Here we go again: the numbers mean everything, and they mean nothing at all. It must be baseball. Welcome to the 2022 MLB playoffs.
The Phillies, after an eleven-year absence, are in, but - although every talking head in the universe would have one think that this is simply unfathomable, that something must have gone wrong, that a bunch of other teams must really have blown it, that baseball success in Philadelphia is the rarest, strangest thing that ever happened, and that not only should whoever the other team might be beat them but is entitled to beat them because it's right and just - the Seattle Mariners' playoff drought was a decade longer for a solid US drinking age of years, so cheers to young Seattleites and old, and, most importantly, go Phillies!
Of course, the shameless anti-Philadelphia bias among the media disappears as soon as the Phillies win. Of course it does. They all knew this was going to happen. Right. Immediately after the Phillies win is when they suddenly always had strengths and talent and arms and legs and stuff.
Anyway...
Seattle, Philadelphia, and San Diego bring us to a fascinating discussion of improbability that only baseball could induce. Fortunately, much of this discussion comes at the expense of New York, Los Angeles, and Atlanta. Tomahawk chop them apples.
Naturally, since you read The Greatest Game in the World, Vol. 1, you know that in baseball such improbability is only to be expected.
Three teams in the National League - and four in total - won at least 100 (101, actually) games in 2022. This only happened once before - in 2019. The 2019 Astros, however, the team with the best record, at least made the World Series. The team with the best record this year, the Dodgers, didn't make the League Championship Series. Oh, no. So sad.
San Diego ousted Los Angeles after first ousting the New York Mets, which means a fifth seed that won 89 games knocked out two hundred-win teams, including a Los Angeles team that set a team record for wins (111), which is no small feat for a team with a history as rich as the Dodgers. The Padres, therefore, did something no team had ever done before the World Series let alone before the League Championship Series. Well done, Fathers.
San Diego's charge to the NLCS matched them up against the sixth seed Phillies (87 wins), who had just knocked off the NL's third hundred-win team, the Braves. In doing do, both Philadelphia and San Diego defeated the regular-season winners of their respective divisions.
Doesn't sound fair? Cry me a river. Last year's champs, those same stupid Braves, won 88 games in the regular season. Same with the 2014 San Francisco Giants. And if you're a Yankees front-runner - ahem, excuse me, I mean 'fan' - and you don't like all these inferior teams interfering with your athletic hegemony, the 2000 Yankees won exactly 87 regular season games, same as this year's sixth-seeded Phillies club. Even the 1995 Braves - they of the ever-celebrated, historically potent Hall of Fame starting rotation who all had their career years the same year - only won 90 regular season games.
The 2006 Cardinals take the cake, though. They won 83 regular season games. Fortunately for St. Louis, the NL Central division was unfathomably mediocre that year, and the Cardinals got hot at the right time...and the Tigers pitchers just couldn't throw the ball to first base. It's the little things.
In case you were wondering, the 2006 Phillies, anchored by league MVP Ryan Howard (who was still able to make contact in those days) won 85 games to the Cards' 83. Sigh...
In fact, in the Wild Card era (since 1995 - we are now in year 28), the team with the best overall regular season record has won the championship 7 times, and it's not going to be 8 this year because the Dodgers are already out, so we're looking at a clean 25% success rate, which, as statistics would have it, is just a few ticks shy of a normal team batting average. Baseball statistics never fail to humble, do they?
Also, as I'm sure you were wondering, a Wild Card has won the World Series...
- wait for it -
- wait for it -
- wait for it -
8 times in that same span. Hm. That then leaves 13 championships for division winners who did not have the best overall record in the game. This all makes sense. There's only one best record, and not-best-record division winners used to make up the majority of the rest of the field. Now that Wild Cards make up the majority of the rest of the field...well, we're going to see how much home field advantage really matters - or, perhaps, who really has it. The away team won three out of four Wild Card Series this year.
So what's fair? Enough crying about the 'best team' not winning. There's no such thing until the games are over. Once you get to the playoffs, everyone is 0-0, advantages are built in for regular season success, and the better team is the team that wins a given series until there are no series left especially if the team that wins is not the one granted advantages. Then - and only then - is there a 'best.'
Why is this fair? The length of the season and approximately a trillion resultant variables, e.g., head-to-head matchups this year. The Phillies won their season series with the Dodgers, Padres, and Cardinals. Even their 8-11 record against the Braves wasn't cause for concern unless you're really into overreacting. The difference between being 8-11 against a team and having a winning record against that team is 2 games. Two. As in one more than one. The only team who pounded the Phillies was the Mets. Thanks, Padres!
As the cliché goes, that's why they play the games.
Back to the American League: forget the boring Yankees and Astros. Let's tip our caps to the Seattle Mariners, who beat the Blue Jays in the first round but fell to the Astros in the AL Divisional round. They were eliminated in an 18-inning marathon. For all you counters out there, that's two full games' worth of innings. Although that game still only tied for the longest playoff game ever played with game 3 of the 2018 World Series, the Astros-Mariners game was the game that went scoreless the longest with the Astros scoring the game's lone run in the top of the 18th.
If any more history is made this postseason, you can bet I'll be back here revising. If not, enjoy the rest of the playoffs, and let's hope the WS trophy stays with the National League.
Spring Training 2023 update
Well hey, there was a bit more history made last postseason, and the Phillies almost became perhaps the most improbable championship team in recent memory. Still, National League championship rings are nothing to sneeze at. Bryce Harper now has an NLCS MVP trophy in his case, and after coming up only two wins short of the dream, the Phillies acquired about a hundred bullpen arms, a strong mid-rotation starter (Taijuan Walker), and perhaps the best free agent available, Trea Turner. And now the Phils are projected to win...85 games.
Wait, WHAT!?
That's right - the NL champs who upgraded significantly are projected to win 2 fewer games than they did last year. Whatever.
The Phillies haven't been this exciting in a while. I'm excited. Penelope's excited. Bryce Harper's excited. The rest of the National League can take this and shove it. Enjoy 2023, baseball fans!