When it comes to the bottom-line total of wins and losses, rebuilding can be a difficult time for fans, even with the knowledge that it's part of a long-term plan for future success. The Houston Astros and Chicago Cubs have their forever flags, but Houston did see attendance drop from 3.1 million in 2004 to 1.6 million in 2012, while even the attendance of the Wrigley faithful has had its ups and downs, dropping below 3 million from 2012 to 2015. But coming out of that rebuild? That's an exciting time for a team and for fans, the team shifting toward prioritizing current wins rather than future ones.
By the ZiPS projections -- and I agree with the computer on this one -- two franchises stand at or near the brink of completing their rebuilds. Just as no analyst is perfect, no rebuilding team does a perfect job, but these teams have gotten themselves near relevance without making major blunders that could have derailed their long-term plans.
Philadelphia Phillies
Based on win-loss record, the 2017 season might have felt to some as if the Phillies lost ground, dropping back to 66 wins from their 71-win 2016 season. In reality, the team continued to progress toward contention, actually improving its so-called Pythagorean record, based on runs scored and runs against, to 72-90 from 62-100.
Even more important than just the progress in wins is that the team took its time to answer questions about its players, giving them important information on moving forward. And as such, you see the outlines of what a contending Phillies team will look like. Tommy Joseph demonstrated that he's not likely the future at first base, but Rhys Hoskins showed off his power potential, and while that show is moving to the outfield with the signing of Carlos Santana, that's two large positional questions answered.
The deck has also been cleared for J.P. Crawford to get a full shot at shortstop in the majors, and while the question about what kind of player Maikel Franco will be has been answered more negatively than positively, the point is that the Phillies have given him 400 games to show what he can do. If the Phils had responded to his struggles by paying some random 30-year-old journeyman as a stopgap, they wouldn't have learned anything about Franco.
There is still a lot of work to do in the rotation, but the Phillies have done the hardest part: finding their ace. Aaron Nola is not the traditional ace pitcher in that he doesn't overpower batters like a Roger Clemens, but the sinker/changeup/curve combination was enough to rank him seventh in the National League in WAR among starting pitchers. That wasn't a fluke; his 2016 ERA was 4.78, but his 3.08 FIP suggested bigger things on the horizon. In terms of projected career WAR remaining, Nola was just outside of the top 10 coming into 2017, and he now ranks sixth among pitchers, between Clayton Kershaw (Kershaw is better but five years older) and Carlos Martinez.
The Phillies' financial situation gives them the ability to Think Very Big in the next few years as they hit contention. The team's deal with Comcast, both for rights fees and the equity stake in the regional sports network, came in at a cool $5 billion over 25 years. Resisting the temptation to lock in players ahead of time, before the team's needs are known for certain, the Phillies could literally add $100 million a year to payroll if they choose to do so.
ZiPS projects the Phillies to flirt with .500 in 2018, slightly under but with a realistic chance to win more games than they lose for the first time since 2011. So like the Twins in 2017, when ZiPS projected them in the high 70s but with a realistic playoff shot, a Phillies playoff run in 2018 would not be shocking.
But let's jump a little forward to what the roster will look like in 2019 and 2020 solely based on which players they currently have, with the projected WAR totals for their allocated plate appearances. Obviously, this omits players they do not yet have on the team, but that's kind of the point, to see what they look like based just on their current assets:
These projections put the Phillies, just with the roster they have and without any big breakouts from the prospects (these are mean projections, after all), at 82-83 wins or so. For those unfamiliar with where replacement level is, thanks to a sabermetric détente between FanGraphs and Baseball-Reference a few years ago, replacement level has been set at 47.7 wins (so that there are 1,000 in baseball yearly).
Win totals in the mid-80s tend to be the position at which additional wins are most valuable, in terms of playoff contention, so not only do the Phillies look like they have the ability to spend aggressively, it also looks smart to do so.
Note that two of the three largest holes in the projected Phillies lineup are at right field and third base. A little bird tells me that there may just be some highly sought after options via free agency at these positions.
Just for fun, here's a look at some of the top free agents over the next two seasons and their projected WAR for 2019 and 2020 (as of today):
2019: LHP Clayton Kershaw if he opts out (5.3 in 2019, 5.1 in 2020), 3B/SS Manny Machado (4.9 in 2019 and 2020), RF Bryce Harper (4.8 in 2019 and 2020), 3B Josh Donaldson (4.9 in 2019, 3.9 in 2020), LHP Dallas Keuchel (2.8 in 2019, 2.7 in 2020).
2020: LHP Chris Sale (5.8), 2B Jose Altuve (5.2), 3B Anthony Rendon (3.9), 1B Paul Goldschmidt (3.4), RHP Justin Verlander (2.9), LHP Madison Bumgarner (2.6), LHP Cole Hamels (2.5).
And then there's Mike Trout after 2020 ...
Atlanta Braves
The Phillies aren't the only team nearing the end of its rebuilding period in the NL East. The other team ZiPS sees as having major breakout potential from the rebuilding set in the next two years (after which the White Sox and Padres also become interesting) is the Braves.
Atlanta's path to success isn't mapped out exactly the same as that of the Phillies. The new stadium does give team ownership more ability -- or perhaps, more accurately, more willingness -- to invest more heavily in the team during its competitive phase. Still, it's unlikely that the Braves will be spending as much as the Phillies will at their respective peaks.
But what the Braves do have is an incredibly deep farm system, with a few players with solid shots at superstardom. That's not to say Philadelphia doesn't have a good farm system as well, but in neither breadth nor depth can it match Atlanta's organization.
Suffice it to say, the ZiPS projections love Atlanta's prospects, ranking the farm system second in baseball behind only the Yankees, who have shown a maddening ability to snag players they want without giving up any of their most valued prospects.
I wasn't always a believer that Atlanta would stay the course, given the team's expressed desire to have a good team on the field to coincide with the opening of SunTrust Park. In the end, however, the team avoided doing anything that actually hindered the rebuilding process. Sure, the organization drastically overrated the contributions of players like Matt Kemp and Nick Markakis, but in the end, none of that has had real long-term consequences.
Let's repeat what we did with the Phillies above, with the Braves best projected players for 2019 and 2020.
Just on talent already within the organization, the projections put the Braves on track to get up into the mid-80s over the next two seasons. And just as the Phillies' projections underestimate what they can do because of the wallet, these numbers underestimate how high the Braves can get.
Just below the top five starting pitchers in the projections there are a shockingly large number of other prospects, like Kyle Wright, Joey Wentz, Ian Anderson, Max Fried and holdover Mike Foltynewicz, all of whom project just below making that depth chart above. These are mean projections, but the Braves will have the luxury of picking the players for their rotation who exceed their projections. From their own field of alternatives, it's unlikely that the fifth-best starter in-house won't beat that Teheran 1.7 WAR projection in 2020.
That's a significant advantage. While the best five mean projections for the rotation add up to only 11 wins, ZiPS actually places the over/under for WAR from their best five starters at 15 WAR in 2020.
The other source of upside for the Braves is that a few of these positions are unlikely to be filled by the players listed above. I don't think Dustin Peterson or Alex Jackson is likely to be the future of the Braves at right field or catcher -- they are simply the best-projected players in-house (because Tyler Flowers, Kurt Suzuki and Markakis are all unsigned beyond this season). And a Braves team heading into contention is likely to add a bullpen arm or two to what it currently has available.
The fact remains that with such a deep farm system providing cost-controlled talent, the Braves could go after Bryce Harper if they wanted to. As with the Phillies, right field looks to be a weak spot in the lineup. Baseball-Reference's payroll estimates have the Braves at only $81 million for the 2019 season and at $103 million (with arbitration awards and the like) for Freeman's final season in 2021, so one ginormous contract wouldn't remotely send the team payroll into the stratosphere.
With the Washington Nationals looking at some heavy losses in the next few seasons and the Phillies and Braves ascending, the NL East may look a lot different in 2020 than it does right now. And if things work out according to plan and we get to watch two upstart elite teams beating each other up for the next five years? That'll be a lot of fun.