The A's/Tigers will be dangerous in the playoffs because of their three top starters.
No, the Tigers can't win. They have no relief pitching.
The A's have stumbled into the post-season. They're done.
The Angels are well rested. I don't see anyone beating them.
The Orioles are going to struggle because they live by the long ball. You need to manufacture runs to win against the best teams.
Washington and Anaheim are on fire going into the playoffs. I wouldn't want to play them.
The Dodgers are the favorite because they have the best pitcher, period. Great pitching beats great hitting in the post-season.
Look out for St. Louis. They've had to fight nearly to the end. They will be battle tested going into the playoffs. The same for Kansas City, Pittsburgh and San Fransisco.
No one wants to play the Giants. They have a lot of veterans with playoff experience.
You will hear these aphorisms -- and more -- as the playoffs wind into view next week. They're all commonly understood and accepted. And all but one of them sink in a sea of facts.
In one sense, the idea that any team in the tournament can win the World Series is, by definition, true. Seven game series among roughly equally-matched teams in unusual circumstances (sellout crowds, national TV audiences, extreme micro-managing, increasingly cold weather) are essentially lotteries. A good bounce here and missed call there can alter any series.
At the same time, every team is a long shot in the sense that they must win three series (and in some cases, a single elimination game) to emerge as champions. No team is so dominant that the odds favor them over everyone else. (Indeed, there has never been such a team, at least not in the playoff era.)
Beyond that, the calculations that you hear from the "analysts" are so much hoo-hah. Behold:
There is not a scintilla of evidence; not a jot; not an atom, a particle or a speck, suggesting that teams particularly imbalanced towards the top of their starting rotations perform better in the post-season than those with broader but shallower rotations. Possessing one great starter, or three, without quality behind them has not in the history of baseball delivered superior results versus those with five good but not lights-out starters, all else being equal.
Relievers actually do matter a little, says the research, but the closer and set-up man are a vastly over-rated element in the equation. Good pitching is important in every inning, and because managers manage for an edge on nearly every pitch, the bullpen takes on added importance generally. In any case, this actually does bode poorly for the Tigers.
In the great history of baseball, teams have won with small ball and large ball and welterweight ball and every combination and permutation allowed by the laws of mathematics. Winning with three-run homers has not proven to be any less dependable, nor any more, than winning with station-to-station offense.
In the 125 years our pastime has been played, the recent records of the teams entering the playoffs has not correlated in any way, shape, form or function with their performance in the playoffs. Not an iota, a smidgen or a crumb, as recent Series participants can attest. Teams' overall records do correlate, suggesting that 100-win teams are superior to 85-win teams, even "hot" ones.
An Oakland-San Francisco rematch is as plausible as a Nationals-Angels pairing, not withstanding that the former have a 50% chance of being eliminated in the play-in before the tournament begins in earnest.
Furthermore, rosters thick with wily veterans make no nevermind, according the the research. Doe-eyed youngsters perform with equal manliness to grizzled old-timers, talent being equal. Don't expect Mike Trout to stumble quivering with nerves or Raul Ibanez to suddenly bat, well, I'd say .250 is out of his range at this point.
There actually is one old wives tale that does carry some weight. Teams that have to play hard to the end actually do enjoy a small advantage over the early clinchers. Evidently, being in playoff mode for the incoming week or two keeps everyone sharp. Or anyway, that's the ex post facto explanation. Based on that, smart managers around the Beltway and SoCal should be exhorting their charges to earn the best record, or home field, or some other illusory advantage, because just battling for it confers an advantage of its own.
Keep all this in mind as the sports soothsayers justify their "predictions" with nonsense that was, once-upon-a-time, beyond disproof. But disproof has drunk its Gatorade, stolen signs and turned it on since the All-Star break. And it tells us what we should have always known: you can't predict who will win. That's why it's fun.
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