While a few notable moves have been made so far in this nascent offseason, most contenders still have the same problem areas to address that they did a month ago. More, actually, depending on who was non-tendered earlier this month. So, as virtual Winter Meetings week gets going, who are those contenders -- and where are those must-be-filled weak spots?

1. How '21 contenders can fill their lineup holes
By Mike Petriello @mike_petriello
December 8, 2020
While a few notable moves have been made so far in this nascent offseason, most
contenders still have the same problem areas to address that they did a month ago. More,
actually, depending on who was non-tendered earlier this month. So, as virtual Winter
Meetings week gets going, who are those contenders -- and where are those must-be-filled
weak spots?
Let's start by figuring out who "contenders" even are, lest we write a dozen identical sections
along the lines of "the Orioles need help at seven spots," and "the Rockies need help at five
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2. spots, and so on.
We'll start by eyeballing 2021 projected wins above replacement, based on current depth
charts supplied over at FanGraphs. WAR is hardly infallible, but there's unsurprisingly a
pretty strong relation between "lots of WAR" and "lots of wins." The 2019-20 WAR team
leaders for position players: Dodgers, Astros, Yankees, Twins. For pitchers? Twins, Indians,
Rays, and Dodgers. The top projected 2021 position players? Mike Trout, Fernando Tatis Jr.,
Alex Bregman, Juan Soto, Cody Bellinger and Mookie Betts. Hard to argue with that.
Then what we'll do is draw a line. We'll say that only teams projected to have at least a .475
winning percentage, or the equivalent of at least 77 wins, are "contenders," which cuts out
the bottom eight teams. (Sorry, Orioles, Rockies, Tigers, Pirates, Rangers, Mariners, Marlins
and D-backs. We wouldn't be shocked if one or two of you poke over .500 in 2021, but only
one of you managed it in 2020 -- Miami, barely, at 31-29 -- and the line has to be drawn
somewhere.)
That leaves us with 22 teams. Then, we'll look at the positional breakdowns (as of 8 p.m. ET
Monday) and make a color-coded projected WAR chart that shows red as "good" and blue as
"weak." In the world of WAR, 2 is roughly average, and anything north of 4 is a star, but it's
those handful of 0 WAR areas we're most interested in. If we just look at position players --
every team could use another handful of pitchers -- and ignore DH, due to the uncertain
status of it in the NL next year, we'll find that on our 22 contenders, we have 13 problem
spots, highlighted in dotted boxes below.
Anyway, investigate the chart. Some of these positions just leap off the page at you. (Here's a
larger version.) Not hard to find the bright shining red box that signifies Trout, is it?

3. A view like this pretty clearly shows how teams like the Nationals (Soto, Trea Turner) and
Rockies (Trevor Story, Nolan Arenado) have two elite stars and not a whole lot else. See that
red spot at third base for the Pirates? The projections love Ke'Bryan Hayes. You know what
else stands out, which might be worthy of further investigation? All of the best teams -- all of
them -- have strength on the left side of the infield, with the Dodgers being an exception only
because they've not yet re-signed or replaced Justin Turner. But just about no one without
Christian Yelich has strength in left field, which increasingly seems not to matter.
Let's focus on contenders, and let's focus on those dark blue "0 WAR" blocks, the 13 big
problems. The thing about these is that the bars here are so low to clear that it's not actually
that difficult to improve; one team that was in the original draft was the White Sox and right
field, but they bumped that up -- not a lot, but enough -- by signing Adam Eaton.
The 13 0-WAR problem spots for contenders
Angels right field
Projected current starter: Jo Adell
Adell was the No. 5 overall prospect in baseball entering the 2020 season, but his Major
League debut was extremely rough. Adell hit just .161/.212/.266, which was literally the
weakest line of any hitter who had at least 130 plate appearances, in part because his 41.7%
strikeout rate was the second-highest of those hitters. He didn't distinguish himself on
defense, either. It was, all in all, a forgettable first impression.
That, as well as a relatively unimpressive half season in Triple-A in 2019, is largely why the
projections look so negatively upon him. We understand yet don't fully agree, because 132
plate appearances in a pandemic season from a 21-year-old aren't exactly enough to give up
on his future, and don't forget that even the great Trout hit only .220/.281/.390 in his 135 plate
appearances in a 2011 cameo.
Possible solutions: Just play Adell. It's not hard to dream on Joc Pederson, Kyle Schwarber,
Eddie Rosario, etc., in an outfield corner, but Adell isn't even 22 until April, so the Angels have
to give him a full season to prove himself -- or not. A veteran lefty backup type like Robbie
Grossman might not be a bad depth reinforcement, though.

4. Astros left field
Projected current starter: Chas McCormick?
Unlike the Angels, the Astros don't really have an in-house solution here due to the likely
free-agent departures of an entire trio of outfielders in Michael Brantley, George Springer and
Josh Reddick. Kyle Tucker seems likely to man one of the outfield spots -- maybe he ends
up in left, not right, but it doesn't matter that much right now -- and he's certainly not going to
be joined on Opening Day by both McCormick, who hasn't yet made his Major League debut,
and speedy Myles Straw.
Possible solutions: The free-agent market is absolutely stuffed with corner outfielders of
varying shapes and sizes, even excluding the three former Astros. In left field, Schwarber,
Pederson, Rosario or David Dahl would all make sense -- as, possibly, would Marcell Ozuna, if
they wanted to shoot higher. At a lower level, perhaps Adam Duvall, Hunter Renfroe or
Nomar Mazara fit. And since we're here, wouldn't Jackie Bradley Jr. look good in center field?
Why not just bring back Brantley? How about two? They could really use two.
Red Sox left field
Projected current starter: Michael Chavis
Red Sox first base
Projected current starter: Bobby Dalbec
Let's lump these two together. (We've assumed that with Bradley a free agent, left fielder
Andrew Benintendi will slide to center.) Dalbec, 25, hit for some power and struck out a ton in
a brief look. Chavis, also 25, didn't hit for much power but still struck out a ton. Combined,
and this is much more Chavis than Dalbec, they've been worth 0.6 WAR in parts of two
seasons. It's not hard to see either player making a contribution to the 2021 Red Sox, but it is
difficult to see them going into the season with these positions handed to them.