So You Want a Cinderella Story?
According to our playoff odds, there are currently 13 teams which feature playoff odds below 2%. As that number grows throughout the month, an increasingly large percentage of baseball fans will be bidding farewell to the hopes that this is the year for their preferred teams and looking to adopt other rooting interests. There’s no full replacement for the satisfaction of your team winning in October, but playoff baseball is still worth enjoying as much as you can. So, for whom do you root this month?
In recent years, Jay Jaffe of Sports Illustrated has popularized Team Entropy — spending your September rooting for the chaos generated by ties testing the limits of baseball’s tie-breaker system. With a range of 5.5 games separating the seven teams atop the AL Wild Card standings, Team Entropy is as in play as ever. The theoretical implications of a three- or four- or five-way tie for a Wild Card spot are delightful to imagine. It would be a blast to watch and, as someone with no skin in the game this year, I’d enjoy the hell out of it. That said, my strongest loyalties lie with another team — I’m not Team Entropy, I’m Team Cinderella.
For me, there’s no more exciting storyline than a September longshot bucking the odds and finding its way into the postseason. Two years ago, the Pirates had roughly a 20% chance to make the postseason on September 3rd according to The Baseball Gauge and then proceeded to secure themselves a spot in the Wild Card game. But I’d argue an even more exciting September Cinderella storyline unfolded a year before that when the 2013 Indians finished off the season by winning 15 of 17 and beating out the Rangers for a Wild Card Spot despite possessing 15% playoff odds at the start of that final 17-game run. Now that’s my idea of brilliant September baseball.
It’s been a few years and, though it may be a virtue, patience is certainly no fun. It’s time for a new September Cinderella team, so let’s go searching for one. For this exercise, I’m considering the cases of the five teams with playoff odds currently in the 3%-20% range.
Royals – Playoff Odds 3.1%
I thought about setting the outer limits of this exercise at 5% odds, but I couldn’t stop myself from including the defending champions and famous projections beaters, the Royals. The good news is they’re just four games out of the Wild Card. The bad news is they would have to leapfrog four teams in order to reach that final Wild Card spot and their only opportunity to make up ground by beating the teams ahead of them is one three-game set against the Tigers. Their offense has been disappointing and injury-plagued. Their pitching has been notably impressive of late, but a look at the members of the rotation gives rise to concerns that regression is nigh. If they have any magic left, they’ll need to capitalize on the fact that they face the White Sox, Athletics, and Twins in 14 of their remaining 23 games and hope the teams above them collapse.
Mariners – Playoff Odds 5.0%
The Mariners are objectively the best Cinderella-story candidate from a narrative perspective. All four of the other teams at which we’re looking were in the playoff last year; the Mariners’ last trip to the playoffs occurred when Cal Ripken was still an active player. Wait, I can do better than that… Chuck Finley was the opposing starter during the Mariners’ last playoff game. Chuck Finley! How about one more: the Mariners’ last playoff game came two weeks before Apple first introduced the iPod Classic. It’s been a while, is what I’m saying.
They’re 4.5 games back in the Wild Card race, but they do hold their fate in their own hands to some extent, with six games remaining against the Astros and three against a Blue Jays team that’s probably out of reach. They have a powerful lineup core in Robinson Cano, Kyle Seager, and Nelson Cruz that makes you want to believe something magical could be in store, but they pair it with a starting rotation that makes it hard to let yourself.
Pirates – Playoff Odds 5.7%
Last night, the Pirates won the first game of a 12-game stretch played solely against the Reds and the Phillies. They currently sit four games out of Wild Card position and would need to pass two of the Mets, Cardinals, and Giants in order to reach the postseason — a heckuva mountain to climb. But the present opportunity to beat up on two of the worst teams in the league makes it possible to dream ever so slightly on the Pirates right now. It’s a long shot, but they could be primed to inch themselves ever so closer to relevancy.
Yankees – Playoff Odds 10.8%
Look, I don’t know. After hitting 378* home runs in 15 games, Gary Sanchez has finally cooled off a bit and has now gone 10 games without a home run. But after watching him post a 237 wRC+ in the month of August, are you going to be the one to bet against Sanchez right now? I’m not.
The Yankees are a really fun team at the moment and, what’s more, they’re not bad. They bade farewell to copious veterans at the trade deadline and have responded by going 22-13 since the trade deadline. They have a young lineup that is not without talent, a bullpen ace in Dellin Betances and a rotation ace in Masahiro Tanaka. They’re now just two games out of Wild Card position and, although they’re in fourth in the AL East, they’re only four games out of that race with games remaining against all three teams ahead of them. Yes, this could actually happen, folks.
(*Fine, it was 11.)
Astros – Playoff Odds 16.3%
It’s hard to get around the fact that it’s been a disappointing season for the Astros, but all that could disappear if they’re somehow able to get themselves to the postseason. Their lineup is rich with talent including potential MVP candidate Jose Altuve, rookie breakout Alex Bregman, the highly underrated George Springer, and more. If Carlos Correa is able to return to form from his current shoulder injury, then this could have a strong case for being the best lineup in the American League. The back of their bullpen features one of the best young closers in the game in Ken Giles. If their rotation is able to keep them in games, then this team could be very dangerous.
As the playoff odds indicate, there’s no denying that the Astros and Yankees are best positioned to put on a show this September, but weird things happen in baseball. Maybe the Mets and Cardinals collapse and the Pirates find their way back to another Wild Card game. Or perhaps the Mariners finally bring Felix Hernandez to a postseason. And sure, maybe the Royals have a chance, too. I’ll be here on Team Cinderella waiting for a bandwagon upon which to jump. Here’s hoping September fulfills its annual promise of captivating baseball drama.
Corinne Landrey writes for FanGraphs and MLB.com's Cut4 site. Follow her on Twitter @crashlandrey.
In 2116* I’ll entertain the possibility that the Yankees could be my Cinderella Team**. (* I’ll be 149 then.) (** If they haven’t won another World Series between now and then.)
I was thinking something similar: the Yankees could be a lot of things — including even, grudgingly, fun to watch — but they’re never going to be my Cinderella.
There are players I’d like to see play in a World Series — Beltre, Altuve, McCutchen — even if their teams make me hold my nose while doing so, but I can’t say I see a Cinderella Team for me among this group.
To make it worse, ‘Plucky never say die Yankees squad” would be the such a profitable low hanging fruit for sports writers that the national media would probably forget to mention any other teams were even in the playoffs.
Well, unless it was the Cubs in the World Series. I wouldn’t want my AL club to end its playoff drought by making the WS in the same year the Cubs are the first to do it since 1945. The media hurricane would be so focused on that team that any reasonable observer would conclude the Cubs must be playing themselves.
There already is a Cinderella Team… the Mets. The Mets have been absolutely decimated by injuries and had playoff odds below 8% in the middle of August, what more could you ask for?
Every starter aside from Colon is either a) lost for the year, b)been on the DL, or c) pitching hurt. They also lost their 3B, 1B, 2B and CF for the year and lost their C, SS and star LF to stretches on the DL as well.
It’s been even crazier than last year in Flushing, but here they are, having roared back. It’s awesome.
What more can I ask for? How about not having played in the World Series for a while? The Mets already had their glass slipper last year.
And if you want to talk about low August playoff odds, look no further than the Astros, whose playoff odds hit a nadir of 6.4% on August 18th. They haven’t come roaring back like the Mets have, and are still a longshot to make the postseason. That’s what makes them a Cinderella; the Mets, by contrast, are already an ugly stepsister with a WC spot essentially locked up.
So the Mets overcame their overwhelming odds too soon? I’m not going to tell you you’re wrong, since it’s a matter of opinion on a term that has no definition. And boy do I hope you’re right that they have a spot “locked up” despite only being .5 games up.
They’re not a Cinderella team because they made it to the World Series last year.
The first team listed in this article made it to the World Series the last two years, and they won it last year.
I give the Mets a lot of credit. I don’t believe there are many teams that could withstand the amount and severity of injuries they have and still be in the playoff picture this late in the season. It’s really quite incredible.
You mean other than the Dodgers who have actually had more injuries and are in a better position?
Dodgers have had more days on the DL but their core players aside from Kershaw have been healthy. I don’t really care to compare the two but be fair.
Ryu, Wood, Anderson, McCarthy, and Ethier aren’t core players? Kazmir looks like he’s done for the rest of the season as well.
Ryu, Wood, Anderson, McCarthy, and Ethier aren’t core players.
Wood, Anderson, and Ethier certainly were. Regardless, just because the Dodgers were able to afford losing some of those players after the fact doesn’t mean that the team wasn’t counting on most of them prior to the start of the season. In that sense, they were ‘core players’.
Ryu, Anderson, McCarthy already had major injury issues going into the season. The equivalent of Zack Wheeler, if you will.
The Mets have lost Matt Harvey, Lucas Duda, Neil Walker, David Wright, Yoenis Cespedes, Asdrubal Cabrera, Travis d’Arnaud, Steven Matz, and Jacob deGrom for long stretches of the season. Every starter in the lineup except for Curtis Granderson.
McCarthy and Ryu, yes, but Anderson was fine until a month before the season began. He was no Zack Wheeler. In any case, all three of those guys returned during the season and reinjured themselves, and considering the Dodgers had to trade for two new starters plus Jesse Chavez before the deadline (and would’ve been more had they not have lucked out with Stripling and Urias), they certainly could’ve helped the team.
The Dodgers had lost Yasmani Grandal, Clayton Kershaw, Yasiel Puig, Joc Pederson, Kike Hernandez, Bud Norris, Rich Hill, Andre Ethier, Adam Liberatore, Trayce Thompson, Scott Van Slyke, Scott Kazmir, Brett Anderson, Hyun-Jin Ryu, Brandon McCarthy, Mike Bolsinger, Carlos Frias, and others all for significant stretches. The Dodgers not only lead the MLB in number of days on the DL by a wide margin, but they’ve broken the record for most number of different players on the DL in one season. In terms of value, I’d be surprised if there is any significant difference between what the Mets have lost vs what the Dodgers have lost.
Sorry, but I’m 100% Team Chaos. I want a three way tie between Houston, Detroit, and Baltimore for the second wild card and Toronto with the first. Let the four offenses bludgeon each other and see who’s left standing to face Texas or Cleveland.
If any of those four make it to the ALCS, then you can call them Cinderella.
I want something like a three way tie between Tampa, Seattle, and Oakland, with Baltimore being the first wild card and Anaheim having the best record in the AL. So maybe Seattle plays in Tampa in game 163, then in Oakland for Game 164, then in Baltimore for the one game playoff, then in Anaheim to open the ALDS.
Even better if they have to play game 162 at home to make up a rain out after playing game 161 in Boston or New York..
I’m not even sure if this is all possible, but I really, really want it.
What if there was a 4 way tie atop the AL East, along with Detroit, Kansas City, Houston and Seattle tied with the same record as the AL East group?
We could have an entire pre-post season tournament to set up the AL side of the post season bracket. It would push the World Series back until Christmas, but damn it would be exciting.
Boy, and I thought I was being mean in wanting a homerun derby dogfight.
Last Mariners playoff game was losing to Drew Pettitte http://www.baseball-reference.com/boxes/NYA/NYA200110220.shtml
Funny passage on the Mariners but you forgot the 2001 Mariners made the ALCS. They lost to the Yankees in the 2001 ALCS. M’s beat Chuck Finley and the Indians in the ALDS that year.
The projections still won’t completely stick the fork in the Rockies even if they’re 7 back of the 2nd Wild Card with 21 to go. I don’t buy it, but apparently FanGraphs thinks it could happen once in every 500 universes.
People seem to prefer fairy tales than stories based on facts.
The 2 copious veterans the Yankees jettisoned were Beltran and Arod. Beltran was their best hitter playing most of his games at DH, while Arod was riding the bench and not hurting too much as a result. Despite them, the Yankees went on a 11-5 run starting before the break, yet the team started off their selling with Chapman, hardly an old man. To close July, the team was obviously distracted knowing the team was selling off, and they lost 4 straight during which the Yankees sold off Miller, Nova and Beltran. Only 1 of these guys were old, and he was the team leader in WAR (position players).
Through much of June and July, options existed to improve the team. Sanchez over McCann (or at least Romine), Severino in the pen, Judge in RF over the anemic Hicks, and Austin at 1B over the powerless Teixeira who needs surgery at the end of the season .
These were all moves that could have been made, and should have been made before the trade deadline. There is no doubt that if the team did not sell, and made the moves they should have made (releasing Arod, sitting Hicks and Teixera, and giving Sanchez most of the AB at C over the slumping McCann) that this team would be in much better shape.
But the fairy tale is much more attractive to people
I hear you, but this sounds like 20/20 hindsight. Even fangraphs’ own projections still don’t believe in the Yankees. More so, the Yankees have historically been incredibly biased against rookies, especially on the offensive side.
We Yankee fans who frequent sites like this were both overjoyed and completely shocked at the deadline moves because we’ve never seen them trust the kids before.
Besides that could you honestly expect Sanchez to outperform McCann before he actually arrived and went nuts? I don’t think so.
Releasing Arod was an immediate benefit for sure, but I don’t think it’s fair to say “of course this team is better” now in hindsight, especially because one of the reasons they are better is the improved performance of some of their vets.
My theory is that the Yankees did this specifically to protect the kids from unfair expectations, and that is a particular consideration that the Yankees need to consider far more than any other franchise in the MLB.
From a pure baseball standpoint, you are totally correct that calling up the kids earlier would’ve made them a better team earlier than they became one, however back in July the climb back to contention was still extremely steep and unlikely.
The chances that these kids would come up and struggle was too high, and in turn would have put their entire rebuild process in jeopardy under the weight of both media and fan backlash. For example, just imagine how Judge’s 53 wRC+ would be perceived in such a setting.
Instead they waited until they could call these kids up into a welcoming environment, one where the supporting base would comfortably allow them to struggle and adjust without the worry of that backlash. They just happened to all perform well in composite – possibly in part because the environment was one without unnecessary pressure.
I’m saying this as a Met fan, I feel the Yankees handled this transition perfectly. I haven’t seen my Yankee friends this excited about the future of the team since 1995.
Today. the Pirates has just passed away.