Wins Above Replacement (FanGraphs)
	2011 Actual	2012 Projected*****	2013 Projected******	2014 Projected	2015 Projected	2016 Projected	2017 Projected
Gordon	6.9	5.6	5.4	4.9	3.6	3.1	2.2
Moustakas	0.7	4.1	3.6	3.9	3.9	3.6	3.4
Butler	1.8	3.2	2.5	2.3	2.1	2.0	1.4
Escobar	2.2	2.8	2.3	2.1	2.0	1.8	1.3
Dyson	0.3	2.0	0.6	1.3
Perez	1.4	2.1	5.6	6.5	7.0	7.0	6.5
Cain	0.1	1.3	1.5	1.9	1.8	0.5	0.4
Abreu	0.0	0.3	0.9	0.9	0.8	0.6	0.5
Pena	0.5	0.0	0.0	0.0	0.0	0.0	(0.0)
Hosmer*	1.6	(0.5)	2.6	3.0	3.2	3.2	3.0
Giavotella**	0.0	(0.9)	0.0	0.0	0.0	0.0	0.0
Francoeur	2.9	(2.4)	(0.4)
Myers***			1.8	3.1	3.6	3.8	3.8
Starling****					0.7	1.8	2.0
Team Hitting Total	20.1	17.7	26.4	30.0	28.6	27.4	24.5

*Used 2011 as Baseline **Used 2011 as Baseline ***Used combination of Moose/Hosmer rookie seasons as baseline ****Used Moose rookie season as baseline *****Year-to-date Annualized (adjusted for expected playing time) ******Average of 2011 & 2012 WAR per game (double-weighted towards 2012) adj. for expected PT

First time posting and first time doing this sort of projection for baseball (do it 45 hours a week for my job). I used player ages and expected aging curves (http://baseballanalysts.com/archives/2010/06/war_aging_curve.php) to project what our lineup might produce over the next 5 years. There's a lot of math that you can't see (assumptions around how many games everyone will play), but I think this is a decent projection of how our lineup will look.

For 2012, I took year-to-date performance and expected playing time the rest of the way. 2011 isn't complete because I am only looking at players currently on the roster. The totals won't add up because I hid players like Chris Getz and Humberto Quintero, but they are included in 2012 totals.

For 2013, I took the WAR per game from 2011 (single weighting) and 2012 (double weighting) and multiplied that by their expected playing time plus an aging factor (see above). However, for Hosmer and Giavotella, I only used 2011 as a baseline.

For Hosmer, 2012 is just a lost season of development as far as this projection is concerned. For Gia, I don't particularly care whether it's him or Getz or Colon playing 2B, I'm assuming that we will at least get replacement-level production from that spot. Dyson and Pena were similar in that I don't know if it will actually be them playing, but we will have someone in their roles that will likely produce only marginal WAR.

I have Myers phasing in next year and playing 120 games at an average of Moose and Hosmer's 2011 seasons. Francoeur will lose PT as will Cain. I also have Starling coming in 2015 at Moose's 2011 levels. At that point, Cain becomes the 4th outfielder.

The conclusion:

• The lineup projects to improve by 12.3 wins in 2014 (the high point) over 2012. If we end up around 71 wins this year, that puts at 83 wins (assuming current levels in pitching). To be safe, let's say it takes 95 wins to make the playoffs. We need another 12 wins of improvement from the starting pitching (bullpen would do well to maintain its current pace).
• Salvador Perez projects to be our best player (probably not news to anyone, but the combination of his age and production bodes extremely well for the future). Now, I don't actually expect him to be a 7-WAR player, but that's what the methodology produces.
• None of Moose, Hosmer, and Myers break the 4-WAR barrier (I expect them to be better than this, so while Perez is overvalued here, these 3 may be undervalued).

I'd appreciate your feedback on tweaks I could make to improve this projection. I'd like to add in the pitching staff, but projecting Zimmer, Lamb, Duffy, etc. plus trying to guess at our free agency moves becomes more crystal ball than projection.