Expectations for the "Solid Six"

[DrungoHazewood]

Hyperbole of course. Something you should be familiar with.

Even at my most ludicrous I shy away from assigning groupthink to the whole board.

[calmunderfire]

Even at my most ludicrous I shy away from assigning groupthink to the whole board.

Yes, but when you have your own original thoughts you can get blasted for not falling victim to groupthink.

[DrungoHazewood]

Yes, but when you have your own original thoughts you can get blasted for not falling victim to groupthink.

Only if you fail to produce evidence that you are right and everyone else is wrong.

[Can_of_corn]

Only if you fail to produce evidence that you are right and everyone else is wrong.

Absolutely.

Heck I posited having an entire pitching staff conditioned to go through a lineup once each and I didn't get blasted. Some posters, like Drungo, didn't think my idea was viable but I wasn't blasted.

[weams]

Absolutely.

Heck I posited having an entire pitching staff conditioned to go through a lineup once each and I didn't get blasted. Some posters, like Drungo, didn't think my idea was viable but I wasn't blasted.

He just wanted to use the phrase "groupthink".

[waroriole]

He just wanted to use the phrase "groupthink".

That seems to be popular among people who can't back up their ideas.

[Frobby]

I'm calling these guys the "solid six" because they played almost every game this year and are under contract for next season.

Chris Davis (28 years old next season)

2013: .286/.370/.634, 53 HR, 138 RBI

2012: .270/.326/.501, 33 HR, 85 RBI

Career: .266/.327/.512, 35 HR, 98 RBI (162 game average)

J.J. Hardy (31 years old next season)

2013: .263/.306/.433, 25 HR, 76 RBI

2012: .238/.282/.389, 22 HR, 68 RBI

Career: .260/.312/.428, 23 HR, 76 RBI

Manny Machado (21 years old next season)

2013: .283/.314/.445, 14 HR, 71 RBI

2012: .262/.294/.445, 7 HR, 26 RBI

Career: .279/.309/.435, 16 HR, 76 RBI

Matt Wieters (28 years old next season)

2013: .235/.287/.417, 22 HR, 79 RBI

2012: .249/.329/.435, 23 HR, 83 RBI

Career: .255/.319/.420, 21 HR, 81 RBI

Adam Jones (28 years old next season)

2013: .285/.318/.493, 33 HR, 108 RBI

2012: .287/.334/.505, 32 HR, 82 RBI

Career: .279/.322/.460, 24 HR, 82 RBI

Nick Markakis (30 years old next season)

2013: .271/.329/.356, 10 HR, 59 RBI

2012: .298/.363/.471, 13 HR, 54 RBI

Career: .292/.360/.441, 17 HR, 81 RBI

I ran a group comparison for 2013 vs. 2012, in which I tripled Manny Machado's numbers for 2012 (he played only 51 games), and marked up Nick Markakis' numbers by 50% (he played only 104 games) to make them more comparable. Here's how that looks:

2013: .271/.320/.459, 157 HR, 531 RBI

2012: .268/.320/.457, 151 HR, 477 RBI

Career: .272/.325/.449, 136 HR, 494 RBI (simple average of the six players' 162-game averages)

Overall, I think it's unrealistic to expect to get anything more from these six players as a group in 2014 than we got this year. We can hope that Markakis and Wieters rebound towards their career norms and that Manny continues to grow, but Davis is highly likely to decline and Hardy at 31 figures to decline a little. Jones probably is who he is at this point.

Most importantly, the chances that all six of these guys stay completely healthy in 2014, as they pretty much did this year (except for Manny's injury with six games left to play), are not very good. The Orioles were very fortunate that these six core guys did not have a single trip to the DL among them.

So, if the team is to make improvements, it's going to have to come from the 2B/LF/DH spots and the bench, not from expecting our core guys to contribute more than they did this year. I'll leave you with this:

"Solid Six" .271/.320/.459, 157 HR, 531 RBI in 3995 PA

"The Rest": .238/.294/.378, 55 HR, 188 RBI in 2149 PA

Here's a rough estimate of the various projection systems for the "solid six" in 2014 (.779 OPS in 2013):

ZiPS: .773 OPS (3,782 PA)

Steamer: .772 (3,471 PA)

Oliver: .776 (3,600 PA)

Bill James: .791

RotoChamp: .799 (3,200 PA)

CAIRO: .781 (3,343 PA)

I say "rough estimate" because I'm assuming an equal number of PA for all six for purposes of this estimate. If I weighted Machado and Markakis a little more, and Wieters and Hardy a little less, the results might be slightly different, but not much.

As an aside, I seriously doubt these six players will have 3,995 PA, as they did last year. ZiPS projected them for 3,782 PA, which would leave room for maybe 50 days on the DL for the Solid Six. If that's what we get, we'll still be pretty fortunate. RotoChamp's 3,200 PA estimate could mean up to 200 games on the DL. That seems pretty pessimistic, but not unrealistic.

[NCRaven]

Here's a rough estimate of the various projection systems for the "solid six" in 2014 (.779 OPS in 2013):

ZiPS: .773 OPS (3,782 PA)

Steamer: .772 (3,471 PA)

Oliver: .776 (3,600 PA)

Bill James: .791

RotoChamp: .799 (3,200 PA)

CAIRO: .781 (3,343 PA)

I say "rough estimate" because I'm assuming an equal number of PA for all six for purposes of this estimate. If I weighted Machado and Markakis a little more, and Wieters and Hardy a little less, the results might be slightly different, but not much.

As an aside, I seriously doubt these six players will have 3,995 PA, as they did last year. ZiPS projected them for 3,782 PA, which would leave room for maybe 50 days on the DL for the Solid Six. If that's what we get, we'll still be pretty fortunate. RotoChamp's 3,200 PA estimate could mean up to 200 games on the DL. That seems pretty pessimistic, but not unrealistic.

I'd like to see four of those six get a few more days off, but for rest, not injury. Manny seemed worn down by the end of the seaso; Hardy and Markakis are at points in their careers where a little more rest might help their overall games; and Wieters definitely should get more breaks if Clevenger can provide some offense as the second catcher. Davis plays a less demanding position and seems to be a horse, so I don't mind him playing 162 and Jones is young enough and in good enough shape that it doesn't seem to hurt him. So if Machado, Markakis and Hardy each got a week's work of games off and Wieters another week (in addition to what he got this season), that would account for nearly 30 games worth of innings less. Hopefully injuries don't cause another 170 games, although I'm sure they'll account for some.

[Frobby]

So, the Oliver projection system has projections for the next five years. I thought it might be interesting to see how they projected the Solid Six over that period.

BA	OBP	SLG	HR	RBI	wOBA	WARHardy						0.262	0.308	0.426	21	80	0.319	3.40.260	0.308	0.417	20	78	0.315	3.20.255	0.303	0.404	19	75	0.308	2.80.249	0.298	0.394	18	63	0.302	2.50.244	0.293	0.372	16	60	0.291	1.9Jones						0.278	0.317	0.480	27	92	0.344	3.90.274	0.313	0.477	27	90	0.341	3.80.271	0.311	0.458	25	88	0.332	3.30.267	0.308	0.455	25	86	0.330	3.20.264	0.305	0.439	23	83	0.322	2.8Markakis						0.268	0.329	0.365	9	59	0.308	0.70.266	0.327	0.358	8	58	0.304	0.50.262	0.324	0.352	8	57	0.301	0.30.260	0.322	0.351	8	55	0.299	0.20.255	0.317	0.338	7	54	0.292	-0.2Wieters						0.244	0.301	0.428	23	80	0.315	3.00.243	0.301	0.421	22	79	0.313	2.90.239	0.299	0.411	21	77	0.308	2.70.236	0.295	0.403	21	75	0.304	2.40.232	0.293	0.392	20	73	0.299	2.2Davis						0.279	0.368	0.600	45	120	0.408	4.90.276	0.367	0.593	44	117	0.405	4.80.271	0.363	0.576	42	114	0.398	4.40.267	0.361	0.560	40	110	0.391	40.264	0.358	0.548	39	107	0.385	3.7Machado						0.288	0.323	0.443	14	73	0.333	3.90.293	0.329	0.456	15	77	0.341	4.30.296	0.333	0.466	16	79	0.347	4.60.296	0.336	0.472	17	80	0.350S	4.80.297	0.338	0.470	17	80	0.351	4.8Totals						0.270	0.324	0.457	139	504	0.338	19.80.269	0.324	0.454	136	500	0.337	19.50.266	0.322	0.445	131	490	0.332	18.10.263	0.320	0.439	129	469	0.329	17.10.259	0.317	0.427	122	457	0.323	15.2

In 2013, the groups hit .271/.320/.459, 157 HR, 531 RBI, .337 wOBA, 22.9 WAR. Bottom line, they're declining assets, but still pretty good throughout the period (except Markakis, who Oliver doesn't like at all). Only Machado is expected to get better, and he won't make up for the other five. Bottom line, you need to have other players who are getting better (or, are better than the players we have now in the other spots).

[Frobby]

I'm calling these guys the "solid six" because they played almost every game this year and are under contract for next season.

* * *

I ran a group comparison for 2013 vs. 2012, in which I tripled Manny Machado's numbers for 2012 (he played only 51 games), and marked up Nick Markakis' numbers by 50% (he played only 104 games) to make them more comparable. Here's how that looks:

2013: .271/.320/.459, 157 HR, 531 RBI

2012: .268/.320/.457, 151 HR, 477 RBI

Career: .272/.325/.449, 136 HR, 494 RBI (simple average of the six players' 162-game averages)

Overall, I think it's unrealistic to expect to get anything more from these six players as a group in 2014 than we got this year. We can hope that Markakis and Wieters rebound towards their career norms and that Manny continues to grow, but Davis is highly likely to decline and Hardy at 31 figures to decline a little. Jones probably is who he is at this point.

Most importantly, the chances that all six of these guys stay completely healthy in 2014, as they pretty much did this year (except for Manny's injury with six games left to play), are not very good. The Orioles were very fortunate that these six core guys did not have a single trip to the DL among them.

So, if the team is to make improvements, it's going to have to come from the 2B/LF/DH spots and the bench, not from expecting our core guys to contribute more than they did this year. I'll leave you with this:

"Solid Six" .271/.320/.459, 157 HR, 531 RBI in 3995 PA

"The Rest": .238/.294/.378, 55 HR, 188 RBI in 2149 PA

So far, here is a composite, weighted average projection from the OH voters who have responded to my poll:

Davis .908 OPS (79 votes)

Jones .825 OPS (63 votes)

Markakis .777 OPS (56 votes)

Machado .749 OPS (26 votes)

Wieters .744 OPS (43 votes)

Hardy .742 OPS (41 votes)

Overall, nothing too wacky there. If you weight those according to last year's PA, it gives a composite OPS of .792, compared to .779 in 2013. That is probably a bit optimistic, but far from crazy. Of course, the bigger issue will be, how many games will they play compared to last year?

[Frobby]

Bump...

I'm calling these guys the "solid six" because they played almost every game this year and are under contract for next season.

Chris Davis (28 years old next season)

2013: .286/.370/.634, 53 HR, 138 RBI

2012: .270/.326/.501, 33 HR, 85 RBI

Career: .266/.327/.512, 35 HR, 98 RBI (162 game average)

J.J. Hardy (31 years old next season)

2013: .263/.306/.433, 25 HR, 76 RBI

2012: .238/.282/.389, 22 HR, 68 RBI

Career: .260/.312/.428, 23 HR, 76 RBI

Manny Machado (21 years old next season)

2013: .283/.314/.445, 14 HR, 71 RBI

2012: .262/.294/.445, 7 HR, 26 RBI

Career: .279/.309/.435, 16 HR, 76 RBI

Matt Wieters (28 years old next season)

2013: .235/.287/.417, 22 HR, 79 RBI

2012: .249/.329/.435, 23 HR, 83 RBI

Career: .255/.319/.420, 21 HR, 81 RBI

Adam Jones (28 years old next season)

2013: .285/.318/.493, 33 HR, 108 RBI

2012: .287/.334/.505, 32 HR, 82 RBI

Career: .279/.322/.460, 24 HR, 82 RBI

Nick Markakis (30 years old next season)

2013: .271/.329/.356, 10 HR, 59 RBI

2012: .298/.363/.471, 13 HR, 54 RBI

Career: .292/.360/.441, 17 HR, 81 RBI

I ran a group comparison for 2013 vs. 2012, in which I tripled Manny Machado's numbers for 2012 (he played only 51 games), and marked up Nick Markakis' numbers by 50% (he played only 104 games) to make them more comparable. Here's how that looks:

2013: .271/.320/.459, 157 HR, 531 RBI

2012: .268/.320/.457, 151 HR, 477 RBI

Career: .272/.325/.449, 136 HR, 494 RBI (simple average of the six players' 162-game averages)

Overall, I think it's unrealistic to expect to get anything more from these six players as a group in 2014 than we got this year. We can hope that Markakis and Wieters rebound towards their career norms and that Manny continues to grow, but Davis is highly likely to decline and Hardy at 31 figures to decline a little. Jones probably is who he is at this point.

Most importantly, the chances that all six of these guys stay completely healthy in 2014, as they pretty much did this year (except for Manny's injury with six games left to play), are not very good. The Orioles were very fortunate that these six core guys did not have a single trip to the DL among them.

So, if the team is to make improvements, it's going to have to come from the 2B/LF/DH spots and the bench, not from expecting our core guys to contribute more than they did this year. I'll leave you with this:

"Solid Six" .271/.320/.459, 157 HR, 531 RBI in 3995 PA

"The Rest": .238/.294/.378, 55 HR, 188 RBI in 2149 PA

This certainly turned out to be pretty prophetic. The "solid six" have had only 2809 plate appearances before today, and three of the six won't have any more this year. The group will end up about 1,000 plate appearances short of where they were last year. Thankfully, Cruz, Pearce, Schoop, Young, Joseph, Hundley and others have made major contributions. I'll do the full breakdown when the season's over.

[Spy Fox]

0/6 of the Solid Six are in the game tonight.

That lineup card sure looks weird without them.

[malkusm]

Great bump. And great predictions on your part.

We have to remind ourselves when nothing goes wrong, that in fact, a whole lot has gone right. You could make a thread with a similar thought process in this upcoming offseason about our pitching staff, and you'd not be wrong to reach similar conclusions, I think.

[Frobby]

Bumping this thread about the "solid six" of Davis, Hardy, Machado, Jones, Markakis and Wieters.

2013: .271/.320/.459, 157 HR, 531 RBI

2012: .268/.320/.457, 151 HR, 477 RBI

Career: .272/.325/.449, 136 HR, 494 RBI (simple average of the six players' 162-game averages)

Overall, I think it's unrealistic to expect to get anything more from these six players as a group in 2014 than we got this year. We can hope that Markakis and Wieters rebound towards their career norms and that Manny continues to grow, but Davis is highly likely to decline and Hardy at 31 figures to decline a little. Jones probably is who he is at this point.

Most importantly, the chances that all six of these guys stay completely healthy in 2014, as they pretty much did this year (except for Manny's injury with six games left to play), are not very good. The Orioles were very fortunate that these six core guys did not have a single trip to the DL among them.

So, if the team is to make improvements, it's going to have to come from the 2B/LF/DH spots and the bench, not from expecting our core guys to contribute more than they did this year. I'll leave you with this:

"Solid Six" .271/.320/.459, 157 HR, 531 RBI in 3995 PA

"The Rest": .238/.294/.378, 55 HR, 188 RBI in 2149 PA

This played out even more strongly than I expected. Here are the results from 2014:

"Solid Six": .264/.318/.416, 95 HR, 320 RBI in 2952 PA

"The Rest": .249/.301/.428, 126 HR, 361 RBI in 3178 PA

The Solid Six had about 26% fewer PA than in 2013, but their HR were down by 39.5% and RBI by 40%. The power drop was mostly on Davis and Hardy.

Of course, for 2015, the Solid Six are now the Familiar Five, with Markakis out of the mix. Their production in 2014 was .260/.310/.426, 81 HR and 270 RBI in 2242 PA. They will need to do a lot better than that in 2015 if the O's offense is to keep pace with the last two years.