PECOTA Projects 2009 Cubs to Win 96 Games; Still Can't Determine Who Will Win Short Series

If you read any Cubs blogs, then you may have already heard this news since it seems like we are the last ones to report it. Apparently PECOTA, an advanced system used by sabremetricians to determine an individual player's contribution to wins based on certain advanced metrics (I think? This stuff is usually way over my head), is used in the aggregate to determine the amount of wins each team will have.

Well using PECOTA, Baseball Prospectus has determined that the Cubs will win the Central by 13 games:

Central	W	L	RS	RA
Chicago Cubs	96	66	871	749
Milwaukee Brewers	83	79	823	807
St. Louis Cardinals	80	82	779	796
Cincinnati Reds	79	83	783	796
Houston Astros	67	95	712	850
Pittsburgh Pirates	65	97	720	885

Well...we saw what all this hoopla and high hopes did for us last year. I'm not saying that 96 wins isn't nice, but isn't there something that can project wins in a series? I mean come on nerds, you've been studying the statistics and math of baseball for the past 30 years! I think it's time to figure this one out. Sorry, I just find it hard to get excited about all these Vegas odds and PECOTA projections when all I really want is a goddamn ring.