Importantly, for the Cubs, this season isn’t over. Obviously, this season isn’t over — in a sense their real season hasn’t begun. We’ve known the Cubs would make the playoffs for something like five and a half months, and only now do they get to compete for the grand prize. Because there are games remaining, this might not seem like the best time to examine the 2016 Cubs through a historical lens.

I believe the opposite, though. At last, we have final, official regular-season statistics. Those are the stats that matter the most. And even though the Cubs are clearly Team No. 1 moving forward, the odds are still better that they don’t win the World Series. They’re probably going to lose, somewhere and somehow. And I don’t want to allow for playoff emotion to color the way people feel about this analysis. This season, the Cubs won eight more games than anyone else. The Cubs had a better run differential than anyone else, by a margin of 68. Clearly, they were really good. But how good, historically, when you’re talking about more than 100 years?

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According to recent reports, the Marlins are on the verge of signing third baseman Martin Prado to a contract that would keep him from hitting the free agent market this winter; the extension will cost them roughly $40 million over three years, keeping Prado in Miami for his age 33-35 seasons.

According to even more recent reports, the Cubs are on the verge of signing President of Baseball Operations Theo Epstein to a contract that would keep him from hitting the free agent market this winter; the extension will cost them roughly $50 million over five years, keeping Epstein in Chicago for his age 43-47 seasons.

Between the two of them, the Epstein news is certainly more significant. The architect of the best team in baseball, Epstein is now the highest paid executive in the sport, and this represents about a 250% raise over the contract he got when he got to Chicago, which paid him $18 million over five years. The Prado deal is more of a run-of-the-mill contract extension for a nice player, but it barely rated as news in the baseball landscape. But given the differing lengths of the contracts, Prado is actually making more per season, and the two deals are roughly comparable in value.

In other words, MLB just told us that one of the best executives in the game is worth about the same as the decline years of a solid non-star, a guy who should be expected to be something like a league average player during the contract he just signed. I’m sure the Marlins and Cubs weren’t trying to create this kind of juxtaposition, but thanks to the timing of these two deals, we can say that the market is currently valuing coveted front office members in a similar way to an average player.

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I’ve been thinking a lot lately about the Rangers’ success in one-run games. They actually lost by one run yesterday, but if you’ve been paying attention, that was the first time that’s happened all season, probably, and one game doesn’t upset the whole pattern. The regular season is just about done, and the Rangers have put together an incredible stat. That’s — well, it’s incredible. I don’t need to provide any other words.

It’s tricky to write about these things, and I wasn’t looking to cover this in the familiar way. We’ve all read a number of articles about what the Rangers have done. We’ve all read articles before about similar teams doing similar things. It’s boring to say “luck,” and it’s tired to say “luck,” and with the playoffs around the corner pointing toward luck is additionally irrelevant. The Rangers have done what they’ve done, and their fans have been able to enjoy it. There’s no taking any of that enjoyment back for math-y purposes.

I’ve just been amazed by how the Rangers have stood out. They’ve won 77% of their one-run games. The Yankees are in second at 69%. Then you have the Tigers at 62%. Thinking about the Rangers got me wondering: Is this the most extraordinary team statistic of the year? I’ll tell you right now: It’s not! Follow along below.

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The National League Cy Young race is an incredibly competitive one, and as Dave Cameron (who has a vote this year) broke down a few weeks ago, much of the differences between the candidates deals with run prevention in a team sense (RA/9-WAR and ERA) versus run prevention in a component sense (FIP, WAR). As a result, there has been considerable discussion on the concept of weak contact, and last week I looked at the role of the Cubs defense in the Chicago pitchers’ low BABIPs. Taking a small step further, let’s use the Statcast to look at weak and strong contact to determine if the Cy Young candidates in the National League have been helping out their defenses.

To whittle down the candidates, I found the pitchers who are among the National League’s top 10 both by WAR and RA/9-WAR — and then added Jose Fernandez, who just missed the second list. This is a list of those pitchers and their respective ERA, FIP and WAR marks.

As you can see, the NL pitchers ranked first and second in ERA only rank sixth and seventh in FIP, which has led to discussions, particularly with regard to Kyle Hendricks, about how to evaluate such discrepancies when discussing a pitcher’s Cy Young candidacy. To examine the type of contact a pitcher is generating, ee can start with a simple look at average exit velocity. Here are the pitchers’ average exit-velocity numbers and MLB ranks, per Baseball Savant.

While the evidence isn’t overwhelming, there is some reason to think that a pitcher has some, if not a lot, of influence over exit velocity, with the bulk of the influence coming from the batter. Those arguing for Kyle Hendricks for the Cy Young would likely say there is a considerable effect and point to the very good exit-velocity numbers and very low BABIP he’s conceded as evidence. That said, Clayton Kershaw has an even better average exit velocity and his BABIP isn’t quite as low as Hendricks’. Which pitcher gets more credit?

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Just a little more than a week ago, the Indians had a reportedly healthy Danny Salazar, a totally healthy Carlos Carrasco, and their odds of winning the World Series, according to our projections, sat at 13.4%. Aside from a 24-hour window back on July 5 during which Cleveland’s odds jumped up to 14.2%, last week’s figure was the highest of the year for the soon-to-be American League Central Division champions.

Of course, Salazar is no longer healthy, having finally given in to the right elbow that’s been barking at him for much of the season. He seems unlikely to contribute again until 2017. And of course, Carrasco is no longer healthy, having been knocked out just two pitches into his most recent start after being struck by an Ian Kinsler line drive and fracturing his throwing hand. He won’t contribute again until 2017.

Understandably, this has provided a huge blow to Cleveland’s odds, which our own Corinne Landrey touched upon this morning. While the Indians will still have a better shot at winning it all than all but seven teams come October, their odds have been cut from 13.4% to 9.3% in the blink of an eye, a 30% decrease that couldn’t occur so quickly without a devastating injury or two. Our projections have long viewed Cleveland as either the strongest contender for the American League pennant, or at least the team most likely to stand in someone else’s way. No longer is that the case.

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The Chicago Cubs are the unquestioned best team in baseball at the moment. There is no aspect of the game where the team struggles. They hit, hit for power, field and run the bases at a high level, pitch well as starters, and pitch well as relievers. When we ask questions and delve into the numbers, we do not ask if they are good. Instead, we ask how good are they, how this happened, and who is responsible. On the hitting side of things, numbers are easier to come by and believe in. On the run-prevention side, however, assigning value between pitching, defense, and luck can be difficult.

Back in June, August Fagerstrom noted that the Cubs’ opponent BABIP, then at .250, was basically the lowest of the past 55 years when adjusted for league average. Back in June, we had not yet completed half the season. Now in September, with the season nearly complete, the Cubs BABIP has risen… all the way to .251, increasing just one measly point. The Cubs are preventing balls in play at a record level.

On balls in play there are three principal groups of actors: pitchers, hitters, and defenders. While an individual hitter might have a decent amount of control over whether a batted ball becomes a hit or an out, pitchers face so many different hitters over the course of a season that, for any one pitcher and any one team, the control by the pitcher and defense on batted balls is likely very influential. So how do we break this down?

First, let’s back up a step, and note something else the Cubs have been doing at a historic level. Generally speaking, a team’s FIP is going to be fairly close to a team’s ERA. Since World War II, there have been 1,716 team seasons, and all but 108 (6.3%) have produced an ERA and FIP within a half-run of each other; two-thirds of teams, within a quarter-run. The Cubs are one of the biggest outliers we have ever seen.

So we see the Cubs up there, and wonder what could be causing this. Do the Cubs have a secret sauce? Is it the pitching? Is it the defense? Is this luck?

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Last week, we ran a series of posts laying out the case for the most compelling candidates for the American League’s Most Valuable Player Award (links to all of which are available here). Today, we continue with the National League MVP Award.

Note that, as with last week’s posts, these are designed to make an affirmative argument for their subject and are not intended to serve as comprehensive looks at every candidate on their own. The authors tasked with writing these posts may not even believe their subject actually deserves to win, but they were brave enough to make the case anyway. The goal of these posts is to lay out the potential reasons for voters to consider a variety of candidates and to allow the readers to decide which argument is most persuasive.

Not every award race has an obvious front-runner. Like, take the American League Cy Young Award. That’s as tight a race as you can imagine, so any number of candidates can emerge. For any one of them, you can go in asking, why should this guy be the winner? I think the National League MVP Award is different. The way I see it, the conversation begins with Kris Bryant. He’s out in front, so you have to wonder, why shouldn’t this guy be the winner? Perfectly legitimate question. Trying to answer it just leads you right back to the start.

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Certain people on a baseball field possess the type of abilities that lend themselves to being noticed. It’s very easy to notice Giancarlo Stanton when he hits a massive home run. It’s tough to miss Noah Syndergaard pumping 101-mph fastballs in the first inning. Others possess the type of abilities that only become noticed when things go wrong. We don’t really notice the first-base umpire until he blows the call that ruins a perfect game. Nobody knows the third-base coach’s name until he holds the runner that could’ve changed the World Series. And then there’s a third group who possess extraordinary abilities, one way or another, that go completely unnoticed. Someone is the best in the world at playing ricochets off the wall in the outfield, but we’ve got no real way of knowing. There’s a king of the “second-base-glove-flip-to-first,” but we haven’t crowned him.

For some time, Javier Baez existed in that third group, of having an elite skill that’s not as obvious as hitting a home run or throwing 100. Lately, he’s been moving into group one. It’s getting hard not to notice Javy Baez’s tag game.

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Just yesterday, I wrote about some concerns regarding Jake Arrieta. In particular, over time, Arrieta has gotten worse against left-handed hitters, losing the effectiveness of his best pitch while also losing his pinpoint command. This can be traced back to Arrieta losing the remarkable consistency of his mechanics. Arm speed and release point are everything, and for the last little while, Arrieta has been fighting uphill. He needs to get himself right before the playoffs.

Arrieta remains plenty good, but he has some stuff to work out. Kyle Hendricks, meanwhile, has nothing to work out. And compared to Arrieta, Hendricks has followed kind of the opposite course. He’s gotten better against left-handed hitters. He’s essentially added a new pitch while honing his pinpoint command. His mechanics are as consistent as they’ve ever been. Right now, we’re seeing the best version of Kyle Hendricks. You’ve probably read about him limiting quality contact. When you dig in, it’s no mystery how it’s happened.

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Any Cubs fan could tell you Jake Arrieta just doesn’t seem quite right. This has been the case for a number of weeks, or months, and we’ve touched on it before. It’s funny to think about the hand-wringing over a pitcher sitting on a sub-3 ERA. But, he really has gotten meaningfully worse, and he’s the staff ace of a World Series favorite. Cubs fans don’t have a whole lot of negatives right now. Arrieta might be turning into one, and he had a clunker against Pittsburgh just Monday.

Last week, I wrote about the curious disappearance of Arrieta’s unbelievable slider. It hasn’t killed him or anything, with the fastball picking up the slack, but that’s not something Arrieta would’ve wished for. The slider going away is a symptom of something. I can present to you now another symptom of something. And it’s related to the slider’s deterioration — Arrieta’s developing a platoon split. He’s having some trouble with lefties, and, it turns out there are lefties everywhere.

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