The Baseball Playoffs Are Coming
MLB still owns October
Let’s run through some of the biggest sports stories from the last few days. President Trump just un-invited Stephen Curry and the Warriors from the White House; Carmelo Anthony wants to be traded; college football is approaching mid-season strength. Behind all of this noise, though, Major League Baseball is rapidly nearing October, a month that this league traditionally owns. Yes, the NFL, college football, and NBA will all have games next month, but baseball will be king until the World Series Ends.
I’ve been spending too much time away from baseball recently. I started a new job, my free time plummeted, and I’ve missed more games than I care to admit. Soon, though, I’ll sit myself down in front of a television to happily watch game after game of October magic.
Baseball is unique among the major sports for the randomness of its playoff format. The Golden State Warriors have already been crowned 2018 NBA champions by many, and the NFL has a shortlist of teams that can actually compete for a championship. In baseball though, any team that reaches the postseason has a legitimate chance of bringing home the World Series trophy. I know this reality grates on many baseball fans — after all, it seems weird that the best teams in the league have nothing more than a puncher’s chance.
Today, I’d pick the Cleveland Indians as the most likely team to win the World Series. Their pitching staff is obscenely good, and the recent 22-game win streak serves as a reminder of just how good this team was last year. The best way to get over blowing a 3–1 lead in the World Series is to avenge that defeat the next year (sidenote: a 3–1 lead in baseball is nothing like that same figure in basketball). However, picking any team to win the world series right after I expounded on the inherent randomness of the sport feels weird. Cleveland is probably the best team in the entire league right now after the Los Angeles Dodgers’ recent woes, but (to use a cliche) anything can happen in October.
Cleveland is also playing in what looks like the most interesting half of the league right now. The Cubs don’t have the same sense of wonder and fun that they did last year, and the Dodgers look like a shell of their former selves. A Cubs/Dodgers or Nationals/Dodgers NLCS would be a lot of fun, but some of these teams need to start playing a high level once again before that happens. In the American League, the Indians are just one of three elite division leaders. The Boston Red Sox and Houston Astros also look primed for strong postseasons, and the New York Yankees are lurking in the shadows as well.
The Yankees might be the most interesting team out of this bunch. New York has recovered from its midseason woes and is now a respectable team on all fronts. Aaron Judge looks like an elite player again, and the pitching staff, while not as good as Cleveland’s, is good enough to keep any series competitive. However, the Yankees are all but locked in to a one-game playoff with the Minnesota Twins, a vastly inferior team that has a chance to wipe out 162 games in nine innings. You can probably guess from my tone that I’m a Yankees fan, and I can feel a one-run loss in the Wild-Card game coming from weeks away.
But no matter what happens the AL Wild Card Game, I can’t wait to watch playoff baseball again. The importance of any one game can get lost over a season that makes every team play 162, but the playoffs make every inning, every at bat, and every pitch feel significant. The energy in every park rivals the intensity in any stadium or arena around the world, and the games are a joy to watch. Playoff baseball is almost here, and I can’t wait for it.
