You'll have to forgive #Nats signed Max Scherzer: "I just started laughing. I'm like: 'Where's my ring?'"
— Mark Zuckerman (@ZuckermanCSN) February 25, 2015So yeah, there is no pumping the breaks in Washington, not after the splash they made with Scherzer this winter. In fact, our new preseason power rankings have Washington as the second-best team in baseball behind only the Los Angeles Dodgers. The rest of the NL East, however, should avert their eyes.
The rankings below are based on each team's nERD score, which is a numberFire-specific stat that calculates how many runs a team would be expected to defeat a league-average team by on any given day on a neutral site. For more details, click it here.
So, let's take a look at how the NL East shapes up in 2015.
1. Washington Nationals
nERD: 0.58 | Projected Win-Loss: 91-71 | Division Odds: 80.9% | Playoffs Odds: 87.1%
No team in baseball is favored to win their division more than the Nationals. The Dodgers are next-closest at 70%, but Washington really benefits from the state of the rest of the division, which doesn't place a team any higher than Atlanta at number 21 in our rankings.
The addition of Scherzer gives the Nationals a Super Rotation that also features might not be ready for Opening Day after offseason neck surgery. Atlanta signed the 31-year-old to a four-year, $44 million deal in one of the more unexplainable signings of the winter. will be given the opportunity to hold the job, but if he struggles, Franco will get the nod some time in late May.
As for the rotation, it's led by walking trade rumors Cole Hamels and Cliff Lee, both of whom will probably be gone by the time the team reaches July. The Phils made a nice addition in the offseason by signing Chad Billingsley to a one-year, low-risk, high-reward deal. They also signed veteran Aaron Harang to a one-year contract and retained veteran Jerome Williams to round out the rotation with second-year man David Buchanan acting as insurance and long relief. But that is one motley crew after Hamels and Lee.
The one area of strength is the bullpen with closer Jonathan Papelbon still closing games and grabbing his junk. Young fireballer Ken Giles reminds some of a young Kimbrel, and lefty Jake Diekman is murder against left-handed hitters. They form a very nice trio at the end of games, and the Phils are loaded with other hard throwers although many of them also struggle to control it.
It's hard to see a path for the Phils to be anything but cellar dwellers in 2015, and our projections see them as the second-worst team in baseball with only the Arizona Diamondbacks slated for fewer wins. Frankly, it's better than I thought it would be.
But at least the rebuild has finally begun in Philadelphia.