Yankees

The Toronto Blue Jays have about a 99.99987% chance of making the playoffs

tomisphereLeave a comment

There is a very very narrow range of circumstances under which the Toronto Blue Jays do not make the playoffs. So narrow, in fact, that if we assume every game remaining in the MLB this year has a 50% chance of being won by either team, the odds of the Blue Jays failing to make the playoffs are 1 about 793,072. That equates to a 99.999874% chance that they make the playoffs.

So how do we work out such numbers? Buckle up for a logic roller coaster ride.

To fail to get into the playoffs, every one of the Yankees, Red Sox, Mariners, Astros, Tigers, and Gaurdians would have to beat the Blue Jays, and these are the only 6 teams capable of surpassing the Blue Jays at this point.

At this point, the Blue Jays can end up with at most 73 losses, if they lose all 7 of their remaining games. So surpassing them would especially require a lot of winning by the Gaurdians and Astros (with 71 losses each currently) and the Red Sox and Tigers (with 70 losses each).

But these teams are limited in how much winning they can do the rest of the way, because there will be 6 games played between them. The Tigers and the Gaurdians will play 3 games against each other, and the Tigers and the Red Sox will play 3 against each other. That means there will be at least 6 losses spread around among those 3 teams.

So let’s consider the possible outcomes of the Tigers/Gaurdians series. For each outcome, let’s assume the Blue Jays lose all 7 of their remaining games, ending with a record of 89-73. Let’s also assume both the Tigers and the Gaurdians win all 4 of their other remaining games.

Except that we can’t assume that. Because if the Tigers win all their other 4 games, that means they deliver 3 losses to the Red Sox, who end up at best 89-73, the same as the Blue Jays. Because the Blue Jays end up with 7 wins and 6 losses against the Red Sox, they win the tiebreaker with the Red Sox and are in the playoffs. So the Tigers must lose a game to the Red Sox, and the Red Sox must win their other 4 games not against the Tigers, for the Blue Jays to have a chance at elimination here.

So we’ll assume the Tigers lose 1 more game (versus the Red Sox) outside of the Tigers/Gaurdians series, and the Guardians don’ t lose any others.

If the Gaurdians sweep the Tigers, the Tigers end up 88-74, a game behind the Blue Jays, and the Blue Jays are in the playoffs.

If the Tigers sweep the Guardians, the Gaurdians end up 88-74, a game behind the Blue Jays, and the Blue Jays are in the playoffs.

If the Gaurdians win 2 of 3, the Tigers end up 89-73, tied with the Blue Jays. Because the Blue Jays had 4 wins and 3 losses in their games against the Tigers this year, they win the tiebreaker between the teams, and are in the playoffs.

That leaves the scenario where the Tigers win 2 of 3. Then the Tigers end up 90-72, ahead of the Blue Jays, while the Guardians tie the Blue Jays at 89-73. So as a tiebreaker we look and see that the Blue Jays and Gaurdians each won 3 games against each other this year. We have to use the second tiebreaker, which is records within their own divisions. The Gaurdians end up 36 and 16 against their weaker division; the Blue Jays 25 and 27 against their stronger division. The Gaurdians therefore win this tiebreaker, and the Blue Jays are out of the playoffs – if the other 3 teams surpass them too, that is.

That’s the only scenario in which the Blue Jays are eliminated.

What if The Tigers lose one more game against another opponent? Then they end up with the same record as the Blue Jays, and the Blue Jays are in because they win the tiebreaker with the Tigers. So the Tigers must only lose the one game against the Red Sox.

That covers what must happen with the Tigers, Gaurdians, and Red Sox. What of the Yankees, Mariners, and Astros?

The Blue Jays hold the tiebreaker over the Yankees, so the Yankees must get to at least 90 wins, and therefore must win at least 3 of their last 7 games.

The Blue Jays hold the tiebreaker over the Mariners, so the Mariners must win at least 4 of their last 7 games.

The Astros hold the tiebreaker over the Blue Jays, so they must win at least 5 of their last 7 games.

So now we must get the odds of all these things happening and multiply them together to get the odds that the Blue Jays miss the playoffs. We assume in every game that the teams have an equal chance of winning. The following table contains all the odds:

The reason the Mariners and Astros are lumped together in the last line is that they play one more game against each other, so their odds of reaching their respective win totals are linked because of that game.

When you multiply all these odds together you get 693,198 divided by 2 to the 39th power, which is about 1 in 793,072, or 0.000126%. That’s the odds that they don’t make the playoffs; so the odds that they make the playoffs are about 99.999874%.

Garrett Crochet pitched the best start of the year but didn’t get the win. We can fix that.

tomisphereLeave a comment

The merit method of awarding wins fixes all the injustices that the current method of awarding wins punishes starting pitchers with. The latest of these injustices happened to Garrett Crochet, ace of the Boston Red Sox, last night. He threw 8 scoreless, 3-hit innings before giving up a game-tying solo home run to baseball’s best hitter, Aaron Judge, with one out in the top of the ninth. With only one run of support from his teammates, that tie score made Crochet ineligible to earn a win, as he was removed from the game at that point, and the current rules say the win goes to the pitcher who was the active pitcher when the winning team took its final lead. So the win went to Garrett Whitlock, who retired the two batters he faced in the top of the 10th inning. Whitlock performed well. But who did more to earn the win? The guy who faced 2 batters over 1 inning of work, giving up no runs, or the guy who faced 30 batters over 8 and 1/3 innings, giving up 1 run to a top offense and the Red Sox’ arch rivals?

If you agree with me that Crochet did more to earn that win, then you’ll like the merit method for awarding wins.. I explain the method in my post The how and the why of awarding wins to pitchers by the merit method.

Using that method, we take the 2 runs that the Red Sox scored in Friday’s game and divide by 9 and 2/3, which is the number of innings the Red Sox were at bat. This gives us the average number of runs the Red Sox scored in each inning, the fraction 6/29. Then we simply credit each Red Sox pitcher with this number of runs for every inning they pitched. And then we subtract from this the number of runs they gave up. This gives each pitcher a number of “Runs Ahead”. Then we give the win to the pitcher with the greatest number of Runs Ahead.

The cool thing about this method is that adding the Runs Ahead of all the winning team’s pitchers always gives you a positive number, and adding all the Runs Ahead of the losing team’s pitchers always gives you a negative number. This method also assigns the losing pitcher as the one with the most negative Runs Ahead value.

Here’s a table showing the numbers discussed above for the Red Sox pitchers in last night’s game. In the first three columns in the table below we see IP, RCr/IP, and RCr, which stand for Innings Pitched, Runs Credited per inning pitched, and Runs Credited, respectively. You get the third column (Runs Credited) by multiplying together the first two.

PitcherIPRCr/IPRCrRRA
Garrett Crochet8 ⅓6/2950/29121/29
Aroldis Chapman⅔6/294/2904/29
Garrett Whitlock16/296/2906/29
Runs Ahead (RA) calculations for Red Sox pitchers in victory over New York Yankees, June 13, 2025

Then you subtract runs allowed (R) from this to get each pitcher’s number of Runs Ahead (RA) for that game. Because Garrett Crochet had the highest number of Runs Ahead for the winning team, he would be awarded the win by the merit method. But by current rules, the win went to the other Garrett (Whitlock).

I hope someday to convince MLB league officials to change to the merit method for awarding wins. It fixes so many things that are just not right about the current method.

6-team AL wildcard race now looking like a 3-team race

tomisphereLeave a comment

It’s been exciting watching the wild card race in the American League evolving these last couple of weeks, with 6 teams having a real shot.  With division leaders pulling away, making the division races relatively uninteresting, and with the National League’s 5 playoff entrants pretty much a done deal (with only positioning remaining a question), this race has provided most of the late-season playoff race drama.

But as we approach the last week of play of the regular season, 3 of those 6 contending teams now look like outside longshots.

Each of these 6 teams has either 7 or 8 games remaining in the season.  It’s not likely that any of them will lose more than 3 or 4 of these remaining games.  However, the Yankees, Orioles, and Royals, each with 73 losses, will require at least two of the Rays (now at 69 losses) , Indians, and Rangers (70 losses each) to lose 3 or 4 games just to have a chance at tying.  Were the Indians and Rangers both to lose exactly 3 of their remaining games, one of the 73-loss teams would have to win all their remaining games just to tie.  Not unheard of; the 2007 Rockies faced this sort of scenario with just over 2 weeks to go that season, needing to win their last 15 games to make a wild card berth probable; they won 14 of those 15 to tie for the wild card and force a one-game playoff for the spot (which they won).  These streaks would be half as long, and with 3 teams poised to try for it, it’s not too out-of-the-question that one may do it.

At this point, scheduled opponents can make a big difference.  The Orioles seem to have the short end of the stick here, with 2 of their remaining 8 games against the Rays (who are fighting to keep their slim wild card lead). and 3 against the Red Sox (who will likely be trying to maintain their lead for home-field advantage against the other division leaders, Detroit and Oakland).  The Yankees also have 3 games against the Rays, but otherwise have an easy schedule, with 3 games against the bottom-dwelling Astros.  The Royals seem to have the best schedule of all though, with today’s game against the Rangers their only one against a contending opponent.

Though the Rays have the best record right now by a slim margin, if the Yankees or Orioles make a charge now, the Rays’ position in the standings will fall rapidly, while the Rangers and Indians, with easier schedules, would most likely stay put at the lead of the wildcard race.  Unfortunately for the Yankees and Orioles, this would only allow them to leapfrog one of the three leading teams; not enough to take a wildcard berth.

In the end, two of the 3 leading teams must falter, and that just doesn’t seem all that likely.  The Yankees, Orioles, and Royals are all positioned to make it interesting by winning, but won’t likely catch a wild card berth even if they do.

Red Sox could catch the Yankees by this time next week

tomisphere1 Comment

Improbable, but not that improbable.

The Red Sox play four in Kansas City. The Yankees play 3 in Anaheim. There couldn’t be much more difference in the strength these opponents. If the Red Sox seep KC, and the Yankees lose 2 to the Angels, that moves the Red Sox to 2 and a half games behind the Yankees. Then a sweep of the Yankees in New York next weekend would put the Red Sox on top.

That last part, of course, is the rather improbably part. Still, even coming a little short of that, the Red Sox could end the week withing striking distance of the division title, with one week to go in the season.

Red Sox fan is glad the Yankees won tonight

tomisphereLeave a comment

You wouldn’t think it.

Red Sox fans are not supposed to root for the Yankees.  Ever.  Except maybe, when the Yankees are playing a team the Red Sox need to beat.  That was not the case tonight.

In fact, a Yankees loss tonight would have put the Red Sox into the playoffs.  No way I, a Red Sox fan and lifelong Yankee hater, should be rooting for the Yanks.  And yet, I was watching tonight, rooting for the Yankees to beat the Baltimore Orioles.

What gives?

Tonight, the Yankees played their last game in Yankee Stadium.  Next year they move into a new stadium, and the current Yankee Stadium, with all its great baseball history, will be gone.  It was a night for baseball fans to reminisce.  It was a night to celebrate all the greats who played there, all the great moments that occurred there, and perhaps create a few new ones.

It was NOT a night for the Yankees to eliminate themselves from playoff contention by losing.

Even though everyone knows the Yankees will not make it to the playoffs this year (the odds of all the remaining necessary games going their way are about 4 in a million), the fact that they leave their stadium as a team officially still in the hunt is only right.  A loss tonight would have meant they were out of playoff contention for the first time in 13 years.  What a damper that disappointment would have put on a night that should be about positive memories.  Leave that hard truth for another day.  Let it happen with a Red Sox win tomorrow.

Farewells are bittersweet enough.  I will get satisfaction enough tomorrow in seeing the Yankees not make the playoffs.  Let’s not have the Yankees’ worst on-field disappointment in 13 years mar a day of celebration.

The Will of the Baseball Gods – a postseason prediction

tomisphere1 Comment

Here is a prediction for the postseason in 2008:

I believe the Baseball Gods will make their feelings about the ending of Yankee Stadium known this autumn by sending the Red Sox and the Cubs to the World Series.

That would mean that this year, the World Series would be played in the only two parks in baseball that are older than Yankee Stadium, and the only other parks built before 1961.  These three are the only remaining parks to have seen the likes of Ty Cobb, Babe Ruth, Lou Gehrig, Joe Dimaggio and Ted Williams.

There is a place for these older parks in this game.  They are our most tangible connection to the years gone by when the game of baseball was made great.  The Baseball Gods will want us to know that a move to the newer is not necessarily a move to the better.

Elimination numbers can be misleading

tomisphereLeave a comment

Here is a post I put on my MySpace blog earlier this evening, before the Monday, September 15 games were final.

Sometimes in baseball, a team’s chances aren’t as good as they look.

The Yankees and Toronto are right now tied at 80 and 70.  The Red Sox and Rays are ahead of these two teams, in the same division each with 88 wins (that’ll change by the time you read this, though).  This means that, even though their elimation numbers are 5, at least one of the Yankees and the Blue Jays will do no better than a tie for the division’s best record.

If you don’t know what an elimination number is, it’s the number of losses by a team in their remaining games that will eliminate them from being able to win the division.  In fact, if the sum of wins by the division leader in their remaining games, and losses by trailing team in their remaining games, adds up to at least this number, the trailing team is eliminated.  This number is calculated by subtracting from 163 both the number of wins the division leader already has, and the number of losses the trailing team has.

So if both the Yankees and Blue Jays have elimination numbers of 5, shouldn’t they both be able to pass the current division leader?  Interestingly, they can’t.  Why?  Well, they play each other three times more, so one must lose at least 2 more games, and thus will finish with at least 72 losses.  With at least 72 losses, they can have at most 90 wins.  And the Sox and Rays play 3 more against each other, so one must win at least 2 more games, and so will finish with at least 90 wins.  Hence, at least one of the Yankees and Blue Jays can do no better than tie one of the two current division leaders.

Of course we all know that neither of them will actually make it.  😛