The MLB Playoff Race Is Getting Wild With Three Weeks to Go

Kamil Krzaczynski/USA TODAY Sports

We are three weeks away from the start of the playoffs, with the first game of all four wild-card series scheduled back-to-back-to-back.

You can be sure that MLB will market the event as baseball’s version of the first day of March Madness. (Fall Frenzy, anyone?) But regardless of how well the league succeeds in bringing in the casual sports fan, for those of us who can’t get enough baseball, it will be the perfect way to begin the most exciting time of the year.

So, in this week’s newsletter, let’s take a look at the playoff races, with a specific focus on the teams we could be seeing in that opening round.

This year is the first with the new 12-team playoff format. A quick refresher on how it works:

• The top two division winners in each league get first-round byes.
• The third division winner (the No. 3 seed) will host the third wild-card team (No. 6) in a best-of-three series.
• The first wild-card team (No. 4 seed) will host the second wild-card team (No. 5) in a best-of-three series.
• The first division winner (No. 1 seed) will play the winner of the No. 3 vs. No. 6 matchup in a best-of-five Division Series. No. 1 will host Games 1, 2 and 5 (if necessary).
• The second division winner (No. 2 seed) will play the winner of the No. 4 vs. No. 5 matchup in a best-of-five Division Series. No. 2 will host Games 1, 2 and 5 (if necessary).
• The League Championship Series and World Series will follow, under the same format as previous years.

Here are the current playoff seedings for each league.

American League:

1. Astros
2. Yankees
3. Guardians
4. Mariners
5. Blue Jays
6. Rays

National League:

1. Dodgers
2. Mets
3. Cardinals
4. Braves
5. Phillies
6. Padres

So, if these standings hold, the four wild-card matchups would be:

AL 1: Guardians vs. Rays
AL 2: Mariners vs. Blue Jays
NL 1: Cardinals vs. Padres
NL 2: Braves vs. Phillies

Of course, we can’t expect these standings to remain the same. There are still two-and-a-half weeks left of regular-season games, with four key races still up for grabs.

Let’s start in the American League. For as ominous as things looked for the Yankees in August, they’ve started to turn things around again and now lead the AL East by 6.5 games. That’s too much ground for the Blue Jays or Rays to make up with fewer than 20 games left. That means the Astros will almost certainly have the No. 1 seed (they lead New York by 6.5 games), and the Yankees will be the No. 2.

That leaves seven teams—the Blue Jays, Rays, Orioles, Guardians, White Sox, Twins and Mariners—competing for the final four playoff spots: the AL Central title and the three wild-card places. This weekend features five series with major AL playoff implications:

• Blue Jays vs. Orioles in Toronto (three-game series)
• Rays vs. Rangers in St. Petersburg (three-game series)
• Angels vs. Mariners in Anaheim (four-game series)
• Guardians vs. Twins in Cleveland (five-game series)
• Tigers vs. White Sox in Detroit (three-game series)

Baltimore is 4.5 games behind Tampa Bay for the third and final wild-card spot; Toronto is tied with Seattle for the first and second wild cards, and only a half game ahead of Tampa Bay. An Orioles series win would at least keep them alive in the race for a little while longer. But depending on what happens in the other four series, things could get especially interesting.

Say, for example, that Baltimore wins all three of its games and Tampa gets swept—and that the Mariners lose their first three games with the Angels—the AL wild-card standings would look something like this:

1. Mariners, 80–65
2. Blue Jays, 81–66
3. Rays, 80–66
4. Orioles, 78–67

Two games would separate the Mariners, the first wild card, and the Orioles, the first team out. The Rays’ lead for the third spot would be down to just one.

There could be a similar log jam in the AL Central come Tuesday morning, after Cleveland and Minnesota cram five games into four days between now and Monday. Right now, the Guardians are up three games over the White Sox in the division, and the Twins are just one game behind Chicago.

So, if the White Sox sweep the Tigers, and the Twins sweep the Guardians, the AL Central standings would be:

1. Twins, 77–70
2. White Sox, 77–70
3. Guardians, 76–71

With a 7–6 head-to-head record vs. Chicago, Minnesota currently holds the tiebreaker. The two teams play each other six more times, including a three-game series on the South Side to end the season.

Yes, it’s true these hypothetical results of this weekend’s AL series are meant to show the most chaotic of possibilities. But even with less extreme outcomes, these two races are going to be thrilling to follow the rest of the way.

Entering this weekend, the Mets hold a one-game lead over the Braves in the NL East. Most likely, the winner of this division will get the No. 2 seed and the first-round bye. Unless … the Cardinals, who have the second-best record in MLB since the All-Star break, run down both New York and Atlanta in their remaining 18 games, the final six of which all come against the Pirates.

The Braves appear to have the toughest road ahead of the three teams, with seven of their final 19 games coming against the Phillies (including this weekend’s three-game series) and a pivotal three-game set at home against the Mets on the last weekend of the regular season.

Meanwhile, including that trip to Atlanta, New York has only two series left against teams with winning records, the other matchup being their trip to Milwaukee for three games next week. Then again, we just saw the Mets get swept at home by the woeful Cubs. Falling to the No. 4 seed definitely wouldn’t be the worst late-season collapse for the Mets, but it would still be pretty bad. Neither they nor the Braves are at risk of missing the playoffs entirely. Atlanta holds a 12-game lead over the Brewers, the first team out of the wild-card standings. It’s also unlikely Milwaukee will catch St. Louis in the NL Central, where the Brewers trail by 7.5 games with 19 to play. Again, those final six games vs. Pittsburgh give the Cardinals a cushion.

This doesn’t mean the Brewers are toast, though. They are still in the mix for one of the final two wild-card spots. They are 1.5 games behind the Padres for the third wild card and four behind the Phillies for the second one. Things aren’t looking all that great for San Diego. Much of the promise for the Padres after their trade deadline splurge hinged on the return of Fernando Tatis Jr. from injury. Of course, Tatis has since been suspended 80 games for performance-enhancing drugs, leaving the Friars’ lineup still a bit frail, even after they added Juan Soto, Josh Bell and Brandon Drury. Soto and Bell have both struggled since arriving in San Diego, with their batting averages hovering just above the Mendoza line and slugging percentages well below their standards. (Soto is slugging .319; Bell is at .307.) Nine of the Padres’ final 18 games come against teams with winning records (the Cardinals, Dodgers and White Sox).

Have any questions for our team? Send a note to mlb@si.com.

1. THE OPENER

Erick W. Rasco/Sports Illustrated

“The Mets have not always demanded excellence. Sometimes they almost seem to court the opposite. Few fans have suffered as many excruciating, confounding blows as the ones in Flushing …

“[This year] they are one of the best teams in the National League and are poised to make the playoffs for the first time since 2016. Most surprising of all, they have been … a normal baseball team. There have been no ridiculous stories sucking the oxygen out of the room for weeks at a time. Can this possibly continue? Are attitude, personnel and money—and one competent season—enough to erase decades of dysfunction? And what happens when the Mets stop being the Mets?”

That’s Stephanie Apstein, writing in her excellent Daily Cover story about the Mets. It’s one of my favorite stories of the year, with so many rich lines. Example: “Since [Fred] Wilpon took control of the team in 1987, the club has tweeted more photos of dildos (1) than it has won titles (0).”

If you haven’t read it yet, you can do so by clicking the link below. It’s absolutely worth your time.

How MLB’s Most Confounding Team Is (Mostly) Overcoming Decades of Dysfunction by Stephanie Apstein

2. ICYMI

Let’s run through some of our other great Sports Illustrated baseball stories from this week.

There Will Never Be Another Adam Wainwright and Yadier Molina by Emma Baccellieri
It’s difficult to imagine the Cardinals without them, and impossible to imagine one without the other.

The Unexpected Greatness of Framber Valdez by Will Laws
The Astros’ lefty is making history and emerging as one of MLB’s best pitchers.

Erick W. Rasco/Sports Illustrated

Everything in Aaron Judge’s Career Led Him to This Historic Season by Tom Verducci
After years of work and study, the Yankees slugger is a hitting master coming into his own at the right time.

How the Brewers Can Still Make the Playoffs by Tom Verducci
Their postseason hopes look pretty bleak, but they have a knack for rising to the occasion. History, if not the math, is on their side.

3. WORTH NOTING from Stephanie Apstein

We witnessed one of the greatest “well, actually” moments in baseball history this week, when the Dodgers celebrated their 10th straight postseason berth Sunday after beating the Padres—only to wake up Monday to an MLB announcement that the math had been wrong. It turned out that in the unlikely chance that the Padres won the NL West and Los Angeles finished in a three-way tie with the Brewers and the Cardinals, Milwaukee would win the NL Central and St. Louis would take the final wild card, leaving the Dodgers at home.

“I really don’t care,” L.A. manager Dave Roberts told reporters after he heard that the magic number was back at one. “We’re going to do it at some point in time.” Indeed they did, that night.

4. W2W4 from Matt Martell

Well, since I pretty much previewed some of the more consequential series this weekend in the opening section, I’d like to use this space to look ahead to a few player-specific events I’ll be watching for over the next few days.

First, obviously, is Aaron Judge and his push for 61 home runs. The Yankees are in Milwaukee for a three-game series against the Brewers, beginning tonight. The stadium formerly known as Miller Park (sorry, I cannot say, or even type, “American Family Field” with a straight face) has been one of the most home-run-friendly parks in MLB over the last three seasons, according to Statcast. Judge enters the weekend with 57 homers and is on pace for 64. Milwaukee is scheduled to start three righthanders: Adrian Houser on Friday, Brandon Woodruff on Saturday and Jason Alexander on Sunday.

Recently, Judge has also emerged as a potential Triple Crown contender. He’s led the AL in home runs and RBIs for a while now, but his hot start to September has brought his batting average up from .296 to .310, which ranks fourth in the league. The three players ahead of him are Luis Arraez (.320), Xander Bogaerts (.317) and José Abreu (.313). That’s probably too much ground for Judge to make up—and too many players to leap—with 19 games to go. But if there’s anything we’ve learned this year, it’s that we shouldn’t bet against him.

The other series to watch for players chasing history is in St. Louis, where the Cardinals are hosting the Reds for the final four of their five-game set that began last night. Albert Pujols is just three home runs away from 700. Manager Oliver Marmol seems to be penciling Pujols in the lineup nearly every game at this point, regardless of whether the opposing pitcher is a lefty or a righty, so he should get plenty of swings this weekend to get closer to the milestone.

Meanwhile, we’re also on NL Triple Crown watch for Paul Goldschmidt, though he has cooled off a bit in recent weeks, to the point that he might not lead in any of the three categories at the end of the year. Freddie Freeman has overtaken Goldschmidt in batting average (.329 to .324). Goldschmidt is tied for third in home runs (35), three behind leader Kyle Schwarber, and ranks second in RBIs (110), two shy of Pete Alonso.

5. THE CLOSER from Emma Baccellieri

Roberto Clemente Day yesterday gave us the first all-Latino lineup in the history of MLB, courtesy of the Rays, plus this wonderful moment with the icon’s son and grandson throwing out the first pitch before the Pirates played the Mets. (Even though it happened on the road: I realize schedule-making comes with all sorts of difficulties, but really, would it be so hard to ensure the Pirates get to play in Pittsburgh on Roberto Clemente Day?) It’s a good opportunity to reflect: An MLB-wide retirement of Clemente’s No. 21 would be more than befitting of his legacy, both as a player and a humanitarian, and it’s time to do it.

Yes, that’s a monumental, rare honor, afforded so far only to Jackie Robinson. It shouldn’t be taken lightly. But if there’s one other person who’s deserving, it’s Clemente.