Schoenfield How the Guardians found their grooveĬleveland started the season with baseball's youngest roster and finished it with a division title. October baseball has become more and more about the bullpens and Cleveland can match up with any team. Get a lead through five or six and the Guardians almost always hold it. The pen has been even better since the beginning of July, with the second-best ERA in the majors behind the Dodgers. They're hard to hit, they strike batters out and all four are stingy with the home run. Emmanuel Clase is as good as any closer this side of Edwin Diaz and the top three setup relievers in front of him - James Karinchak, Trevor Stephan and lefty Sam Hentges - have all been outstanding. How they could stay around longer: The Guardians have drawn comparisons to the 2014-15 Royals for their style of play: Contact hitting, speed, defense. World Series odds: 2.9% | Caesars odds: +3500 Wild-card opponent: Yankees (37.7% chance of advancing) Jose Urquidy, Framber Valdez and Cristian Javier have a 5.40 ERA in 48⅓ innings against the M's this year. In other words - it's going to be crucial for Seattle to take advantage on the days Verlander doesn't pitch. In his past three outings against Seattle, Verlander allowed three runs in 21⅔ innings. In the six games started by Justin Verlander, however, the Astros outscored their division rivals 30-11. One thing they do that could take down the Astros: The Astros won 12 of 19 games against the Mariners, but they outscored Seattle by only eight runs. The Mariners don't score enough runs to leave much margin for error, so the entire staff will need to bring it. The bullpen was pushed hard throughout the season and closer Paul Sewald has been homer-prone of late. Robbie Ray had two scoreless starts in September mixed in with three mediocre ones. Rookie George Kirby had been a model of consistency until a recent bad outing (and is well beyond his innings total from 2021). Luis Castillo had three rough September starts when he suddenly lost it in the middle innings. What could send them home soon: The pitching will need to carry them, but it also looked a little fatigued at times down the stretch. How rookie Julio Rodriguez became the Mariners' $470 million man. But they'll need to score some runs and to do that, how about a dream scenario: Rookie sensation Julio Rodriguez returns from the sore back that sidelined him at the end of September and has a postseason for the ages. If you want a baseball reason, the bullpen is deep and built for October. Maybe destiny really is on the Mariners' side. Hey, after Cal Raleigh clinched Seattle's playoff spot and ended the franchise's 21-year-old playoff drought with a dramatic pinch-hit, two-out, bottom-of-the-ninth, 3-2 count, walk-off home run - and then Seattle pulled off the comeback of all postseason road comebacks to eliminate Toronto on Saturday. How they could stay around longer: Refuse to Lose. World Series odds: 4.9% | Caesars odds: +2000 ĪLDS opponent: Astros (36.2% chance of advancing) PHI | SD | ATL | LAD American League They made it this far, but. Note: World Series and matchup odds come from Doolittle's formula using power ratings as the basis for 10,000 simulations to determine the most likely outcomes.īracket | Our picks | Wild-card takeaways MLB experts Bradford Doolittle, Alden Gonzalez and David Schoenfield get you ready for it all with everything from odds for every matchup and a predicted date of each team's last game to the best- and worst-case scenario for all eight remaining World Series hopefuls. Will the favored Los Angeles Dodgers rule the National League or will the repeat-minded Braves make another deep run? Can anyone in the American League keep the New York Yankees and Houston Astros from squaring off in the ALCS? 5, it was a very short October stay for some - and we could ultimately see the latest championship celebration in MLB history for the last squad standing. With an extra round to begin the postseason and the possibility that this year's Fall Classic extends to a Game 7 on Nov. After an action-packed Wild Card to get the 2022 MLB playoffs going, there are eight teams left battling for World Series glory entering the division series round.
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