How Good are the Arizona Diamondbacks Right Now?

Despite losses to free agency, the Diamondbacks are working off a high projection platform to improve the roster for 2025

Jun 25, 2024; Phoenix, Arizona, USA; Arizona Diamondbacks infielder Ketel Marte (4) celebrates with teammate Corbin Carroll (7) after hitting a two run home run in the first inning against the Minnesota Twins at Chase Field. Mandatory Credit: Mark J. Rebilas-Imagn Images / Mark J. Rebilas-Imagn Images

The Arizona Diamondbacks are coming off an 89 win season in which they agonizingly missed the playoffs by one game. Despite a five game improvement over 2023's regular season win total, missing the Postseason left the organization and their fans feeling disappointed.

After all, the D-backs went all the way to World Series just the year before, and then made large investments in the roster, running payroll up to a franchise record $177 million in an effort to get back to the Fall Classic. Ultimately, those efforts fell short however.

A number of players, including a large chunk of their offense, have now become free agents, including Christian Walker, Joc Pederson, Randal Girchuk, Josh Bell, Paul Sewald, and Kevin Newman. Newman has already signed a contract with the Angels for 2025.

So how good is the Diamondbacks roster that's left behind, and how much payroll room do they have to improve it? The answer is surprisingly good. As the D-backs embark on their offseason, they're working from an incredibly high platform of 89 projected wins from which to make improvements. Below table shows the projected OPS, WAR and WIN totals compared to 2024

Diamondbacks Projected OPS and WAR for 2025 / Jack Sommers

What the above table above shows is that the offense as currently constituted would clearly take a step back from being one of the best in the league. Offsetting that however, the pitching is projected to be significantly better. The net result is just two wins fewer than 2024's expected wins (the D-backs fell two wins short of what their expected wins in 2024). And that's before the team has made a single offseason move.

How did we come up with the above numbers? This is based on what amounts to an advance preview of Fangraphs' Depth Chart projections. Each year that website takes Steamer projections, which were developed by David Cross, and ZiPS projections, developed by Dan Szymborksi, and averages the two together.

Then they apply those average rates to a playing time projection created by the Fangraphs' staff, thus coming up with the Depth Chart projections that are the basis for their win projections.

I'm doing the same thing, in advance of the official rollout of Depth Chart projections, except the playing time allotment is done by me, based on the current 40-man roster and minor league depth in the organization (note: the final ZiPS spreadsheet is not out yet, but Szymborski released the Diamondbacks projections first this year).

You can see the individual player projections averages and the playing time projections at this Google Sheet. I highly recommend checking out that document, but here are a few highlights and important points from that sheet:

• Corbin Carroll's 4.8 WAR projection leads the team. Ketel Marte takes a step back from his near MVP season, but still has a strong 4.7 WAR projection.

• Gabriel Moreno, Geraldo Perdomo, and Eugenio Suarez have solid, above average projections, helping create a strong core behind the two stars.

• Pavin Smith is Projected to get 537 PA. Expect that number to lower as the team fills out the roster with a right-handed bat capable of playing first base. If platooned properly, with playing time against left-hand pitching greatly reduced, expect Smith's OPS projection to improve.

• Adrian Del Castillo projects to get a sizable chunk of the left-hand DH plate appearances in this roster scenario. I expect that to change significantly as the team makes roster moves. Due to mediocre batted ball metrics and high strikeout tendency, his projection is quite underwhelming compared to his small sample size production in 2024.

• The rotation is surprisingly solid. There are six pitchers projected to post between 3.69-4.26 ERA while garnering the lions share of the innings.

• While Zac Gallen is projected to be at 3.69 ERA, Brandon Pfaadt has a 3.94 projection, and perhaps most surprisingly, Eduardo Rodriguez sits at 3.87.

• Low 3.00s ERA projections for A.J. Puk, Justin Martinez, and Kevin Ginkel form the basis of a solid bullpen core.

The Diamondbacks are currently committed to approximately $145 million in payroll for 2025, and have roughly $30 million in payroll space before they hit last year's number. They can create more space if they are able to trade Jordan Montgomery and a portion his $22.5 million salary.

Earlier this month I proposed a plan in which the D-backs use that space to bring back Joc Pederson and Randal Grichuk, sign a right-handed platoonmate for Pavin Smith at first base, and trade for or sign a high leverage reliever that will cost under $10 million. It's possible to do all that and still stay slightly under or around last year's payroll.

Related Content: Proposing a Simple, Realistic Plan for the Diamondbacks' Offseason

That plan would increase the overall win projection by at least three to four wins, taking the on-paper team win projections up to the 93-94 range. In a world where your payroll can only be 40-50% as high as the top spending teams in the league, that is already a great starting point.

The main caveat is that none of these projections can account fully for unexpected injuries. Each year the team loses at least several wins to injury, but that is the same for all teams. In 2023 the Diamondbacks enjoyed relatively good health compared to the rest of the National League. In 2024 they suffered more than the average number of key injuries.

Mike Hazen and his baseball operations staff have done an excellent job building organizational depth. The result of that is despite losing so much firepower to free agency, the team is in a solid position to build out the roster and compete for a Postseason berth once again in 2025.