los Angeles Angels won't be making the 2021 MLB playoffs.  If he can get them to win the ALDS, then sure, maybe I'll consider him the best player in center field.  But I don't think that's happening this year, and that probably won't happen the next year, either.   

Truly great players in major league baseball can dominate a playoff series, and their presence can be unstoppable every time they step into the batters' box.  Carlos Beltran in 2003 did this for the Houston Astros in his first postseason.  David Ortiz did this in 2013 in the World Series against the St. Louis Cardinals.  The effect Barry Bonds had was this: For a full series against a team, he could dominate and be unstoppable.  Mike Trout hasn't had this in a critical series or with meaningful stakes on the line.  So I can't accept him as the very best player in the game until he does this.

Great players should chase success, and rings are part of success.  You play the games to win, not just to pile up statistics that make you look cool.  Next time a player leaves your organization, don't blame the player, blame the organization and all of their infrastructure for not putting the player in the best place to succeed.  And if the player doesn't recognize if he's not in the best position to win, then it's on him, because players should want to win, and they should get fed up with losing.

Alright.  Your reactions may be:

T-Pain on the Hot Ones when eating the wings with hot sauce.  (via GIPHY)

Or maybe your reaction is....

From the Indiana Jones' Tomb Raiders of the Lost Ark (Pic via GIPHY).

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And now, on to my 2021 MLB Predictions based on my top 10 lists that you guys hate so much.

And....here is all of Baseball Twitter's reactions to my baseball takes.  (Pic via GIPHY, this was from the movie, Half Baked.)

My 2021 MLB Season Predictions:

I decided to rank teams based on this formula: 45% Hitters' Rankings, 45% Pitcher's Rankings, 10% Manager's Rankings.  I know.  Most people in the MLB stats community would probably frown at the idea of rating managers or thinking them to be valuable.  But managers are valuable, and their decisions can be beneficial or costly based on how well they manage their teams in games.

Here are my Rankings for the Team's Infield Rankings:

Here are my Rankings for the Team's Outfield Rankings:

Here are my Rankings for Pitchers:

Here are my complete positional rankings from all of the lists, and then I decided to rate some DHs and managers in my free time, too.

I'm not sure if you can read the above, so here is a more simplistic version of this:

Here are my projected standings in baseball for the time being:

In this model, here would be the projected 2021 MLB playoffs:

In the AL Wildcard game:

(4) Tampa Bay Rays would play against the (5) Minnesota Twins:  (4) Rays advance.

In the ALDS

(4) Tampa Bay Rays would play against the (1) Chicago White Sox: (1) White Sox advance in 5.

(2) New York Yankees would play against the (3) Oakland A's: (2) Yankees advance in 4.

In the ALCS:
(1) Chicago White Sox would play the (2) New York Yankees: (1) White Sox advance in 7.

It's a tough one, for some reason I believe in Lance Lynn.  He's won a lot of games, he's pitched quite well in the past 2 seasons, and technically the White Sox do have the reigning MVP in Jose Abreu.  Yoan Moncada and Luis Robert could be due for prime, breakout seasons. That said, the Yankees do have Aaron Judge and Gerrit Cole, but the Yankees have seemed to have a lot of talent, but they keep coming up short.  The Yankees seem to me to be a bit top heavy, whereas the White Sox seem to have stronger back-end players, and they seem to be a more well-rounded team top to bottom.  It does seem tempting to take the Yankees, though, but I'll go with the White Sox here.

In the NL side of the bracket:

In the NL Wildcard game:
(4) Los Angeles Dodgers would play against (5) Washington Nationals: (4) Dodgers advance.

In the NLDS:

(4) Los Angeles Dodgers would play against the (1) San Diego Padres: (4) Dodgers advance in 5.
(2) New York Mets would play against the (3) Milwaukee Brewers: (2) Mets advance in 4.

The Dodgers-Padres' series would be tough.  Padres have a lot of talent and upside, but Dodgers have experience on their side.  Mookie Betts and Clay Bellinger have been through the ringer, and I know Bellinger's name has been dragged through the mud, but he is a versatile player that can play 1B, CF, he's hit 45 homers, and he's won the NLCS MVP.  That's one more postseason award than Trout's ever won.  Some of you will point to Bellinger's career playoff batting average as something to laugh at, but trust me, Mike Trout's career playoff batting average is twice as worse.

In the NLCS:
(4) Los Angeles Dodgers would play against the (2) New York Mets: (4) Dodgers advance in 6.

2021 World Series Predictions:

(4) Los Angeles Dodgers would play against the (1) Chicago White Sox: I'll pick the Dodgers in 6.

You've gotten this far in the article.  Your thoughts are probably.....

Parks and Recreation and Scott Pilgrim vs. the World's Aubrey Plaza was on The Hot Ones (Pic via GIPHY).

Now, the St. Louis Cardinals' fan in me wants me to say, SCREW those predictions I just made, the Cardinals are going to win 90-100 games, and they're winning it all!  

Alright, now take a deep breath.

Nolan Arenado and Paul Goldschmidt are good, but I have hesitations about the team's pitchers, outfielders, and general hitting approach.  Going all the way in run prevention is a bold choice.  I do think they still could compete to win the NL Central, though there will be a lot of competition they'll face this year.

I'm keeping my expectations my low, so that they'll have a low bar to clear, and hopefully maybe the Cards will make the playoffs and even win the 2021 title.  I've made my predictions, but I'm a Cardinals' fan, and they're my team I'm rooting for.  

Anyways, let's have a fun baseball season, as fun as it can be.