The calm before the… calm?
November results
When we last checked in, we were trying to get the taste of a Dodgers-Yankees World Series out of our palate. There’s probably not enough mouthwash in the world for that. But there hadn’t been much in the way of D-backs information to move the needle over the month of October. The main news was probably that Brent Strom and the rest of the coaching staff on the pitching front would not return. But even there, it was hard to come to any significant conclusions as to how we should feel, while no announcement had been made about who would replace Strom and his colleagues. But here are the results, while we get our brains around the Dodgers finally winning an asterisk-free World Series.
- 0% – 1 (not confident in the slightest)
- 3% – 2
- 3% – 3
- 12% – 4
- 20% – 5
- 15% – 6
- 33% – 7
- 8% – 8
- 6% – 9 (very, very, VERY confident)
As you would expect, not a great deal of movement. The main thing that stood out was a breach in the expected bell-curve, with a peak in the “5” category, and then another one around “7”. Probably not meaningful, just a result of random fluctuation across the smaller number of votes – entirely expected, as we move into the off-season. Especially as people get all excited about the Suns and Cardinals. Bold prediction: both teams will end up disappointing you. History has shown them as the sporting equivalent of those emails from a Nigerian prince. Anyway, the average confidence did drop, but only by 0.14 points, holding just above six at 6.02, down from 6.16 in early October.
Below, you can see the breakdown for the past 12 polls’ results, followed by the line graph showing the trends over this and previous seasons.
December poll
While there has been news and transactions since last time for the Diamondbacks, I’d be hard pushed to say many moved the needle much. Most were largely as expected, such as player options being exercised or not, and Christian Walker declining the qualifying offer. The team did announce Strom’s replacement, in Brian Kaplan – and by and large, the SnakePit collectively went “Who?” However, the Los Angeles Deferreds added to their pitching rotation by adding Blake Snell, which will undeniably make the division tougher for the D-backs in 2025. Does that make a difference to how you feel? Or are you waiting for Arizona to make moves, before you decide on your confidence?
That would be what the poll is for. As ever, feel free to explain your choice in the comments, especially if it has changed from the previous one.