AL: Texas (1) vs. winner of Baltimore (WC1) and Oakland (WC2) or Oakland (WC2) and Yankees (WC3), Baltimore (2a) or Yankees (2b) vs. White Sox
NL: Washington (1) vs. winner of Atlanta (WC1) and St. Louis (WC2), Cincinnati (2) vs. San Francisco (3)
Notes: OK, here’s how it would work if the season ended today:
1) On Thursday, October 4, the Yankees would play at Baltimore to determine the AL East title. Why at Baltimore? Because the teams are tied head to head, 7-7, and the Orioles have an intra-division record of 30-21 to the Yankees’ 26-25. The two teams have four games remaining; they’ll kick off a four-game series in Baltimore tomorrow night.
2)The winner of that game would advance to the playoffs at the second seed and open the AL Division Series in Chicago against the White Sox on Saturday, October 6.
3)The loser of that game would play Oakland in the wild-card game on Friday, October 5. If the Yankees lose, then they would have to travel to Oakland, because the A’s have a 4-3 edge head-to-head. The two teams have three games remaining, Sept. 21-23 in The Bronx.
If the Orioles lose, then they would host the A’s. The two teams are tied head to head, 3-3, and the Orioles’ 30-21 intra-division record trumps Oakland’s 19-20. The Orioles
4) The winner of the wild-card game would host the start of its AL Division Series against Texas on Sunday, October 7. The loser, naturally, would be done for the season.
–At the Yankees’ latest loss, I interviewed Hal Steinbrenner for my column. He obviously will never match his father’s bombast or propensity to threaten people, but he made it clear that he doesn’t like what he’s seeing. How could he?
One issue that people love to discuss is “the mood of the team.” Often in postseason games, some dopey reporter will ask a manager, “What’s the mood of your clubhouse?” I’ve yet to hear a manager respond, “We’re despondent. We’re done. Hey, Pete Rose! Bet on the other guys!”
What’s the mood of the Yankees? They seemed calm enough before yesterday’s game. Some guys were talking about their NFL fantasy draft from Monday night. Alex Rodriguez joked around with Derek Jeter and Robinson Cano.
I’ve been around a few of these freefalling teams now. The 2007 Mets and 2011 Red Sox mostly seemed calm before games, too. Of course, we know now that, once the games started, some of the 2011 Red Sox were not fully invested in the game’s outcome.
To me, the greater concern is a team’s “mood” during games. For instance, IMO, the 2007 Mets don’t get enough credit for just how hard their lineup fought to keep the team in games. September was one of their best months offensively. They just couldn’t pitch.
These Yankees feel different right now because they’re not hitting. Some of that can be tied into health, while some of that, as Yankees hitting coach Kevin Long noted after last night’s game, is probably due to guys trying to do too much. Pressing.
Should the Yankees carry themselves with more urgency as they arrive for work? I’m not sure that matters? If anything, I think they need to find a way to take their pregame relaxation into the games themselves.
–R.A. Dickey starts for the Mets today which means we’ll have more talk about his chances to win the NL Cy Young Award. His chances are decent, for sure; he’s in the conversation along with Cincinnati’s Johnny Cueto, reigning NL Cy Young Award winner Clayton Kershaw of the Dodgers , Washington’s Gio Gonzalez and Stephen Strasburg and Arizona rookie Wade Miley.
Just do me a small favor: Let’s look at Dickey’s start today in St. Louis not through the prism of whether he gets the win, but rather whether he pitches well.
I get why wins are viscerally appealing. You play to win the game, after all. We’ve been tracking wins forever, and certain win totals – 20 for a season and 300 for a career – are particularly appealing.
Nevertheless, come on, now. We’ve already moved past this conversation. We know that a pitcher’s wins total says as much about the quality of his team as it does about the quality of his performance. And we’ve already seen the Cy Young Award go to starting pitchers who didn’t come close to leading their league in victories, but who pitched the best. Most notably, Seattle’s Felix Hernandez won 13 games in 2010, and in 2009, Kansas City’s Zack Greinke won 16 and San Francisco’s Tim Lincecum won 15.
Wins are fun. And they are noise. They are neither evaluative nor predictive. So let’s go ahead and keep track of them. Let’s just not discuss them in the context of the Cy Young Award race.
–Have a great day.