2019 Standings and Playoff Races Discussion

[KeithStone53151]

Imagine being the Angels...best player in baseball and seriously trying to contend...and you lose a game like this a few days before the deadline

 

[tmwiese55]

If you smell something stinky coming from the bed. It’s the mess the cubs and brewers left letting the cardinals get in first place

 

That team belongs nowhere near the lead. And there they are

 

 

Well, to be fair, look who they have played out of the ASB...the Reds and Pirates(twice). They won't be in first for long(and will fade) once they start playing real teams like with the next few series they have coming up with the Cubs, A's, Astros and Dodgers. Goodbye Cardinals.

 

I mean we've just laid an egg vs teams like Pit, Reds, Giants, Sea, SD and Miami. Generally speaking I'd probably agree with what you say but it's not like the team doesn't have talent. Basically it's tough to knock them for doing exactly what we couldn't do. If we'd have beat those teams we'd have a 6 game lead.

[Cirilloing]

We may as well buy a relief arm or two at the deadline and let this play out. If we don't rebound we can always have a fire sale in the offseason given that guys like Hader, Yelich, and Hiura still have a ton of team control left.

 

Also, the value on at least Hader and Yelich can only go down after this season. There is no way they can get any better.

[Eye Black]

The Brewers are now back tied with the Phillies for the second Wild Card spot and 2.0 GB of the Nationals for the top wild card spot. They trail the Cubs by 3.0 games for the division lead.

 

Following the August 7th games a year ago the Brewers were 2.5 GB of the Cubs for the division lead and were sitting in the first wild card spot, 1.0 game ahead of the Braves who occupied the second Wild Card spot at the time.

 

All things considered it seems sort of incredible the Brewers remain well positioned to make a run at both the division and wild card spots over the final quarter of the season.

[OldSchoolSnapper]

If the bullpen reinforcements continue to play as well as they have, the Brewers are somehow well positioned to make the playoffs. It never gets less shocking to say out loud because the season really feels like a dumpster fire until you look at the standings. I've felt all year like they should be 5-10 games under .500 but they've somehow managed to tread water.

[MrTPlush]

Minor additions can make the dumbest of impacts sometimes. Heck over a month or two months someone can pitch like they are the greatest reliever/starter in the game. You just never really know. Look at Davies to start the year...you never know.

 

Jordan Lyles - 10 IP 1.80 ERA

 

Zack Greinke - 6 IP 7.50 ERA

 

 

And the postseason? All it takes is Clayton Kershaw (or whoever the #1 is) to blow chunks for two games and you are 2/3 of the way to winning the NLDS. Which happens way more often than people think. That is usually how teams lose.

 

Stupider things have happened. Season is far from over.

[tmwiese55]

Agree with the sentiment of the last few posts. But I guess if we think back to the beginning of the season most folks viewed the NL as tough due to there only really being one truly bad team. So in a way it was kind of expected to have a mess of a parity since teams are just going to beat each other up. I'd agree it's still worse than I expected though, like the clump of teams battling here I wouldn't have expected to be 4ish games over .500. More like 8-11ish instead. Still, it's somewhat playing out as expected in a way

[OldSchoolSnapper]

The 5-game first round is probably the best thing the MLB playoffs have going for them. I still don't know how I really feel about the Wild Card. In the NL this year it's a good thing, but I still have a bit of a problem in situations where WC1 wins like 97 games and has to play an 83-win team for one game.

[Fear The Chorizo]

I think I've posted this in another thread, but if the Brewers can stay within arm's length of the NL Central lead and WC spots through the rest of their tough August slate of games, they've got to be considered a favorite to make the postseason once rosters expand in September - despite the uneven bullpen arms, the expanded rosters will help them the same way it did last September at least to some extent. The more important factor is what their schedule looks like for the month compared to what other NL teams competing with them will face.

 

The Cubs and Cards play each other 7 times during the last 10 days of the season, when the Brewers will be playing the Pirates, Reds, and Rockies. Keep the offense humming along and the season-long pitching inconsistencies are less alarming...particularly if Woodruff can get back in the rotation down the stretch.

[tmwiese55]

Starting with WSH next weekend they'll have 19/21 games against direct competitors for the division and WC. The other two being vs HOU. That's the season right there.

[KeithStone53151]

Despite their competition being super easy, I am a bit concerned about the Mets win streak...considering their rotation strength and bats have been heating up. I've been starting 3 Mets position players on my fantasy team for a couple weeks now...mostly just noting that this team is good right now in every facet of the game. The schedule gets tougher this week, so maybe they fall back to reality a bit.

 

I firmly believe the Brewers will make the playoffs if they start to really heat up. It's hard to overly concern myself with other teams...it's as simple as the Brewers performance for me. In my opinion...88 wins is probably a playoff team...90 wins probably get the division. Can we go 28-18...or maybe even 30-16?

[KeithStone53151]

I'm also going to point out, the Cubs have not won a road series since April...and the only 2 they won in April were against the Dbacks and Marlins. They've played some other cupcake teams on the road the last few months...but haven't won any series. They start a 10 game road trip today. No tough travel and no tough teams...Cincy/Philly/Pitt...will be curious to see if they can shake their road woes or if they manage to lose 6 or 7 of these 10 games. Safe to say we are all hoping for the latter.

[pacopete4]

Could we win 28-30 times over the next 46 games? We could. But this team sure hasn’t had that in them so far this season. Hopefully they find the switch but they sure play a lot of good teams coming up. Hard for me to believe it’ll happen but ya never know.

[Madhawk23]

No doubt - these next few weeks are huge. And, now that we are into August, the light at the end of this 2019 tunnel is becoming clearer. Here's how I think this thing needs to play out for the Brewers (knowing full well of course that nothing ever seems to go according to plan):

 

Tex: win 2/3

Min: win 1/2

@Was: win 2/3 (Scherzer is out, and maybe we can avoid one of Corbin/Strasburg in this series?)

@Stl: win 1/3 (if we lose 2/3 in Wsh, then we need to win 2/3 here for a .500 trip)

Ari: win 2/3

Stl: win 2/3

@Chc: win 1/3

Hou: win 1/2

Chc: win 2/4

@Mia: win 3/4

@Stl: win 2/3

SD: win 2/4

Pit: win 2/3

@Cin: win 2/3

@Col: win 2/3

 

To me, these expectations seem a bit lofty - especially given the current state of our pitching staff. And, this would still only leave us at 87 wins. Is that enough to hunt down the Cubs? Or, are we probably more likely to be going for a WC spot with this scenario? We'd have to hope that the Cubs go 25-23 down the stretch if we were to force a game 163 with them again this year, or 24-24 to beat them outright. Boy, that seems like it is a tough "ask," doesn't it? My guess is that the Cubs end up winning 90 games and taking the division by 3-4 games, when all is said and done. If we can get to 87 though, I'd have to think we'd at least be in a fight for one of the two WC spots.

[Madhawk23]

I agree with you - that Mets team is awfully scary right now, and I'm glad we don't have to play them anymore (at least in the regular season) - as I would not want to go up against them in a series with deGrom, Thor, Stroman and Wheeler. The Mets were the laughing stock of baseball when they went out and got Stroman before the deadline, but they might just get the last laugh when all is said and done.

[pacopete4]

I know we don’t do many poll questions around here but a good one would be where do you think the Brewers will finish:

 

-Central Division Champs

-Wild Card 1

-Wild Card 2

-Miss Playoffs

[owbc]

I give them about a 50/50 chance of making the playoffs, and if they do make the playoffs it is about 50/50 between division and WC2. Thinking Nationals are a lock for WC1.

 

Mets will find a way to Mets.

[Madhawk23]

I know we don’t do many poll questions around here but a good one would be where do you think the Brewers will finish:

 

-Central Division Champs

-Wild Card 1

-Wild Card 2

-Miss Playoffs

 

As much as it pains me to say this, I think we end up missing the playoffs - with either 85-86 wins. I just don't think a rotation of Chase, Gio, Lyles and Houser is good enough to get us through these next few weeks, and we'll probably be too far out of it by the time Woody and any other reinforcements are ready to help out in September. Hope I'm wrong though!

 

Now would be a great time for this offense to get really hot and take some pressure off of the pitching.

[willie key]

How many more games against the pirates do we have? 3?

 

We aren't making the playoffs

[OldSchoolSnapper]

Kinda hard for me to imagine 85 or 86 wins and not making it. That should be enough. I don't think the division is really in play. Obviously, it is with 45 or so games to play and being 3 out, but I just don't see that happening. I would say they're 33% of being a Wild Card. The candidates I take seriously for WC2 are the Brewers, Cards and Phillies. If I have to give an answer I'd say they don't make it. If they suddenly have four guys in the bullpen who are lock-down for a month, then that changes everything.

[sveumrules]

Current Playoff Odds per...

 

538: 32% (15% division/17% WC)

BPro: 29.5% (12.5% division/17% WC)

FanGraphs: 28.6% (10.1% division/18.5% WC)

BRef: 24.3% (6.6% division/17.7% WC)

 

I'm still predicting some sort of tie that will require extra baseball to be played & am still hoping the Brewers are somehow involved in it.

[willie key]

Current Playoff Odds per...

 

538: 32% (15% division/17% WC)

BPro: 29.5% (12.5% division/17% WC)

FanGraphs: 28.6% (10.1% division/18.5% WC)

BRef: 24.3% (6.6% division/17.7% WC)

 

I'm still predicting some sort of tie that will require extra baseball to be played & am still hoping the Brewers are somehow involved in it.

 

If Im not mistaken the Brewers % chances have gone down like 32% from July 1.

 

July was a killer month for us

[sveumrules]

Current Playoff Odds per...

 

538: 32% (15% division/17% WC)

BPro: 29.5% (12.5% division/17% WC)

FanGraphs: 28.6% (10.1% division/18.5% WC)

BRef: 24.3% (6.6% division/17.7% WC)

 

I'm still predicting some sort of tie that will require extra baseball to be played & am still hoping the Brewers are somehow involved in it.

 

If Im not mistaken the Brewers % chances have gone down like 32% from July 1.

 

July was a killer month for us

 

I had noted our %s a few times earlier in the thread, I think they peaked somewhere around June 3...

 

FG: 61%

538: 73%

BRef: 85%

 

...so like a 40-60% drop since then, depending on the source.

[Eye Black]

The Brewers are now sole occupants of the 2nd wild card spot with three teams just 0.5 GB of them (Cardinals, Mets, Phillies) and the next closest teams 1.5 GB (Diamondbacks) and 3.0 GB (Giants). The Nationals remain in the 1st WC spot by 2.0 games.

 

Odds are that one or more of those teams currently vying for the wild card game will go on a hot streak over the final month and a half of the season.

 

Here is my prediction on what each will take (2nd WC, 1st WC, NL Champ):

 

I predict it will take 87 wins to get the second Wild Card spot outright, and 86 wins to tie for the spot. In the case of the Brewers this would mean finishing 27-19 to secure it outright and 26-20 in order to hold a play-in game for the spot.

 

I think it will take 89 wins to secure the first Wild Card spot. In the case of the Brewers this would mean finishing 29-17.

 

I think it will take 90 wins to take the NL Central outright. In the case of the Brewers this would mean finishing 30-16. For the Cardinals to achieve 90 wins it would mean finishing 32-17, and for the Cubs they would have to finish 27-20 to get to 90 wins.

[tmwiese55]

What a difference 4 days makes. From the vibe of we're basically done to all of a sudden in the playoffs. Do their job and get 2/3 this weekend and they should be sitting OK with only 40ish games to go