30 Teams in 30 Days 2018 01 New York Yankees

Normally in the weeks leading up to Opening Day, I would fill this space with unique and thought-provoking analysis of the upcoming baseball season. This year was a little different, because I've been busy editing videos for my first ever video game simulation of a Divisional All-Stars Tournament, which you can check out on my YouTube channel. The rest of my free time was spent tracking information for my comprehensive baseball database, including rosters, transactions, and of course fantasy rankings.

But now, with all my lists up to date (as of Opening Day on Thursday), and seeing as it's the first day of April (at least on the west coast), a month that has 30 days, which is coincidentally the same amount of days as MLB teams, I'd like to start one of the most ambitious features this blog has ever seen: 30 Teams in 30 Days! I'll start with the Yankees, a team whose two star sluggers would have adorned the cover of my Sports Illustrated baseball preview issue, if I didn't live in the Los Angeles market. So without further ado, here's a chart based on New York's projected lineup from said magazine:

Fifth Starter

Beyond the offensive firepower, the first thing to mention about this lineup/rotation is the lack of depth - not in the organizational sense, but rather in terms of the list itself. In years past, the SI lists included not just the projected lineup and a full five (5) pitchers in the starting rotation, but also two bench players (or three for teams in the DH-less National League), and up to two relief pitchers beyond the closer. This year, I guess there were budget cuts and they couldn't scrounge up enough analysts to complete a full roster or something? Either way, I turned to the FanGraphs positional power rankings to fill in some of the gaps.

80% of this rotation was already set before veteran lefty CC Sabathia was re-signed to be the fifth starter after his long-term pact expired, as homegrown lefty Jordan Montgomery will  stick around as SP4. Not only is Montgomery younger and thus more controllable / 20x cheaper than Sabathia in terms of salary, he's also ranked ~20 spots better on MLB.com's player preview (185 vs 228) AND he's projected for more Wwins Aabove Rreplacement on FanGraphs (2.1 to 1.6)

Bullpen

This is the one area that I've bemoaned the loss of the most in the way these Sports Illustrated previews have gone. The role of Bullpens beyond the "Closer" has achieved more recognition lately, in terms of front offices signing contracts as well as statisticians, so it's not a one-horse show. And nobody has as many bullpen horses the Yankees, topping the FanGraphs Ppositional Ppower Rrankings as a group. With former closer David Robertson (287), setup Dellin Betances (272), long reliever Chad Green (291), and middle reliever Tommy Kahnle (379) the Bronx Bombers have five total relievers (including Chapman) ranked in MLB's top 400. I'm not going to check, but I'd be willing to bet that's the most of any team in the league.

All-Acquired Factor

The Yankees made the biggest splash of the offseason when they made a blockbuster trade for NL MVP Giancarlo Stanton (and his massive contract) to pair with AL Rookie of the Year Aaron Judge in their outfield/DH mix, giving them two of 2017's top three offensive fantasy scorers. (Charlie Blackmon and his Coors Field-inflated stats was #1) All this maneuvering occurred while New York was trying to stay under the luxury tax threshold, which prompted the proposed strategy of letting cheap prospects Gleyber Torres and Miguel Andujar man second and third bases, respectively. But in a reversal of sorts, GM Brian Cashman went out and traded for super utility type Brandon Drury for the hot corner, and then took advantage of the collapsed free agent market to sign Neil Walker at a bargain rate.

Rankings Changes

Since it's a bit of a chore to manually input all those rankings into my database, what with more than 800 players previewed by MLB.com, I only update them twice per season: once when Spring Training games start, and again on Opening Day. This gives me two data points, roughly a month apart, by which to compare how the projected fortunes of certain players shifted over the course of the preseason. I shaded those rankings red, to mimic the color I give to players on the ten day disabled list. The presence of DL10 member Greg Bird on SI's list shows that the magazine was published before a recurrence of the foot problem that sidelined him most of last year. His ranking fell the most since Spring Training, but Neil Walker's also took a hit, curiously AFTER he got rescued from a long trip through free agency.

Song

Theme from "New York, New York" - Frank Sinatra version

This might be a little on the nose, seeing as they play this song in the stadium after every Yankees win. UPDATE: I just learned through research on something called Wikipedia, that this song is actually played after EVERY New York AL home game. I also learned that this Kander & Ebb song was originally performed by Liza Minelli in a Martin Scorsese movie? And that they used to play Sinatra's version after a Yankee win and Minelli after a Yankee loss? That's a sick burn, Yankees. Liza's version isn't that bad...

Colossus

Another reason I've been neglecting this blog is because I've been playing and re-playing the Shadow of the Colossus re-master on PS4, as it's pretty much the epitome of what I mean whenever I say Games as Art. And as with most art, I've begun thinking about it through the lens of other stuff that I care about, which led me to try to find an MLB team to compare to each of the 16 Colossi in the game. And I think the 2018 Yankees would be best compared to Colossus #1, who some in the gaming world call Valus, and who appears on the cover of the original PS2 version of the game. Both this guy and the team are built to cause as much damage as possible: for the Yankees, it's to baseballs, using bats, and for this wandering giant, the target is that little guy Wander, and his weapon is a much more intimidating giant club. Also, as Simon Miller of TMR remarks somewhere in this playthrough video, this first colossus is one of the most memorable in the game, which corresponds to the recognizability of the Yankees as by far MLB's most accomplished team, in terms of world championships.


So this is the start of a feature I hope will continue to its inevitable conclusion. Each entry likely won't have the same attention to detail as this one, and they obviously won't all share the same categories - we're only just going to cover more than half the league as far as Colossi. And while I will try to be on time with posting, and will make my best effort to stay ahead of the game, don't think I won't backdate entries to stay on "schedule" if I have to. At the very least, I hope these little previews will help keep track of some of the top storylines as this season goes on. Happy Easter!