The division previews continue with the NL East. This year uses a different form of evaluation. Rather than the previous year’s WAR, a crude runs created per game is calculated from Musings Marcels projections for both batters and pitchers. I then average these for the core of the team. The nine or ten position players, the five starting pitchers, and the closer. I weight the pitchers as 90% starters, 10% closer. The selection of players comes from the FanGraphs Roster Resource.

The bottom line is a Core Winning Percentage based on the RC/G of the core batters and core pitchers using the Pythagorean method. You can see the spreadsheet with the data here.

Note that the core winning percentage is going to be high, often the core is going to be over .500. We are basically looking at the best players on the team. Don’t take that as a prediction of team winning percentage, take it as a way to compare teams in a division.

Atlanta Braves

• Position Player RC/G Average: 6.37
• Pitcher RC/G Average: 4.37
• Core Winning Percentage: .681

The Braves pretty much stood pat on the position player side of the team, replacing centerfielder Ender Inciarte with Cristian Pache. It’s something first place teams tend to do; the lineup works, so why tinker? Ronald Acuna, Jr. and Freddie Freeman both project to over eight RC/G, and with two superstars like that there’s plenty of room for a defensive player like Pache.

The pitching is solid, led by Mike Soroka and Ian Anderson. Soroka returns to action today from an injury, so he will start the season in spring training mode. The pitching core RC/G against might be even better if Drew Smyly can repeat his home run improvement of 2020. His project is based mostly on the 2018-2019 season in which he got hammered with the long ball. So there is upside on that number.

Will Smith tops the depth chart as the closer, and he projects to the lowest RC/G at that position in the division.

The Braves are very good on both sides of the ball, and will fight in an improved division for another first place finish.

Miami Marlins

• Position Player RC/G Average: 5.28
• Pitcher RC/G Average: 4.75
• Core Winning Percentage: .553

The Marlin surprised the baseball world with a second place finish in the NL East despite a team that looked poor on paper, and was then wiped out by a team-wide Covid-19 infection. In a way, it was the nightmare scenario in which a team is destroyed and the AAA squad moves into place at the major league level. The Marlins should have been playing at replacement level, but kept on winning.

I don’t believe this will happen again. The 162 game season should be the great equalizer. Apart from Jazz Chisholm cracking the starting lineup, the core position players remain very similar to the core that was supposed to play last season. No one is an offensive standout, the best being Brian Anderson at 5.86 runs per game. We’ll see if the veterans get replaced with prospects as the season gets underway and the Marlins can save a year of service time.

The pitching is on par with the offense, and young. This should be a season where this group gets a chance to experiment and learn. In a couple of season they could mature into a very good rotation

For now, in a stacked division, it looks like a return to last place for Miami.

Philadelphia Phillies

• Position Player RC/G Average: 6.03
• Pitcher RC/G Average: 4.72
• Core Winning Percentage: .620

The Phillies also stood pat on the position player core, only replacing the poor hitting centerfielder Roman Quinn with the better hitting Adam Haseley. That group averages 6.03 RC/G, third in the division. Bryce Harper leads the way with a projected 7.45 RC/G, and no one is the position player core sits below five RC/G.

The Phillies trot out two excellent starters in Aaron Nola and Zack Wheeler, but the rotation behind them is the weak spot on the team. Zack Eflin brought his K rate over 10 per 9 IP in 2020, so if he can sustain that over a full season, the Phillies rotation would look a lot better.

This is a pretty good team, and likely will be in wild card contention.

New York Mets

• Position Player RC/G Average: 6.56
• Pitcher RC/G Average: 4.27
• Core Winning Percentage: .703

The Mets project to rival the Dodgers offensively. The only weak spot in the position player core comes at catcher, with James McCann set to project to 4.85 RC/G. The seven other position players project to over six RC/G, with Pete Alonso, Jeff McNeill, and Brandon Nimmo over seven RC/G. Their 6.56 average is the best in the division. It is going to be tough to hold this offense at bay.

Jacob deGrom leads the pitchers with a 2.99 RC/G against, the lowest value seen for a pitcher so far. With the level of support he should get, the Mets might win 26 of deGrom’s 32 starts. The rest of the rotation is fine for that level of offense, giving the Mets a .703 core winning percentage, highest in the division.

Note that despite the Mets owning a great core, they may not beat out the Dodgers for home field due to the difference in toughness of opponents. Given the core winning percentages of their opponents, we can use the Log5 method to calculate how the Mets should do in the 76 games against the NL East, and the Dodgers in the 76 games against the NL West. The Mets most likely outcome would be 44-32, while the Dodgers figure to go 52-24 in intradivision play. That’s an eight game advantage for the Dodgers due to the quality of the division.

They may not be the favorites in the league, but the Mets are the easy favorites for the division.

Washington Nationals

• Position Player RC/G Average: 6.00
• Pitcher RC/G Average: 4.59
• Core Winning Percentage: .630

The Nationals own an inconsistent core. Among the position players in the division, they start the player with the highest project RC/G, Juan Soto (9.81), and the player with the lowest project RC/G, Josh Harrison (3.94). They have a great 1-2 punch at the top of the rotation with Max Scherzer and Stephen Strasburg, but one of the worst backs of the rotation with Jon Lester and Joe Ross.

With all that, there is still enough great to come in with the third highest core winning percentage in the division. The team won’t wear out opponents, but they won’t go down easily either. The easy fix would see Carter Kieboom tear up AAA again, then return to the Nationals and help push the team into the playoffs.

Predictions

Here is how I see the probabilities of the teams winning the division.

• New York Mets 40%
• Atlanta Braves 35%
• Philadelphia Phillies 12%
• Washington Nationals 11%
• Miami Marlins 2%

I am making the Mets and Braves closer than I might otherwise, just because the Mets have to prove to me they stopped being an organization that screws up. The GM scandal did not help. I also put the Phillies ahead of the Nationals because I the consistency of the Phillies more than the extremes of the Nationals. Take your pick. I don’t believe the Marlins run of good fortune will continue until the prospects start making more of a dent in the majors.