American League Playoff Teams Still Very Much Up In The Air

Welcome to September baseball.

For the remainder of the regular season, I am going to publish newsletters every weekday and, when warranted, on the weekends. Each newsletter will be shorter than the ones I wrote during in the first five months of the season, but will capture the most important/interesting/exciting things going on in baseball each day, as teams jockey for a postseason berth.

There will be a mix of newsletters for paid and free subscribers.

Today, let’s take a look at the American League postseason contenders, their remaining schedules, and make some guesses about how the schedule will affect each team’s push for a postseason spot.

Among contending teams in the American League, every team has either 24 or 25 games remaining, except for the Astros, who have only 23 games to play.

Here are the details on how it shakes out.

American League Contenders

At this moment, before Tuesday’s games kick off, the Orioles lead the Rays by 3.5 games in the AL East, the Twins lead the Guardians by 6 games in the AL Central (so much for Cleveland swooping in to pick up Lucas Giolito, Matt Moore, and Reynaldo López off the waiver wire), and in the AL West, it’s the wild, wild west, with the Mariners and Astros essentially tied and the Rangers 1 game back.

In the Wild Card race, the Rays look like a lock (or the Orioles, if the Rays overtake the Birds in the East Division). Then, it’s a free for all—all three teams in the AL West race vying for a Wild Card spot if they don’t win the division, plus the Blue Jays and, as a long shot, the Red Sox.

Right now, the Red Sox and Twins have the same record at 72-66. It’s quite likely that at least one team with a better record than the Twins will miss out on the postseason. As baseball fans know, that happens not infrequently. And given that the Wild Card has expanded from 1 team (1995-2011) to 2 teams (2012-2021), to 3 teams (2022-present), it’s hard to get too worked up about teams a .530 winning percentage or worse missing the postseason.

With the races this close, we have to ask how much the remaining schedule for each contending team will effect its chances to play October baseball.

Let’s take a look.

As between the Orioles and the Rays for the AL East Division, the Orioles look to have the easier schedule with 7 games against teams with losing records. The Rays’ only series against a below .500 team is against the Angels. Every other series for Tampa Bay pits them against a team vying to play in the postseason.

In the AL Central, the Twins have the edge, with 16 of their remaining 24 games against teams that currently have losing records. The Guardians only have 10 such games, and a lot of ground to make up. It doesn’t look good for Cleveland, which enters today’s action at 66-72.

In the AL West, the Astros appear to have the edge with 3 games left against the A’s and 3 against the Royals—the two worst teams in MLB. Seattle and Texas, too, will play 3 with Oakland and 3 against the Angels, but both will also face tough contending teams outside their division. Seattle will go up against the Dodgers and Reds; the Rangers will face the Blue Jays and Red Sox. It might all come down to the head to head games the three teams have against each other.

In the Wild Card race, the Blue Jays appear to have the easiest path at first blush, but on closer inspection, maybe not. Toronto will play 6 games against the Yankees; NY is currently 1 game under .500 at 68-69, but is 7-3 in their last 10 games, including a 3-game sweep of the Astros in Houston.

The Yankees look energized by the young prospects called up on September 1. Outfielder Jasson Dominguez hit a home run for his MLB hit in Friday night’s game and followed that with another dinger on Sunday. Catcher Austin Wells had 2 key hits and drove in 2 as part of the Yankees’ sweep in Houston.

Still, the Blue Jays may benefit from the Mariners and Rangers going at each other down the stretch. As I wrote last Monday, the Rangers’ bullpen is a big, big problem and may ultimately be what keeps the best offense in the American League out of the postseason.

Tomorrow we’ll look at the National League and the race to the bottom for the NL Wild Card spots.