So I'm sitting here looking at the Yankees' PECOTA Depth Chart and conceptualizing...right now, the Yankees are essentially "missing" these players, through either disability or peculiar inability:
| Name | 2008 Projected VORP |
| Rodriguez | 62.2 |
| Jeter | 35.2 |
| Posada | 33.2 |
| Cano | 29.7 |
| Hughes | 16.1 |
| Kennedy | 22.0 |
All told, that's about 1.2 runs per game that the Yankees are missing...."missing" as in either allowing or not scoring, depending. It's 198.4 runs over replacement level lost were this to continue all year.
Thoughts:
1) Girardi is keeping the Yankees at .500 in the ultra-tough AL East through smoke, mirrors, and sheer force of will. I really, really hope that he gets fired before Hank realizes how good he is.
2) The Yankees were projected at 96 wins by BP. Every eight games that this continues, scratch one win from that projection. They're already approaching three games under that pace...if these factors continue for, say just sixteen more games (a 15-game DL plus one), we're looking at roughly a 91-win Yankees team in 2008.
A "91-win team" will win between 87 and 95 games roughly two-thirds of the time, IIRC, winning more or less a sixth of the time.
But it looks as if it'll take a few more than 91 wins--probably more than 95 wins--to take the AL East this year. I'd suggest that the Yankees are in very real danger of not making the ALDS this year unless a few of these superstars and highly-touted young pitchers turn things around.