Projecting a 12-Team Playoff Structure
Last month, I went over some possible playoff structures in an attempt to design a format that allowed for playoff expansion while still preserving the value of adding a star to the roster. I focused on 14-team structures for a couple of reasons: it was more of a challenge to make a 14-team system that didn’t grossly alter team incentives and I suspected that the players would be willing to accept the larger field if it helped them achieve some of their other negotiation priorities.
Well, we’re a month later, and there’s a little more clarity. While there is still a lot to iron out and little idea as to when the league and the players union might reach a deal on a new collective bargaining agreement, there seems to be some kind of very preliminary sorta-agreement on a 12-team playoff system, though ownership has apparently been very resistant to allowing the more highly-seeded teams any advantage outside of the traditional home field-based ones (meaning no knockout run or “ghost wins”).
So let’s take our lockout projected standings and project the playoffs based on a system in which the best two division winners receive byes, the third division winner plays the lowest seed in a three-game series, and the other two Wild Card teams play their own trio of games against each other. The playoffs then proceed from there.
The American League
| Team | W | L | GB | Pct | Div% | WC% | Playoff% | WS Win% |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| New York Yankees | 90 | 72 | — | 55.6% | 39.1% | 44.3% | 83.4% | 9.1% |
| Toronto Blue Jays | 89 | 73 | 1 | 54.9% | 27.4% | 47.7% | 75.2% | 6.5% |
| Tampa Bay Rays | 88 | 74 | 2 | 54.3% | 25.5% | 47.8% | 73.3% | 6.1% |
| Boston Red Sox | 83 | 79 | 7 | 51.2% | 8.0% | 35.0% | 43.0% | 2.0% |
| Baltimore Orioles | 64 | 98 | 26 | 39.5% | 0.0% | 0.2% | 0.2% | 0.0% |
| Team | W | L | GB | Pct | Div% | WC% | Playoff% | WS Win% |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Chicago White Sox | 88 | 74 | — | 54.3% | 70.7% | 7.9% | 78.6% | 7.0% |
| Cleveland Guardians | 78 | 84 | 10 | 48.1% | 12.0% | 11.1% | 23.1% | 0.7% |
| Detroit Tigers | 76 | 86 | 12 | 46.9% | 6.9% | 7.1% | 14.0% | 0.3% |
| Minnesota Twins | 75 | 87 | 13 | 46.3% | 5.9% | 6.3% | 12.3% | 0.3% |
| Kansas City Royals | 74 | 88 | 14 | 45.7% | 4.5% | 5.0% | 9.6% | 0.2% |
| Team | W | L | GB | Pct | Div% | WC% | Playoff% | WS Win% |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Houston Astros | 91 | 71 | — | 56.2% | 70.9% | 16.1% | 87.0% | 11.6% |
| Los Angeles Angels | 81 | 81 | 10 | 50.0% | 10.7% | 24.0% | 34.7% | 1.5% |
| Oakland A’s | 81 | 81 | 10 | 50.0% | 10.6% | 24.3% | 34.9% | 1.5% |
| Seattle Mariners | 80 | 82 | 11 | 49.4% | 6.9% | 18.7% | 25.6% | 0.9% |
| Texas Rangers | 73 | 89 | 18 | 45.1% | 0.9% | 4.5% | 5.4% | 0.1% |
The National League
| Team | W | L | GB | Pct | Div% | WC% | Playoff% | WS Win% |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Atlanta Braves | 90 | 72 | — | 55.6% | 49.1% | 30.3% | 79.4% | 8.1% |
| New York Mets | 88 | 74 | 2 | 54.3% | 34.3% | 35.5% | 69.8% | 5.7% |
| Philadelphia Phillies | 82 | 80 | 8 | 50.6% | 9.5% | 24.5% | 34.0% | 1.4% |
| Miami Marlins | 80 | 82 | 10 | 49.4% | 5.7% | 18.5% | 24.2% | 0.8% |
| Washington Nationals | 75 | 87 | 15 | 46.3% | 1.3% | 6.4% | 7.8% | 0.1% |
| Team | W | L | GB | Pct | Div% | WC% | Playoff% | WS Win% |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| St. Louis Cardinals | 89 | 73 | — | 54.9% | 49.0% | 25.0% | 74.0% | 6.6% |
| Milwaukee Brewers | 88 | 74 | 1 | 54.3% | 39.3% | 28.2% | 67.6% | 5.2% |
| Cincinnati Reds | 80 | 82 | 9 | 49.4% | 8.5% | 16.7% | 25.2% | 0.8% |
| Chicago Cubs | 76 | 86 | 13 | 46.9% | 3.0% | 8.1% | 11.1% | 0.2% |
| Pittsburgh Pirates | 68 | 94 | 21 | 42.0% | 0.1% | 0.6% | 0.8% | 0.0% |
| Team | W | L | GB | Pct | Div% | WC% | Playoff% | WS Win% |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Los Angeles Dodgers | 94 | 68 | — | 58.0% | 63.7% | 29.1% | 92.7% | 14.4% |
| San Diego Padres | 90 | 72 | 4 | 55.6% | 31.9% | 48.1% | 80.1% | 7.8% |
| San Francisco Giants | 81 | 81 | 13 | 50.0% | 4.2% | 25.6% | 29.8% | 1.1% |
| Arizona Diamondbacks | 72 | 90 | 22 | 44.4% | 0.2% | 3.1% | 3.3% | 0.0% |
| Colorado Rockies | 66 | 96 | 28 | 40.7% | 0.0% | 0.3% | 0.3% | 0.0% |
Don’t laugh that I’m projecting 162 games! We’re simply trying to see the effects of a change to the playoff system and since most seasons that aren’t 2022 hopefully will feature 162 games, it makes sense to look at the standings at this level.
If you’re focused on getting higher playoff chances, well, you’ve got that. Even the expected basement dwellers of the league sneak above the 0.0%/0.1% doldrums. The Pittsburgh Pirates almost move the decimal point, nearing a 1% projected shot of postseason play. (Whether the Pirates having that realistic of a chance at the postseason is a feature or a bug is a judgement I will leave to the reader.)
To get an idea of how the playoff probabilities changed, I ran the old system against the new system. You might notice that the World Series probabilities in the old system vary a bit from the ones you saw in the lockout projections. That’s because I’ve been tinkering with this model in recent weeks. It now considers the distribution of performances on rosters and calculates playoff team strength slightly differently than regular season strength. Here are the projected changes:
| Team | Old Playoff% | Old WS% | New Playoff% | New WS% | Playoff Change | WS Change |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Tampa Bay Rays | 61.7% | 5.5% | 73.3% | 6.1% | 11.6% | 0.6% |
| Toronto Blue Jays | 63.8% | 5.9% | 75.2% | 6.5% | 11.4% | 0.6% |
| New York Yankees | 74.3% | 8.6% | 83.4% | 9.1% | 9.1% | 0.5% |
| Boston Red Sox | 30.5% | 1.5% | 43.0% | 2.0% | 12.5% | 0.5% |
| San Diego Padres | 70.4% | 7.5% | 80.1% | 7.8% | 9.6% | 0.3% |
| San Francisco Giants | 19.7% | 0.8% | 29.8% | 1.1% | 10.2% | 0.3% |
| Oakland A’s | 24.8% | 1.2% | 34.9% | 1.5% | 10.1% | 0.2% |
| Los Angeles Angels | 24.7% | 1.2% | 34.7% | 1.5% | 10.0% | 0.2% |
| Philadelphia Phillies | 23.5% | 1.2% | 34.0% | 1.4% | 10.5% | 0.2% |
| Miami Marlins | 15.8% | 0.6% | 24.2% | 0.8% | 8.4% | 0.1% |
| Seattle Mariners | 17.4% | 0.7% | 25.6% | 0.9% | 8.2% | 0.1% |
| New York Mets | 58.7% | 5.6% | 69.8% | 5.7% | 11.1% | 0.1% |
| Cincinnati Reds | 17.3% | 0.8% | 25.2% | 0.8% | 7.8% | 0.1% |
| Washington Nationals | 4.3% | 0.1% | 7.8% | 0.1% | 3.5% | 0.0% |
| Chicago Cubs | 6.8% | 0.2% | 11.1% | 0.2% | 4.3% | 0.0% |
| Texas Rangers | 3.0% | 0.1% | 5.4% | 0.1% | 2.4% | 0.0% |
| Arizona Diamondbacks | 1.5% | 0.0% | 3.3% | 0.0% | 1.8% | 0.0% |
| Pittsburgh Pirates | 0.3% | 0.0% | 0.8% | 0.0% | 0.5% | 0.0% |
| Colorado Rockies | 0.1% | 0.0% | 0.3% | 0.0% | 0.2% | 0.0% |
| Baltimore Orioles | 0.1% | 0.0% | 0.2% | 0.0% | 0.1% | 0.0% |
| Kansas City Royals | 6.7% | 0.2% | 9.6% | 0.2% | 2.8% | 0.0% |
| Minnesota Twins | 8.8% | 0.3% | 12.3% | 0.3% | 3.4% | -0.1% |
| Detroit Tigers | 10.4% | 0.4% | 14.0% | 0.3% | 3.7% | -0.1% |
| Cleveland Guardians | 17.5% | 0.8% | 23.1% | 0.7% | 5.5% | -0.1% |
| Los Angeles Dodgers | 87.9% | 14.6% | 92.7% | 14.4% | 4.8% | -0.2% |
| Atlanta Braves | 70.3% | 8.3% | 79.4% | 8.1% | 9.1% | -0.2% |
| Milwaukee Brewers | 57.7% | 5.6% | 67.6% | 5.2% | 9.8% | -0.4% |
| Houston Astros | 81.6% | 12.0% | 87.0% | 11.6% | 5.4% | -0.5% |
| St. Louis Cardinals | 65.5% | 7.2% | 74.0% | 6.6% | 8.4% | -0.7% |
| Chicago White Sox | 74.8% | 8.8% | 78.6% | 7.0% | 3.7% | -1.8% |
The changes in World Series probability didn’t follow the exact pattern I originally expected. Division winners take a hit, but a team like the Dodgers, with a high projected chance of sitting out the Wild Card round, sees the least damage. Top teams also see some of their loss mitigated by their opponents in the LDS and LCS being weaker; the last Wild Card will advance sometimes and take out the usually superior third division winner. Speaking of, the format was especially hard on the third division winner, as that team is now being thrust into a best-of-three series when they previously got to watch the Wild Cards duke it out. Naturally, the winners of the Central divisions suffer the most here.
I expected the most advantaged teams to be those in very tight divisions, but I was surprised by the magnitude of the advantage. The AL East has four very solid teams, and the Yankees, by virtue of limiting their downside, was the only division winner to see their World Series probability improve in the new system.
Now, just how bad is that third Wild Card?
| Wins | NL % | AL % |
|---|---|---|
| 73 | 0.0% | 0.0% |
| 74 | 0.0% | 0.0% |
| 75 | 0.0% | 0.0% |
| 76 | 0.0% | 0.1% |
| 77 | 0.1% | 0.2% |
| 78 | 0.3% | 0.6% |
| 79 | 0.8% | 1.4% |
| 80 | 1.9% | 2.9% |
| 81 | 3.4% | 5.5% |
| 82 | 6.0% | 8.4% |
| 83 | 9.1% | 11.1% |
| 84 | 12.0% | 13.5% |
| 85 | 13.8% | 14.4% |
| 86 | 14.0% | 13.0% |
| 87 | 12.5% | 10.7% |
| 88 | 10.0% | 7.4% |
| 89 | 7.1% | 5.0% |
| 90 | 4.4% | 2.8% |
| 91 | 2.4% | 1.5% |
| 92 | 1.2% | 0.8% |
| 93 | 0.6% | 0.4% |
| 94 | 0.2% | 0.2% |
| 95 | 0.1% | 0.0% |
| 96 | 0.0% | 0.0% |
| 97 | 0.0% | 0.0% |
| 98 | 0.0% | 0.0% |
| 99 | 0.0% | 0.0% |
In the simulations, every win total from 73 through 99 made the playoffs as the third Wild Card. Suffice it to say, these years have enough chaos to make Jay Jaffe happy. In the 73-win year, the Dodgers, Padres, Giants, Cardinals, and Mets all won 100 games and there was quite a drop-off from second Wild Card, the Reds, at 85 wins, all the way down to the Braves at 73.
Now, we’ll have to wait, possibly for a while, to find out what the actual playoff format looks like or even how many games we will play this season. But upon examining it, I feel better — or at least less grumpy — about the playoff expansion than I previously did. In March 2022, that counts as good news.
Dan Szymborski is a senior writer for FanGraphs and the developer of the ZiPS projection system. He was a writer for ESPN.com from 2010-2018, a regular guest on a number of radio shows and podcasts, and a voting BBWAA member. He also maintains a terrible Twitter account at @DSzymborski.
yikes