Mike Podhorzer’s 2016 Bold Predictions – A Review

The regular season is officially in the books! Sad faces galore. I hope all of you, every single one of you, won a league. Hopefully, it was thanks to some of my bold predictions (which, as I type this, I still haven’t looked at since the preseason). I have no idea how I did, so let’s be surprised together. For a referesher on my thought process behind each prediction, check out the original article.

1. Stephen Piscotty hits 25 home runs

Oh so close! You all know I kinda loved Piscotty heading into the season given his power upside, but oddly I didn’t end up rostering him in the two leagues he was available. He turned into a very solid contributor, but just missed hitting my bold prediction by three homers, finishing with 22. His HR/FB rate did rise nearly two percentage points, but I think his issue may be that he doesn’t pull enough of his fly balls. If he changes his approach a bit, he could be a future 30-homer guy.

0 for 1

2. Juan Nicasio strikes out 150 batters

Maaaaan, so close again, which is funny, because Nicasio was actually pretty bad, despite his 138 strikeouts and 26.9% strikeout rate. After a thrilling spring training, he ended up making just 12 starts and then got booted from the rotation. He’s a perfect example of why spring stats, while holding some predictive value, still need to be largely ignored given the small sample size and varying level of competition.

0 for 2

3. Xander Bogaerts ranks outside the top 7 shortstops

Can we delete everything negative I said about Bogaerts heading into the season? I did get something right, and even shared the opinion during my MLB Network debut — that Bogaerts should increase his power this year, but that his batting average would decline. Directionally, I was correct, but his power blossomed moreso than I expected it to. And he also swiped a couple more bases than he did last year! I figured he would be down into the single digits. Based on CBS values, Bogaerts ranked 30th overall and fourth among shortstops.

0 for 3

4. Every member of the Royals opening day rotation (Edinson Volquez, Ian Kennedy, Yordano Ventura, Chris Young, Kris Medlen) will post a sub-4.00 ERA

Final ERAs:

Edinson Volquez – 5.37
Ian Kennedy – 3.68
Yordano Ventura – 4.45
Chris Young – 6.19
Kris Medlen – 7.77

This was probably the worst outcome anyone could have ever predicted. There was a pitcher for every single ERA level, 3.00, 4.00, 5.00, 6.00, and 7.00! That’s pretty crazy. Medlen missed most of the year with a shoulder injury, so that’s likely to blame, but I have no idea what happened to Young (the magic wore out?) and Ventura is one of the most baffling/frustrating starting pitchers in baseball at the moment. He’ll probably be cheap next year, so he should be worth gambling on again.

0 for 4

5. Zack Cozart ranks inside the top 10 among shortstops

I’m not even going to bother counting how many shortstops finished ahead of Cozart in CBS’ rankings, but with all the players qualifying at the position that surprised this year, he was beyond the top 20. Injuries hurt as he was limited to just 508 plate appearances, despite hitting first or second the vast majority of the time. But this prediction was based on my belief that the power surge he displayed last year was real, and he did indeed hold onto most of those gains. In fact, he essentially performed as I expected when he was on the field, but the strong performances by everyone else simply made him a less attractive option relatively speaking.

0 for 5

6. If you roster Victor Martinez, you get nothing! You lose! Good day sir! More specifically, V-Mart is worthless

This was bad. His poor 2015 could have been chalked up to injuries that you might figure he bounces back from, or old age. I bet on the latter. I guess it was the former. V-Mart swatted the second most homers in a season during his career, which I just did not see coming. There’s a big red flag though — he just posted the highest SwStk% and K% marks of his career and he’ll be entering his age 38 season next year. Ya know what that means? I might be tempted for a repeat of this prediction.

0 for 6

7. Zack Greinke ERA above 3.50

There we go, one correct! Looking back, I could have even been bolder by predicting an ERA above 4.00, but 3.50 was bold enough given that his ERA hadn’t even exceeded 2.71 since 2012 and hadn’t been above 3.50 since 2011. He missed some time to injury and the BABIP suppression “skills” he displayed in 2015 magically disappeared from his toolbox this year. Plus, his strikeout rate fell to its lowest mark since 2010. At age 33 next year, it will be interesting to see how far he falls in drafts.

1 for 7

8. Wil Myers goes 25-90 (homers-RBI)

YES! This was the only prediction I remembered making. Well, the homer part, totally forgot about the RBI part, but just squeezed by on that one (28 HRs, 94 RBI). I noted that his batted ball distance had surged in 2015 and he had serious HR/FB rate upside, and sure enough, he posted a career high mark. He also stayed healthy all year, easily setting a new career high in plate appearances, which was obviously one of the biggest drivers of his success given his injury history. The steals were a complete shock and it’s hard to bet on a repeat there.

2 for 8

9. Corey Dickerson ranks outside the top 50 outfielders

According to CBS’ values, Dickerson finished as the 64th best outfielder. Three in a row! The argument against Dickerson was a simple one — that moving from the top hitter’s park in baseball to one of the top pitcher’s parks was going to kill his offense. And it did. But while his HR/FB rate did decline, his ISO actually remained relatively stable. Also surprising is that his strikeout rate barely rose, as I expected it to increase more significantly. The biggest driver of his offensive collapse is the BABIP, which fell from .367 to just .285. It’s often forgotten that the thin air at Coors does wonders for BABIP and boosts line drives. He might be slightly undervalued next year, but don’t expect much of a rebound.

3 for 9

10. Rubby de la Rosa outearns Shelby Miller

Ha, what a hilarious prediction! But the underlying idea here was both that I was a fan of RdlR and quite bearish on Miller. Rubby missed much of the year to injury, but posted intriguing skills when he took the mound. The results were underwhelming as he posted just a 4.26 ERA, but he could be a sleeper again if health cooperates. Miller was a complete mess this year, even getting demoted to the minors. I literally could have chosen just about any pitcher and would have been correct. Most expected a decline in performance and jump in ERA, but no one would have figured an ERA above 6.00 was in the cards! His strikeouts disappeared and that special BABIP suppression skill he supposedly had evaporated. Who knows what to expect from him next year.

4 for 10

—

I’m fairly certain that this was my best bold prediction year ever. I think I’ve gotten three correct once, but definitely not four. Even cooler is that the Piscotty prediction was a win in spirit and given how cheaply Cozart was getting rostered for, he likely delivered a profit to his owners as well.