The Rockies are Projected to Win this Many Games in 2019
MLB fans got a little tease of the season last week when Seattle and Oakland played internationally, but the rest of the teams are all gearing up for official Opening Day this Thursday. With lots of moves happening across the board during the off-season, 2019 should be an exciting year for fans and teams alike. For those with their eyes on the Rockies, the team will certainly be looking different - sans players like CarGo, LeMahieu and Parra, but will the recent changes have an impact on how they stack up this season?
It's impossible to predict the future, and with 162 games a lot can happen, however there's always preseason projections that fans can use as an indicator of how their team ranks among the rest. Fortunately, there's people out there who do the hard part for us, combing through and comparing hundreds of different MLB stats to come up with, what they feel, are accurate assumptions of how the season could play out. Here's what some of the sources are saying about the Rockies win totals for 2019:
Las Vegas Casinos
Vegas is all about taking risks and making bets, and with Caesars Palace being the first sportsbook to release 2019 MLB win totals, we'll use their odds that came out in January as a loose prediction. They say that the Rox are going to win a total of 82 games this season with he Dodgers topping the National League at 95 wins.
CBS Sports
CBS Sports put out their preseason rankings about a month after Las Vegas released theirs, but share the same thought that the Dodgers will likely be on top of the NL West, with the Rockies falling into second with 80.5 projected wins. Furthermore, CBS believes the Rox only have a 19% chance of making the playoffs, and just a 3.6% chance of winning their division...yikes, but as the great Yogi Berra used to say, "It ain't over 'til it's over."
RotoChamp
The fantasy baseball app, RotoChamp, also has the Rockies finishing with the second most wins in the National League West, predicting a record of 81-81 for the season.
Baseball America
There's definitely a common trend among the standings, the Dodgers winning the pennant, with the Rockies coming in at #2 (*rolls eyes*). Baseball America agrees, and while they don't have exact numbers in the wins/losses categories, they do give props to one Rockies player in particular, claiming that Arenado could take home the award for National League MVP.
Bleacher Report
The Bleacher Report is predicting similar standings to how last year ended for the NL West, with the Dodgers in first, Rockies in second, Arizona in third, and then the Giants finishing on top of the Padres rather than the other way around. They believe the Rockies will finish with a record of 86-76, the most wins predicted for the Blake Street Bombers thus far.
PECOTA
An acronym for Player Empirical Comparison and Optimization Test Algorithm, PECOTA is a baseball projection system, known for forecasting team records for the season to come. Their predictions are pretty similar to the others, Rockies coming in second in the NL West with a final record of 85-77.
Keep in mind, these are simply predictions and a lot can change during the season. Hopefully, the Rockies are able to slide past the Dodgers and come out on top. In 2018, the Rockies finished with a record of 91-71.