A's not projected to finish last in MLB in 2024

The Oakland A's could see a huge jump in wins in their final season in Oakland

With the end of the football season behind us, that means it's baseball season, baby! While A's fans don't have a lot to be excited about with this season potentially being the final year the team will play at the Oakland Coliseum, on the field there have been some decent adjustments made to the roster that could lead to better results, and hopefully not a third consecutive 100-loss season. 

Baseball Prospectus released their projected standings last week, and in a surprise to some, the A's were not at the very bottom of the standings after a 112-loss campaign. Heading into 2024, they're slated for a 63.7-98.3 record, but let's call it 64-98. While that's still not a great record and it's precariously close to another 100-loss season, this would still be a 14-game improvement over last season, which is a big shift if you want to take the optimistic route. 

The reasoning here is that the A's are projected to score 676 runs in 2024 (4.17 per game) after putting up 585 (3.61/game) last year, a difference of 91. On the rubber, they're expected to allow 831 runs (5.12/game) after giving up 924 (5.70/game) a season ago, a difference of 93. The difference between the runs scored and runs allowed is still 155, which is why they're projected as a 64-win team. 

That 64-win projection would still have the A's finishing last in the American League, two games behind the Chicago White Sox (who may very well trade Dylan Cease), but they'd be six games clear of the Washington Nationals (58-104) and seven above the Colorado Rockies (57-105) over the in the National League. 

As we discussed back in October, the A's are going to be dinged in the Draft Lottery later this year after consecutive picks in the lottery last year, and this coming MLB Draft. The rules state that you cannot pick in the lottery three consecutive drafts, which means that the A's could at best pick tenth overall in 2025, even though they had they third-worst record. 

Regardless of the team's play on the field, fans have likely already made up their minds as to how much attention they'll be paying the A's this season with the team's impending departure. For those that will be hanging on until the end, at least there's hope that the team will be a little bit better than the one's we've seen the past two seasons.