Here are the latest standings in each league, with each team's chances of making the divisional playoffs in parentheses. Teams with a less than 10 percent chance are in italics:
AMERICAN:
Los Angeles (99.6 %): 89-55 --
Baltimore (99.9 %): 85-59 4
Oakland (48.9%): 81-63 8
Kansas City (48.7 %): 79-64 9 1/2
Detroit (73.1 %): 80-65 9 1/2
Seattle (25.1 %): 79-65 10
Toronto (2.1 %): 75-69 14
Cleveland (2.2 %): 74-69 14 1/2
New York (0.5 %): 73-69 15
Tampa Bay (0.0 %): 70-75 19 1/2
Chicago (0.0 %): 64-80 25
Houston (0.0 %): 64-81 25 1/2
Boston (0.0 %): 63-82 26 1/2
Minnesota (0.0 %): 62-82 27
Texas (0.0 %): 54-90 35
The Angels appear safe in the AL West, while the Orioles appear to have the AL East well in hand. That leaves the A's, Royals, Tigers, and Mariners in a four-way scramble for the last two divisional spots.
This will be the first time since Wild Cards were implemented in 1995 that neither the Yankees nor the Red Sox have made the AL Playoffs. I won't miss them at all.
On June 3, a loss to Houston left the Angels with a record of 30-27. Since then they have gone 59-28, a winning percentage of .678. That is one of the best stretches of baseball you will ever see.
NATIONAL:
Washington (99.9 %): 82-61 --
Los Angeles (93.8%): 82-63 1
St. Louis (96.1 %): 80-65 3
San Francisco (56.6 %): 79-65 3 1/2
Pittsburgh (35.0 %): 75-69 7 1/2
Atlanta (9.3 %): 74-71 9
Milwaukee (8.4 %): 74-71 9
Miami (0.9 %): 71-72 11
New York (0.0 %): 70-75 13
Cincinnati (0.0 %): 68-77 15
San Diego (0.0 %): 67-77 15 1/2
Philadelphia (0.0 %): 67-77 15 1/2
Chicago (0.0 %): 64-81 19
Arizona (0.0 %): 59-85 23 1/2
Colorado (0.0 %): 59-86 24
I know the A's fans have had it rough lately, but consider the situation in Milwaukee. On August 19, the Brewers beat Toronto 6-1. At that point, Milwaukee was 71-55, and the Brew Crew had a 2 1/2 game lead on St. Louis in the Central. Since then, the Brewers have gone 3-16, while the Cardinals have gone 12-8. So now Milwaukee is six games behind St. Louis, and their season is probably over.
As Tim Kurkjian often says, baseball is "a hard game played by hard men."
ReplyDeleteWhat the Angels have done is astounding. Lately, they've just been clobbering people, too. That is a great team. I'll bet I've now seen Howie Kendrick have 20 at-bats over the last two seasons, and I'll bet he's gotten a hit in 15 of them--and about half of those drove in runs. Everything I've always believed about Joe Morgan, I now totally believe about Howie Kendrick, too.
And back in April and May, a lot of people figured that Mike Scioscia was about to be fired.
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