Matthew, when you predict two starts for Hill, I'm really hoping that you mean Shawn, not Aaron.  On the other hand, if Aaron is pressed into the rotation, it might be interesting to see what happens...

The scoring encourages people to over-estimate the number of starts that each pitcher makes.  If you project 40 starts for every pitcher, you'll do very well.  Another way to score it is the total difference between projected and actual with the lowest figure winning.  So, for instance, if I project Marcum at 28 and Zep at 20 and Marcum starts 30 and Zep starts 18, that would count as 4 against me. 

My figures are Romero 28, Marcum 26, Zep 24, Eveland 17, Purcey 13, McGowan 13, Tallet 11, Cecil 7, Morrow 7, Mills 7, other pitcher not on the 40 man- 9. 

Mike: I see what you mean. The other way to handle it, I guess, is to make it a rule that your total number of starts guessed has to be 162, no more. What's everyone think?

--

Actually it was neither Shawn nor Aaron Hill, but Benny Hill.

ohhh I like this challenge.  Here goes:

Ricky Romero        30
Shaun Marcum        30
Mark Rzepczynski    20
Brian Tallet        8
Dana Eveland        16
Brandon Morrow        16
David Purcey        6
Jesse Litsch        15
Brett Cecil        10
Brad Mills        2
Shawn Hill        2
Chad Jenkins        2
Kyle Drabek        4
Robert Ray        1

Darn it I forgot Mr McGowan.   I'm just totalling 162 starts.  No more no less.  I think it should keep people from over-estimating when you only have a set number of games to fill...

Final draft list:

Ricky Romero        28
Shaun Marcum        28
Mark Rzepczynski    20
Brian Tallet        8
Dana Eveland        14
Brandon Morrow        16
David Purcey        6
Jesse Litsch        15
Brett Cecil        8
Brad Mills        2
Shawn Hill        2
Chad Jenkins        2
Kyle Drabek        4
Robert Ray        1
Dustin McGowan        8

Because (a) I am lazy and (b) I want to see how the math works out (our quirks out, anyway), I am predicting that your 2010 Jays will be the first MLB team in about sixty-leven years to use only six starting pitchers in a season. With no particular rhyme nor reason to the assignations, here's the breakdown:

Ricky Romero: 38
Shaun Marcum: 25
Dustin McGowan: 25
Dana Eveland: 27
Brandon Morrow: 27
Brett Cecil: 20

If this happens, the Jays will be very, very, very good.

And no, it ain't happening. But I'm entered!

Mick, if it happens that way, it'll make Romero the first guy to start 38 games in a season since Charlie Hough in 1987.

I see - with my little eye - in order of most starts:

Marcum 28         (Opening Day Roster)
Romero 28         (Opening Day Roster)
Rzepczynski 26  (Opening Day Roster)
Morrow 20         (Opening Day Roster)
Cecil 15              (Opening Day Roster)
McGowan 10
Stewart 10
Tallet 10
Drabek 8
Litsch 4
Richmond 2
Purcey 1

The most likely reason IF I'm wrong is that I'm no friggin' good at this type of thing. The second most likely reason I could be wrong is 'cause IF this is even NEAR right - then how come I'm not a multi-zillionaire betting on baseball?

By starting Day 2011 I see Stewart and Drabek and McGowan on the opening day roster with Jenkins up by early after the all-star break. Gonna be a lot of quality surplus arms round the Rogers Centre come 2011.  AND - by mid 2012 I see Henderson Alvarez getting into the Starting Rotation.

BY THE WAY: What follows is a quote from Baseball America's 2010 Almanac (page 351):

Our quote of the year, by low Class A Lansing pitching coach Antonio Cacers, on the emergence of righthander Henderson Alvarez. "Even the other teams are like, "Who's pitching tonight? Alvarez? We're (screwed),'" Caceres said. "'Henderson Alvarez? We're (screwed) today.' That's how good he is. All of a sudden he throws his changeup 3 - 2 and they're like 'Where'd that come from?' The hitter ain't got no chance."

It scares me how much people assume Dana Eveland is going to pitch.

Hm. Good question and a fun game. I'll get in early and then check my work to see if I need to edit before opening day:

Romero 25
Marcum 25
Rzepczynski 20
Morrow 20
Tallet 10
Purcey 10
Litsch 10
Cecil 10
Mills 5
Eveland 5
Drabek 5
Ray 5
Stewart 5
Hill 2
Jenkins 2
Perez 2
Richmond 2

Ugh. I hope that sums to 162 because I can't seem to add at the moment. Long day. Fried brain. Need some rest.

Marcum 25
Rzepczynski 24
Morrow 22
Cecil 20
McGowan 18
Romero 17
Litsch 11
Purcey 11
Janssen 3
Drabek 3
Mills 3
Ray 3
Richmond 2

Romero 27
Morrow 24
Cecil 19
Marcum 16
Rzepczynski 16
Purcey 15
Eveland 9
Mills 6
Hill 4
Tallet 3
Stewart 7
someone not in the organization as of Opening Day 16

Not a clue. Injuries and guys suddenly dropping or improving makes this a total crapshoot, especially this year.

Well, might as well look silly...
Marcum: 32
Romero: 32
Rzep: 32 (yes, I think he'll stick)
Morrow: 22
McGowan: 22
Cecil: 10
Drabek: 10
Litsch: 2

Yeah, no chance but fun to play with.

Romero 29
Rzepczynski 24
Marcum 20
Tallet 19
Morrow 15
Eveland 8
Litsch 12
Cecil 11
Mills 6
McGowan 3
Purcey 1
other not in organization - 13

I wish I didn't have Tallet so high but with Cito saying only Frasor, Downs and Gregg are assured bullpen spots (can't even say his buddy Carlson is a lock regardless).  Leads me to believe he will have Tallet open the year in the rotation.  Not sure why since he should be a fallback and is more valuable in the pen as a longman. 

Marcum 32
Romero  32
Rzepcynski 30
Morrow 29
Cecil  27
Litsch 6
Tallet  3
Halladay 1
Bruce Walton 1
Ace The Mascot 1

The scoring might work better if there was two components:

A.  You get say 32 points for correctly naming a pitcher who makes a start.
B.  Then you subtract from that multiple the absolute deviation from your prediction

So if you named 8 starters correctly, you'd get 32 * 8 = 256.  Then if you missed their starts by 19, 17, 31, 9, 4, 29, 6 and 18  You'd get 256 - (19+17+31+9+4+29+6+18)= 123

If the math is wrong sorry I did it in my head.

Wouldn't you need to have a penalty for incorrectly naming a pitcher who doesn't end up making at least one start? Or if you guess Norm Charlton, say, will make a comeback and make 35 starts, an extra penalty for naming someone who actually made no starts to make a bunch? Or else you'd have some wisacre name forty pitchers making 300 starts just trying to rack up the highest possible starting score. True, they'd lose a lot of those points in the subtractions, but on first glance, it just seems like the formula is missing (e.g. not accounting for) something.

Norm Charlton -- that'd be interesting. Predicting 30 starts from Zombie Cory Lidle would be an interesting prediction too, I think. Hopefully both fall into the "not currently in the organization" category.

I'm all in favor a penalty for naming someone who doesn't make a single start a penalty for all the starts named. This is good. Also, leaving off a pitcher who will make a ton of starts ought to be penalized (my preliminary projection excluded McGowan as I'd like to see if he can get through most of ST without needing to retire or needing robotic/zombie implants in his right arm).

There is a beauty in the simplicity of the current scoring (as I understand it) take the pitcher who could reasonably be in a Jays uniform, add a fudge factor category and make it add up to 162. Nothing against other scoring systems, but there is some beauty in keeping it simple, I think.

I created an account just to play this game.

Romero - 32
Marcum - 30
Morrow - 29
Rzepcynski - 20
Tallet - 10
Janssen - 10
Purcey - 10
McGowan - 9
Litsch - 7
Stewart - 3
Drabek - 2

The easiest way is how many of the 162 starts did you predict correctly.

So if a guy has 20 starts and you picked him for 30 you get +20 and have a max possible of 152 as 10 starts will be wrong no matter what (the 10 you said pitcher X would start that he didn't). If you project, say, 1620 games instead then all figures are divided by 10 (so instead of 30 starts it would be 3).

That sounds more precise, but not necessarily more correct. Your method allows the 162 limit to be dropped, but I like that limit. I'm not particularly fond of the "not currently in the organization" category. I'd remove that before relaxing the limit to allow people to predict ten times the number of games the Jays will actually play.

However, there is always the hope that something catastrophic could happen and the season be shortened to 154 games (and someone hits 62 HR). That'd really mess with this game and the game in general. But if the "big September thing" almost 9 years ago only put baseball on pause, I doubt we'll see anything that catastrophic this year.

Predictions, something always goes wrong. On another note, anyone else watching the Yankees first ST game on mlb.tv? Starts soon.

On the whole I think the easiest thing to do is just make everyone stick to 162 games and have done. So that's what we'll do. (At the moment, andrewkw and christaylor are each off by one, but there's no point in making a big stink about it, because what are the odds that one point will make a difference in the end?) So, anyone who hasn't entered yet: make sure your predictions add to 162.

Wouldn't you need to have a penalty for incorrectly naming a pitcher who doesn't end up making at least one start?

Yes I left off the -32 for each starter you miss....  that makes my idea a bit more sensible :).

Romero 33
Marcum 29
Morrow 32
Rzep 10
McGowan 10
Eveland 32
Drabek 15
Tallet 1

Magpie's recent thread reminded me I needed to enter this...

Romero 32
Marcum 28
Rzepczynski 24
Morrow 15
Tallet 12
Cecil 12
McGowan 9
Eveland 7
Drabek 5
Litsch 4
Stewart 4
Mills 2
[Not on 40-man] 8