Playing the Odds

Memorial Day has come and gone, which means it’s time to start seriously assessing how far teams could go. If you follow both leagues, you may have noticed that both of Chicago’s teams sit atop their divisions with a third of the season behind them. The Cubs have no reason to lose the NL Central, and the Sox have benefitted greatly from an unexpectedly mediocre division. Are you thinking what I’m thinking?

Before we continue, let’s get something clear: this is not me, Andrew, militant Sox fan, rooting for the Cubs. This is not an admission of some kind of neutral “I’m happy for their fans” nonsense where by virtue of their playing in my city, driving up my taxes, bringing traffic to a crawl and ruining the parking within a three-mile radius of their ballpark on game days I am somehow vaguely in favor of the Small Bears achieving anything of consequence. Personally I’m counting down the days until their crumbling hellhole of a park is demolished, forcing the team to the suburbs and seeing their unjustifiably large and inexplicably devoted fanbase reduced to nothing.

But I would love a Cubs-Sox World Series. Yes, it would divide families over something totally trivial and ultimately meaningless. Yes, the city would be destroyed in a way no one’s seen since the West Side in 1968, or possibly that whole cow thing well before that. Yes, we’d all be reduced to some kind of squallid, post-apocalyptic, survivalist living once the National Guard had given up on us.

More importantly, it would settle a few debates for a while. Cubs or Sox? Interleague hasn’t really answered the question and the close call of 2003 was such a tease, even though we all got a good laugh when both teams were shown up to simply be different kinds of losers: the Sox as the underachievers and the Cubs as the self-destructors. The two haven’t squared off in any meaningful way since 1906, and every single two-team market has had at least one local World Series since.

Is it too soon for this kind of talk? In a world where September 14, 2003 was too soon, absolutely. Let’s talk anyway. Since the advent of the current three-division, Wild Card format, the following teams have led at Memorial Day (teams that eventually took the division are bolded):

  • 1995: BOS, CLE, CAL | PHI, CHC, SFG
  • 1996: NYY, CLE, TEX | ATL, HOU, SDP
  • 1997: TOR, MIL, ANA | FLA, HOU, SFG
  • 1998: NYY, CLE, TEX | ATL, HOU, SDP
  • 1999: BOS, CLE, TEX | ATL, HOU, SFG
  • 2000: BOS, CHW, SEA | ATL, STL, ARI
  • 2001: NYY, MIN, SEA | PHI, CHC/STL, ARI/LAD
  • 2002: BOS, MIN, SEA | ATL/FLA, CIN, SFG
  • 2003: BOS, MIN, SEA | ATL, CHC, SFG/LAD
  • 2004: NYY, CHW, ANA | FLA, CIN, LAD
  • 2005: BAL, CHW, TEX | FLA, STL, SDP
  • 2006: BOS, DET, TEX | NYM, STL, ARI
  • 2007: BOS, CLE, LAA | NYM, MIL, LAD
  • 2008: TBA, CHW, LAA | FLA, CHC, ARI

Of the 81 teams to lead a division at Memorial Day, 43 finished in the same position. You may ask about the Wild Card, but we’re going to ignore that for now because, frankly, at this rate if the Wild Card comes out of of either Central division that should be proof enough that Major League Baseball is not only fixed but a complete joke. Subsequently I will not watch the playoffs. Unless the Sox take the Wild Card, then I’ll gladly point out how the best non-winner from each league has represented eight of the last 26 pennants.

Forty-three out of 81 is not totally impossible if you think about, but things get tricky when we start looking at specifics. For starters, something crazy could happen between now and then. Cleveland, for example, could pull off a psychotic trade and bludgeon the ALC into submission. Detroit could somehow remember how to play solid baseball, or the Twins could somehow forget.

Likewise, late-May division leaders have only held on tightly enough three times to ultimately face each other in the World Series, and they were always the Yankees: 1996, 1998, and 2001. Three of 13 World Series featuring 43 of 81 teams. A twelve percent chance of the stars aligning, and that’s not including whatever those hateful propellerheads over at Baseball Prospectus have to say about it.

Could it happen? Sure, anything’s possible. Get your riot gear ready just in case.

2 thoughts on “Playing the Odds”

  1. the centrals (both of them, once again) are a joke this year. indians and tigers suck, larussa’s drunk ass won’t get the birds anything, astros have nothing. no reason the sox and cubs aren” both in it this year.

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