Why the Dodgers’ World Series Odds Are So High
With last night’s win, the Dodgers moved into first place by half a game over the Rockies. The clubs are equal in the loss column, and with just 11 games left in the regular season for Los Angeles, their playoff position appears precarious. A glance at our Playoff Odds page, however, might leave you with a different impression. According to the Playoff Odds, the Dodgers have a four-in-five chance of winning the NL West, with Colorado taking the division one in five times. Even in those cases where the Dodgers aren’t projected to take the division, they’re forecast to take a Wild Card spot in half the time. Despite teetering just on the edge of contention, the team has an 89% shot at making the postseason. Nor is that even the weird part: the Dodgers also feature a 17.8% probability of winning the World Series, the highest marks possessed by any team that’s not the Houston Astros.
We could glance at the Dodgers’ number, dismiss it as unreasonably high, and move on with our lives. Alternatively, as my colleague Alex Chamberlain has suggested, we could dig a bit deeper to see what’s going on. Let’s do the latter.
The logic implicit in the Playoff Odds isn’t all that difficult to figure out. The Dodgers are a very talented team with great players, so they would typically be expected to win more games than they lose — and also to win more games than the Rockies. Factor in a series against the Padres and a series against the Giants — while the Rockies play the Phillies and the Nationals — and the disparity between the clubs grows. The Dodgers are going to win a lot of simulated seasons under those circumstances.
That’s how the Dodgers get to the playoffs. In roughly 90% of projected cases they’ve gotten there by way of an NL West win. In the Wild Card scenario, they’re still favored to reach the NLDS. To get a sense of what that looks like, consider this:
The green boxes denote scenarios for which figures are available by way of our Playoff Odds page. Hopefully this make sense so far. Basically, because of their enormous edge in talent plus a favorable schedule, the Dodgers a really good shot at making the Division Series.
Now, let’s add in the next round.
According to our Playoff Odds, the Dodgers are expected to the League Championship Series a majority of the time because they have near-70% chance of winning the Division Series if they get there. That 69.7% figure in the chart above might seem high, but let’s consider the Dodgers’ odds of winning a best-of-five series, likely against the Atlanta Braves. For the sake of simplicity, let’s say the Dodgers have a 60% chance of winning each individual game in a series. The table below shows the odds of the different series results based on that information.
| Outcome | Odds |
|---|---|
| 3-0 | 21.6% |
| 3-1 | 25.9% |
| 3-2 | 20.7% |
| 2-3 | 13.8% |
| 1-3 | 11.5% |
| 0-3 | 6.4% |
| Win Series | 68.3% |
| Lose Series | 31.7% |
That’s just a general look, but it comes really close to the percentages in the visual above and on the Playoff Odds page. Let’s move ahead to the NLCS.
Maybe winning nearly 70% of the time against a team like the Braves makes sense, but a 65% in the LCS seems pretty high given that the Cubs are near-equals on a talent-level basis and likely to have home-field advantage. The Dodgers would get two Clayton Kershaw games, so that might push the average game probability up a bit. Let’s give the Dodgers a 55% chance of winning every game on average. Here are those expected outcomes.
| Outcome | Odds |
|---|---|
| 4-0 | 9.2% |
| 4-1 | 16.5% |
| 4-2 | 18.5% |
| 4-3 | 16.7% |
| 3-4 | 13.6% |
| 2-4 | 12.4% |
| 1-4 | 9.0% |
| 0-4 | 4.1% |
| Win Series | 60.8% |
| Lose Series | 39.2% |
Note that the result here is lower than the 65% chance projected by our Playoff Odds — and this was calculated under the assumption that the Dodgers have a generic 55% chance of winning each game against the Cubs. What if those generic odds are even lower? Doesn’t it seem like the Playoff Odds are once again overly optimistic.
Perhaps. But it’s also necessary to consider those scenarios in which the Dodgers reach the NLCS but don’t face the Cubs. Chicago makes the NLCS 54% of the time according to our odds, but the rest of the time, a team like Milwaukee or St. Louis awaits the Dodgers. In those scenarios, LA has a big advantage. If we go back to our scenario in which the Cubs have a 60% chance of winning each game, the outcomes in a seven-game series are as follow.
| Outcome | Odds |
|---|---|
| 4-0 | 13.0% |
| 4-1 | 20.7% |
| 4-2 | 20.7% |
| 4-3 | 16.6% |
| 3-4 | 11.1% |
| 2-4 | 9.2% |
| 1-4 | 6.1% |
| 0-4 | 2.6% |
| Win Series | 71.0% |
| Lose Series | 29.0% |
In all of the scenarios where the Dodgers play a club besides the Cubs, Los Angeles will have something like a 70% chance of winning the series. Complementing a series against the Cubs with a series against the not-Cubs, for the sake of calculating the projections, is going to get us pretty close to that 65.2% figure from above. For a team like the Brewers or Cardinals to have only a 29% chance of taking the NLCS might seem very low, but it is far from uncommon. For example, Mookie Betts has stepped up to the plate and made a hit at roughly those odds this season. The Dodgers have better odds, but it is far from a guarantee.
As for the World Series, this is what the chart looks like when we add a potential championship.
The Dodgers are a talented team, but they likely won’t be the favorites in the World Series if they qualify. The Astros, Indians, Red Sox, and Yankees are all likely to beat the Dodgers if the two clubs face off — and the odds reflect that outcome. The Dodgers end up with higher World Series odds than the Indians, Red Sox, and Yankees, though, because they would never have to face two of those teams to win a World Series. Any given American League team, however, would have to beat two of those teams just to get the Series.
There is no Braves team or Brewers club in the AL playoffs to potentially boost the odds of getting to the World Series. The Brewers and Braves have good teams; on paper, though, they don’t come close to those AL teams. As a result, the Dodgers have the highest odds of any team to make the World Series. They might not be favored if they get there, but getting there provides enough of a boost to their overall odds that they end up with the second-highest championship odds in baseball.
Craig Edwards can be found on twitter @craigjedwards.
How does winning 70% of their games against the Braves make sense? Going by Baseruns, the Dodgers should have won 60% of their games. Baseruns also says that the Braves should have won 57% of their games, 2nd highest in the National League. Maybe the Dodgers win 70% of their games against the Padres or Marlins, but against another playoff team? Seems way too high. It seem that this is ultimately a result of the projections being too low on some of the young Braves’ players.
The Dodgers are the better team. If they played the Braves over and over a Thousand times, they would probably win about 600 of those games. They don’t need Kershaw to pitch every game, Kershaw is better than Folty. Rich Hill is better than whoever the Braves throw game two and so forth. Add in the fact that the Dodgers have the superior bullpen and a far superior offense. Start praying that the Braves end up with more reg season wins than the Dodgers because without home field adv you aint got a snowball’s chance in Hell.
A 30% chance is more than a snowball’s chance in hell! The Braves only had a 3% chance of making the playoffs before the season started.
With the way the Dodgers play on the road the Braves having home field would be even worse
The dodgers are better than the braves but I doubt they are a 600 team against the braves. Their Pythagorean record has them exactly at 600 but that is against the league (I.e a slightly below 500 team on average).
The braves however are a 560 team themselves meaning the individual game expectation for the dodgers would be 540 according to this matrix
https://sabr.org/research/probabilities-victory-head-head-team-matchups
This, I think, is the key question: Do you think the Braves are actually a .560 team? I have to be honest, I don’t think they’re a .500 team.
BUT
the projections do!
This is what everyone is overlooking in the comments: Depth Charts projects the Braves for exactly a zero-run differential over the rest of the season.
(On the other hand, they’re projecting the Dodgers for +11.)
The projections think the Dodgers are a very, very good team, and the Braves are merely average. This is because Steamer is waaaaay skeptical of anything new. Just because the Braves have a better run differential than that up to this point–that doesn’t matter to the projections so much (at least, not unless it changes the projections of individual players).
I suspect most of you are in my boat–we think the Dodgers aren’t exactly a juggernaut, and that the Braves aren’t just a league-average team. But that’s not how the projections see it.
You lost me at you don’t think the Braves are a .500 team.
No, I think there’s more like a .550 team.
I don’t know how in-depth fangraphs go with their playoff matchups, but perhaps one reason they skew so heavily towards the Dodgers is due to their depth?
We know and have seen how playoff series are run differently from regular season. And the Dodgers certainly have the feel of a team that can perform above their record, even base runs record, in a high leverage playoff setting.
But depth is actually more important in the regular season than in the playoffs, isn’t it?
I don’t think that’s necessarily true…anecdotally, Enrique Hernandez hit 3 HR’s in the NLCS Game 5 clincher, Joc Pederson hit 3 HR’s in the World Series.
The Dodgers in the World Series had an injured Corey Seager hit .220/.290/.370, Bellinger hit .143/.172/.393, Turner hit .160/.323/.360 and Puig hit .148/.179/.370. OPS of .661, .565, .683, .549. Those were arguably the best 4 everyday players on the team last year. The platoon guys, Culberson, Pederson, Ethier, Forsythe, Hernandez had the best results. Their depth wasn’t the problem, extremely poor performance from their good players was the problem.
The Astros had Altuve with a .670 OPS, Bregman .739, Correa .817, Springer 1.471, for comparison.
That’s clearly an exception. Don’t just cherry-pick to try and prove a point.
are the Dodgers really deeper? ATL really gets under-projected because their best players can’t rent a car.
I agree the dodgers have won 55% of their games against ALL teams. How can they be expected to win at a greater rate against better overall competition makes no sense.
Ignore the Braves. And the Brewers, Cardinals, and Rockies too, for that matter. Reasonable people can disagree as to whether any of those teams are actually good, or simply lucky. But the projections also clearly believe the Dodgers are a far superior team to the Cubs.
NLDS Winning %: Dodgers 69%, Cubs 57%
NLCS Winning %: Dodgers 66%, Cubs 48%
WS Winning %: Dodgers 47%, Cubs 36%
Can someone explain this?
Starting pitching. The Dodgers rotation is significantly better than the Cubs. And although the Cubs have a great lineup, the Dodgers lineup is arguably better.
is it though?
August starting pitching-
Dodgers #7 3.4 fWAR, 2.53 ERA, 3.32 FIP
Cubs #8 3.4 fWAR, 3.40 ERA, 3.39 FIP
September starting pitching-
Cubs #6 2.0 fWAR, 2.58 ERA, 3.43 FIP
Dodgers #13 1.3 fWAR 3.76 ERA, 3.92 FIP
For starting pitchers:
Since August 1- Dodgers 2.99 ERA/Cubs 3.09 ERA
Since August 1- Cubs 3.40 FIP/Dodgers 3.54 FIP
So while the Dodgers starters may be as good as the Cubs, they’re not THAT much better. Not since Hamels came to the Cubs. The Cubs starters have rebounded nicely.
And the Dodgers do have some questions in the rotation-
1- can Kershaw’s back hold up? He’s thrown a lot of innings here- 93.1 innings pitched since July 1- 3rd most in MLB- only deGrom and Wheeler have thrown more.
2- Will Buehler wear out? He’s at 135 innings going into tonight. Last year he threw 98.
3- Will Rich Hill bounce back? 4 of the last 6 starts he’s given up 4 runs, with a 5th one giving up 3 runs. 5.18 ERA in those 6 starts
Do you honestly believe the Dodgers rotation has more question marks than the Cubs? I understand the Cubs rotation has been hot, but all season, the Dodgers are clearly better.
Overall pitching:
Dodgers – 19.1 fWAR 3.44 ERA 3.60 FIP
Cubs – 11.8 fWAR 3.61 ERA 4.14 FIP
Starting pitching:
Dodgers – 15.8 fWAR 3.24 ERA 3.44 FIP
Cubs – 7.9 fWAR 3.84 ERA 4.33 FIP
Talking about the last 2 months doesn’t take into account how awful the rotation was for the first 4 months of the season.
Hendricks – 3.58 ERA 3.85 FIP 2.8 fWAR. He’s not markedly better than anyone in the Dodgers rotation outside of Rich Hill.
Lester – 3.43 ERA 4.40 FIP 1.5 fWAR. He’s not striking guys out and he’s allowing a lot of home runs. This isn’t the 2016 model.
Quintana – 3.95 ERA 4.50 FIP 1.2 fWAR. The Dodgers have 7 starting pitchers better than Quintana and Lester this season.
Montgomery – He’s done a good job filling in for Darvish, nothing too good, however.
Hamels – 1.57 ERA 3.11 FIP 1.3 fWAR. He’s found his old Phillies stuff, apparently. As a Dodger fan I believe he’s currently the Cubs best pitcher, and it’s a bit scary.
Chatwood – 5.16 ERA 5.60 FIP -0.4 fWAR. Straight up awful season.
The only truly good pitcher the Cubs have had has been Hamels, with Hendricks and Montgomery being above average bordering on good.
Going by rate stats, the Dodgers rotation is top 5 in the MLB, with the Cubs being near the bottom 10. With the amount of depth the Dodgers have, they could have any 3 of Ryu, Maeda, Wood, Stripling out of the bullpen for the playoffs. Their rotation has questions, but nothing major.
Wood just got demoted to the bullpen because he’s not been good. Stripling in his last 10 starts(11 outings) has a 4.09 ERA. Those 2 are major questions and may not even make the post season roster quite frankly….
I’d much rather have a guy like Hendricks who since the all star break has been a top 10 pitcher. For whatever reason, Hendricks is a much better 2nd half pitcher- 1st half he’s got a 3.52 ERA/3.96 FIP for his career. 2nd half he’s a 2.69 ERA/3.12 FIP pitcher for his career. Hamels- same thing- 1st half career 3.59 ERA/3.86 FIP 2nd half career 3.14 ERA/3.41 FIP.
I think we know pretty much what we’re going to get from Hamels and Hendricks. Lester and Quintana less so- BUT they do have 1 advantage vs the Dodgers. They’re lefties.
Oh and you know darn well that Chatwood has zero chance of starting in the playoffs. So not sure why in the hell you would bring him up?
And yes, I do think the Dodgers rotation has quite a few questions. Like it or not, Kershaw is no spring chicken any more. He’s thrown a lot of innings the 2nd half. Buehler has thrown 135 innings so far this year- and as we’ve seen at times- fatigue can hit young guys like a ton of bricks. Hill has faded some the last 6 starts- 5 of 6 being poor starts. If any of those go- going back to a Wood or Stripling is hardly a guarantee.
No, the Dodgers’ rotation is that much better. The Dodgers have two starters that are definitely better than anyone in the Cubs’ rotation (Kershaw, Buehler) and the remainder of the Dodgers’ army of starting pitchers (Hill, Ryu, Wood, Stripling, Maeda) is at the minimum comparable to the Cubs’ starting pitchers (I would say they are better, but I’m willing to acknowledge there are some differences of opinion on that). Of course, Maeda, Wood, and Stripling are going to be converting to relief in the playoffs, meaning that the bullpen is going to be dominant too.
The Dodgers have the better track record over the season and the better projection. When you have those two things, you have to resort to some pretty weird sample start-end dates to prove that the two teams’ rotation are equal.
I think the Dodgers have some pretty serious question marks in their lineup, but the rotation is pretty freaking good. They’re at the same level as the Yankees and Red Sox, although a notch below the Astros/Cleveland.
Kershaw could break down at any point now. Sad but true. He’s thrown a lot of innings these last 3 months and his body isn’t what it used to be….. Buehler is at a point innings wise where he could fatigue out at any point.
Wood just got demoted to the pen he was stinking it up so much. Stripling hasn’t been the same since mid season- he’s thrown more innings this year than ever before. Hill has 1 quality start in the last 6 starts.
The one other thing the Cubs rotation has that hurts the Dodgers is lefties. They have 3 of them. LA 2nd half(so with Machado) 107 wRC+ vs lefties (to 118 vs righties).
They’ve been averaging in these close September games vs playoff contenders 5.3 batters per game off the bench- using both catchers most every game- something they can’t do anywhere near as freely in the playoffs.. They only will have 5 on the roster. So they aren’t going to be able to swiss army knife their way thru teams creating great matchups. They’ll have say
Muncy/Bellinger
Dozier/Utley
Machado
Turner
Puig/Pederson/Kemp/Hernandez/Taylor
then both catchers
no Verdugo or Freese- maybe they keep Freese and take out Dozier or Utley…..
I think you’ve gone to a lot of effort to show this, and while your persistence is admirable, saying “let’s subtract the top two pitchers on the Dodgers to show how it’s an even” isn’t terribly convincing. I don’t think the Dodgers should be favored that heavily against the Cubs because the Cubs have a very good offense and likely the best defense in the major leagues, but pretending that the Dodgers’ rotation is falling apart and the Cubs’ recent hot pitching streak is sustainable flies in the face of both performance to date and forward-facing projections.
how is a guy like Kendricks who for his career is a much better 2nd half pitcher than 1st half- and he’s done exactly that this year- why should we look at the whole season numbers? He’s done this his entire career.
Also, there’s this small fact that the other 3 pitchers are all lefties, and the Dodgers are no where near as good vs lefties as they are righties. And the Dodgers won’t be able to be anywhere near as liberal with the lineup switches in October as they have been in September.
Hamels sure looked good yesterday! Buehler only had 12 K’s in 6 innings and allowed 3 hits and 0 ER.
I’m not asking why you think the Dodgers are vastly better than the Cubs; I’m asking why the projections do. The playoff projections are based on the ZiPS/Steamer projections, which have the two teams as equals. They rank 5th and 6th in projected WAR, a rounded 0.1 WAR apart. Yet, somehow, when those same Depth Chart projections are plugged into the playoff simulation machine, the two teams come out vastly differently. Why?
I can understand the LDS % chance of winning due to the fact that LA is going to get to face a far easier team in Atlanta than St Louis or MIlwaukee. With St Louis/Milwaukee there’s not going to be a huge penalty for them playing in the wild card game in that they don’t have an ace per se.
60% seems like a massively generous assumption of the likelihood of any good team winning an individual game against another good team. By way of comparison, on 538 the game odds usually only reach 60+% when you have a good pitcher on a good team going up against a much worse pitcher on a much worse team. Kershaw vs. Freeland tonight is at exactly 60-40, and even that probably doesn’t take into account Freeland’s seeming ability to beat his peripheral stats. Unless Kershaw is pitching every night, I highly doubt that the Dodgers would be 3:2 favorites in every game against, say, the Braves.
Yup. Single games are almost always coin tosses, absent a truly massive talent differential.
I want to highlight this comment. If you look at the odds of a team winning any single game, you should never get much beyond a 30/70 split, and that depends a lot on the teams involved and who is starting. The “anything can happen in a single game” factor is enormous in most pro sports games, given how important sequencing is to scoring runs/points.
For example: Tomorrow the Marlins are playing the Nationals. The Nationals are starting Stephen Strasburg, who the projections think are about a 4-win pitcher. The Marlins are starting Sandy Alcantra, who the projections think are about a zero-win pitcher. The Nationals have a lineup that the projections love. The Marlins have 3 position players with WARs over 1. This seems like a lopsided game. It is a lopsided game! Fangraphs projects the Nationals have a 67% chance of winning. That’s it!
The reason for this–and if Fangraphs’ projections doesn’t account for this, they should (but I think they do)–is that the effect of being a better team than your opponent (given starting pitcher) is not necessarily linear. As you get farther and farther away from a 50/50 split, the effect of being a better team matters less. As a result, you can approach a 100/0 split, but you can never actually get there (for obvious reasons)–it’s asymptotic.
I don’t really get your point here…the Nationals a pretty good team playing against a pretty bad one, 67-33 sounds about right. 2 out of 3 times the Nats win that game. The Dodgers are a much better team, and they are 70-71% to beat the Padres at home with Rich Hill and Ross Stripling starting against Jacob Nix and Eric Lauer. Change that to Kershaw and Buehler and it’s probably higher. The fact that it’s not 80% is accounting for the randomness and chance that happens in baseball. It feels like people here see 60-70% and think that means it’s an absolute certainty…it’s not, 30-40% is not that uncommon of a result(obviously).
Let’s say the Dodgers have home field advantage as Fangraphs predicts, they’ll be what, 62-64% to win with Kershaw starting, 61-63% with Buehler, so let’s say 63 and 62 percent. Let’s say 55% in Game 3 with Ryu, Stripling or Hill, and 55% in Game 4 if it’s one of those guys. Then back to 63% with Kershaw in Game 5. I mean, this changes based on who’s starting for LAD, but those percentages are 59.6% per game.
Let’s say you adjust slightly, so maybe it’s 61% with Kershaw, 60 with Buehler, 54 in Atlanta and 61 in Game 5. That’s 58% per game. 60% does not seem very far fetched here.
The point is that you should never really be getting beyond about 70% except in extreme cases–like Chris Sale starting against the Marlins. It is far easier to get to 60% than it is to 70%.
But Fangraphs, who runs these numbers and these projections, who presumably are better at this than I am, or you are, is saying the Dodgers are a 71% favorite to beat the Padres, who are not as bad as the Marlins, with Ross Stripling starting, who is nowhere close to Chris Sale.
You saying it “shouldn’t” be 70% isn’t really backed up by anything besides, it doesn’t feel like it should be that big because the Dodgers don’t have the same record as the Red Sox.
BTW, the Red Sox are 71.2% to beat the Orioles on Fangraphs (the worst team in MLB) with David Price pitching against Dylan Bundy.
That’s right. The single best team in MLB playing the single worst team in MLB gets you to 71.2%. It’s really hard to get much beyond 70%.
Well the Astros were 78.2% to beat the Tigers, 76.6% to beat the Royals, 76% to beat the Royals, 77.1% to beat the White Sox…and I’d imagine will be 77-80% to beat Baltimore in their next series this month. Weirdly the Astros have lost 4 games against the Tigers, Rangers and A’s they were big favorites in, but other than that weird blip, they had a 79-33 run differential with a 12-3 record in 15 games where they were 70% or more to win. That’s an .800 winning percentage.
The Red Sox have been 70% or more to win 12 games this year, they are 9-3 in those games which is a…750 winning percentage.
BTW, the Yankees are 80.5% to beat Baltimore next week, and the Yankees are not the best team in baseball.
The point is that the Braves (and the other NL contenders) are much better than the Nats or Padres. Kershaw’s and Buehler’s odds of winning are NOT that good against other good teams.
Kershaw on the road against Arizona next week is 67.2% to win…is Arizona that much worse than Atlanta? I don’t think so…
Then how come betting + odds every time isn’t profitable?
60 percent odds are represented as a -150 betting favorite (150/250 = 0.6). In today’s slate of games alone, the teams with -150 or better favorite lines are NYY, PHI, PIT, CLE, WAS, MIL, TB, HOU, LAD. That is out of a slate of 15 games. 9 games out of 15 are that favored on a normal Tuesday. 9/15 is coincidentally 60 percent also! The biggest favorite is CLE at -265 which represents about an 83 percent chance of winning.
-265 is more like a 72% chance of winning.
you are right and I am wrong
These numbers are shaded considerably so the house gains its advantage. -150 represents more like 55% chance, and when you stretch out a series that adds up.
actually house edge in baseball is very slim, around two percent total which means one percent either way. -150 pays +140 on the other side, so the middle of the line is -145 which is like 59.1 percent chance.
It’s almost as if sports betting odds weren’t perfectly rational!
So, 60% seems massively generous because… that’s the EXACT ODDS of a game that fits very nearly the EXACT SITUATION DESCRIBED (playoff teams, each with their best pitcher on the mound)? That’s, uh, not exactly persuasive. On top of that, while Kershaw is one of the very best pitchers we’ll see in our lifetimes, there might be a bigger drop from most teams’ #1 to #2 than there is from the Dodgers #1 to #2 (Not even sure who that would be among Hill, Buehler, and Ryu given the way they’ve all been pitching recently)
Not to mention that Vegas has the odds at 69 percent.
Nice.
Um, Freeland is NOT the Braves’ best pitcher.
Fangraphs has tonight at 64-36% for the Dodgers. 538’s model is fairly simplistic compared to the Fangraphs method.
Also, you’re going to have at least 3 starts from Kershaw and Buehler in a 5 game series and Buehler has a 3.14 FIP and those two are 6th and 7th in FIP in the NL (min 110 IP). The Braves top 2 are Folty and Anibal Sanchez who have 3.47 and 3.64 FIPs. Pretty sizable advantage. The Dodgers could have Rich Hill, Ross Stripling or Hyun-Jin Ryu pitch 1 or 2 games, Hill has a 4.18 FIP, but Ryu is 3.01 and Stripling is 3.19.
I don’t know who the Braves would start, Gausman? He has a 3.88 FIP, Newcomb is 4.18, Teheran is 4.82. The Dodgers could conceivably have a large advantage in starting pitching in every game. Last 30 days of active roster bullpen FIP is Dodgers 3.42, Braves are 4.17. Over the whole season they’ve had almost exactly the same bullpen quality.
Dodgers are also 1st in MLB with a 116 wRC+ when removing pitchers, Braves are 106 which is 7th. Including pitchers the Dodgers are 109 wRC+, Braves are 99. If you just include active roster players the Dodgers are 112 wRC+ (thanks Machado and no Forsythe!) and the Braves are 99, and Dodgers are 119 wRC+ with no pitchers, Braves are 106.
This is not to say that the Braves are a bad team, they’re an above average team. The issue is the Dodgers, going strictly by numbers, are one of the best 2-4 teams in MLB, with a higher wRC+ than any team in baseball, and the 2nd best FIP from their active SP’s in MLB.
The entire “THIS DOESN’T SEEM RIGHT TO ME” argument is based off of their wins-loss record, which is totally understandable, but all of the numbers (including their 92-59 pythag record and 91-60 Base Runs record) say they’re much better than their record.
how much more is Buehler going to pitch? He’s already up to 135 innings this year between AAA and MLB and could enter the playoffs up around 150….
Also you said at least 3 starts from Kershaw/Buehler. They aren’t starting either Kershaw or Buehler on short rest so the ONLY way that it would be possible for them to get 4 starts would be a rain out in game 3.
One thing the Dodgers won’t be able to do though is swiss army knife themselves thru a game pinch hitting 10 times. Going to have a finite number of roster spots will impact the Dodgers.
There’s always two off days in the LDS, so it’s actually very common for the ace to pitch both Games 1 & 5.
I think the bigger issue is that Kershaw as he is now is really not that much better than Folty. In this situation, it’s better to compare their ERAs rather than their FIPs.
On top of that, if the Dodgers don’t win their division (while the Braves almost certainly will), then they’ll have to use Kershaw to win the Wild Card game (if they do win it) and therefore only be able to start him once in the NLDS.
Right- but what the Dodgers have done sometimes in the past is start Kershaw in game 1 and bring him back in game 4, while the #2 starter goes in game 2 and then in game 5(on regular rest).
also comparing ERA’s to the minute doesn’t do Folty any good-
ERA live Kershaw 2.45/Folty 2.90 +.45
FIP live Kershaw 3.05/Folty 3.47 +.42
so the ERA is actually a bigger lead for Kershaw…
For whatever reason Kershaw has about a 3.7 FIP in 122 post season innings also, not a tiny sample. Really good, but not regnseason Kershaw. And he’s 30 now
So yeah Kershaw could start 2 games, but we can’t pretend that’s as dominate a pitcher as you see in the regular season.
I’ve noticed that you’ve heavily regressed Atlanta’s expected future (reg. season) winning percentage for awhile now (.492: schedule only moderately difficult going forward, .508)). Yes, they have a lot of unproven players and the default would normally be to assume they are, in toto, playing over their heads.
I’ll just point out that BBProspectus has them with a .583 3rd order team quality winning %, and has their rest of schedule % as .551.
I agree. I read some excerpts from scouts prior to the season who said Acuna would contend for a MVP award…this year. I truly believe he is a top 5 player.
This all makes sense, even if it doesn’t really feel like it. The thing I try to remember as a very worried Dodgers fan is how the Diamondbacks went from being in first place to buried in a few weeks in large part due to their ridiculously hard schedule. The Rockies don’t have a single “easy” game in their last 12, and that matters. They’ve also been incredibly lucky to get to this point at all with a 26-14 record in one run games, which is just inexplicable especially considering how mediocre their bullpen and below average their offense is. I mean, they have a 31-23 record in the 2nd half despite being outscored by 4 runs. I don’t get it.
The division is still in play mostly because of the 3 straight one run Dodgers losses at Coors Field when the Dodgers lost Kenley Jansen. Those games flip and the Dodgers are 3.5 games up right now and it’s basically over. Even just winning 2 of the 3 would be a big shift.
More incredible stats, the Rockies have had 3 full months where they’ve been outscored 370-436 and are somehow 39-43 in those months. Even though there’s only a few games left, it’s hard to believe that could continue. I’m trying to tell myself that even though the Dodgers talent and massive run differential hasn’t led to great results so far, that doesn’t mean it won’t for the rest of the season/playoffs.
At this point as Dodgers fans we have two crapshoots to look forward to:
Crapshoot one is the 12 games left to make the playoffs.
And Crapshoot two is the playoffs.
Normally 1 crapshoot is enough to frustrate me with regards to small sample size issues. Now we get 2
Exactly. All of the numbers and the projections and the talent etc. etc. are great except when you go 1-13 with RISP in Game 7 of the World Series, leave 10 runners on base and allow Lance freaking McCullers to record 7 outs while allowing 7 baserunners and somehow 0 runs.
Not bitter.
Not sure that you can say that Colorado doesn’t have a single easy game left. For one they get 4 with Philly- since August 7, only team in MLB that Philly is better than- Baltimore.
I mean, that’s a pretty arbitrary endpoint, but even with that as a given, the Phillies aren’t the Padres, or Giants or Marlins. Their run differential is -14, the Rockies are -5. Even if they’re evenly matched, that’s not an easy game, that’s a 50-50 game, before adjusting for home field and pitcher.
The Dodgers according to Fangraphs predictions are 64, 60, 70, 71, 69 and 68% in their next 6 games.
Rockies are 36, 40, 53, 48, 50, 54. That’s a massive difference.
Philly is not a good team. They are 45-50 in their last 95 games(since end of May). with a -51 run differential. Colorado in that same time frame is 52-42 with a +12 run differential.
That’s no 50-50 game at all, especially given it’s at Coors…..
Big thing with Colorado and LA is who can handle Arizona better in Arizona. Both with 3 game series in Arizona.
Ok, they also have 8 games of the 12 against the Dodgers, Diamondbacks and Nationals. Who have run differentials of +152, +56 and +76. Putting aside the Phillies for a minute, the Rockies somehow having a .553 winning percentage over 94 games despite only a +12 run differential doesn’t really bode too well for their chances either.
Again, you can pick arbitrary endpoints all day. The Dodgers since May 16th are 67-42 with a +156 run differential. That’s a .615 winning percentage. The Braves are 57-51 with a +36 run differential since May 16th. Clearly the Braves are a .528 winning percentage team now and the entire comments section here arguing that the Braves are clearly so good is wrong.
More arbitrary “since” stats, since May 16th the Dodgers Pythagorean winning percentage is .648, best in MLB. Washington is .536, Arizona is .537, Rockies .515.
So is that more relevant? Or is the last 30 days more relevant? Or since the All-Star break? Or is it the past week, when the Rockies are 3-4 with a .411 expected winning percentage compared to the Dodgers 5-2 with a .794 expected winning percentage. And if it’s the last 7 days, the Phillies are 2-5 even though their Pythagorean percentage in those games is .487.
You know how the Dodgers are so bad against LHP this year? Well since August 1st they’re hitting .276/.359/.469 against lefties. So guess they’re not bad anymore.
The August 7th arbitrary end point is arbitrary, yes, but much better than using full-season stats as you did.
I’d rather look at the last 5 weeks and that run diff than full season – what they did in April, May, June doesn’t have nearly as much relevance on future prediction for the next 12 games than the last few week does.
Ok so after August 1st, the Dodgers have gone 23-19 despite a Pythagorean expectation of a .643 winning percentage. The Rockies have gone 24-19 despite only having a .498 expected winning percentage.
Here’s what’s stupid about doing that though, the best team in the NL by run differential since August 1st is the Mets, who are +65 (!!!) since that date.
Dodgers have a +59 run differential in that time span, Braves +26, Rockies -1. Nats are +15, Diamondbacks -10, Phillies -37, Brewers +2, Cubs +8.
The smaller the sample size, the more variance and randomness you’re going to get.
Um, the Mets since August 1 are 26-20 and 3rd best record in the NL. Phillies are 17-25 in that stretch. I’d MUCH rather play the Phillies than the Mets right now.
Well the Phillies just beat the Mets 2 out of 3, so I guess this isn’t relevant anymore.
Let’s go back to the All Star break, how about that…since then the Dodgers have a +70 run differential, Rockies -4, Braves +27, Diamondbacks +13, Nats +46, Phillies – 32. Gotta love the Rockies going 31-23 despite being outscored by 4 runs.
Run differential can be pretty noisy though. Nats beat the Mets in 1 game what 24-1?
One major problem……. You can’t just add up the Dodgers odds of making the LDS via division title and then making the LDS vs wild card and winning that- and then use that sum as the determinent in their odds of making the LCS. Because a LDS with Braves and a LDS with Cubs are not equal at all.
You have to do 2 logic things and add them up at the end…
odds of making World Series out of division champion slot- facing Braves and then one of Cubs/Brewers/Cards
odds of making World Series out of wild card slot- facing Brewers/Cards, Cubs, and then Braves/Rockies
Neither one is really dependent on the other.
The jump I didn’t join you with was where it says, “for the sake of simplicity, let’s say the Dodgers have a 60% chance of winning each playoff game.” That’s an enormous number. A team that wins 60% of its regular season games will have 97 wins. A team that wins 40% of its regular season games will win 65 games, which accurately describes the Padres. 60/40 sounds like a close split, but it’s not. In the regular season the Dodgers have only won 55% of their games and are on pace to win 89 games. Against high-quality playoff teams we would expect that percentage to be lower. Lastly, to have a conclusion that a team that can’t beat the Reds has a nearly 40% chance of making the World Series sounds flawed right from the start.
Except this completely ignores run differential, true talent level, randomness, and future projection.
The Dodgers are 50-40 against teams over .500 which is a .556 winning percentage…for perspective the Red Sox have a .580 winning percentage in those games (40-29) and the Astros have a .519 winning percentage (40-37).
The Dodgers have the 3rd highest winning percentage in these games, behind the Red Sox and Yankees, and those teams have had far fewer of them.
By run differential adjusted for strength of schedule on Baseball-Reference, the Dodgers have a 1.1 SRS, meaning they’d be expected to beat an average team by 1.1 runs per game, which is 3rd in baseball behind the Astros and Red Sox. The other NL playoff caliber teams are Cubs 0.7, Braves 0.6, Cardinals 0.5, Brewers 0.4, Rockies 0.1. The Dodgers are very very clearly the best NL team, even if their win-loss total hasn’t reflected it yet.
I’m not a math expert and I have no idea how to calculate what the SRS rankings (which I’m sure are similar to what Fangraphs uses to predict future games) mean as far as game by game predictions, but I’d imagine having a 0.5 run per game advantage over the Braves would lead to something like 55-60% win expectancy per game.
For reference, the Dodgers are probably better now than they were at the end of July, but in the last series in Atlanta from 7/26-29 the Dodgers were 57% to win, 61%, 56% and 55%. Those starters were Rich Hill, Kershaw, Alex Wood and Ross Stripling. The games at Dodger Stadium from 6/8-6/10 the Dodgers were 66%, 65%, 60% with Walker Buehler, Alex Wood, Ross Stripling. I don’t think it’s out of line to expect their overall win expectancy to be 60% per game with Kershaw twice and Buehler twice in the NLDS.
It really is in your second paragraph.
Dodgers are only .556 against teams over .500.
Assuming Braves are approximately as good as an average team over .500.
(NL teams over .500 have .539 on average. AL teams .598)
Dodgers are expected to win 56% of their games against braves, not 60%.
Using that number, their chances of winning LDS is 60%, not 70% which lines up more with common sense.
Remember, this is the playoffs. Using regular season win% isn’t fully correct for odds of winning a game.
In the series, they will a) shuffle around rotations to maximize best starters going, where the Dodgers have an advantage and b) utilize their bullpen more, which again the Dodgers (on paper) have an advantage. Bump 55% to 60% with that and it’s fair (if you rather 58% instead of 60%, it’s all good).
One thing that the Dodgers won’t be able to take advantage of in playoffs is having an unlimited bench. You normally have 13 batters and 12 pitchers on your postseason roster. So 5 bench players on average. In September vs contenders LA has played 9 games that were competitive(taking out the 17-4 game on Saturday and the 8-2 game on Monday). In those 9 games- LA is averaging using 5.22 bench players per game. Of the 9, they’ve used more than 5 guys 5 of the 9 games. With 3 of those 9 games 7 guys being used.
Also, they won’t be able to spread the bullpen innings around quite as much as they have in September. So far in September, 10 different Dodgers bullpen guys have had at least 5 outings so far. With 8 bullpen guys in the playoffs, that means 2 of those guys will be out, and those innings will be given to the other 8 bullpen guys. Taxing them more.
This is taking wins and losses at face value though, which you can’t do. Run differential is much more predictive of future results than wins and losses, which is why the Dodgers are not a generic .550 W% team. Fangraphs also looks at talent levels through individual player projections and factors that in. If anything, the point that tb.25 is making about playoff predictions would be an even bigger advantage for the Dodgers.
The numbers back up a 60% win expectancy per game for the Dodgers, maybe it’s 58%…splitting hairs. It’s really not farfetched outside of it seeming wrong because of win-loss records to this point.
If it were based on W-L records, then they would only have about 50% odds per game (and the series). The 56% per game is already a massive adjustment for their true talent level. Only the massive juggernaut teams would have a 60+% chance per game against another playoff caliber team, and as good as the Dodgers may truly be, they are not THAT good.
not sure run differential is all that meaningful. dodgers put up 17 a few days ago with most coming against a mop up. teams that dont call off the dogs in blow outs are usually at the top of that list most notably the red sox for years.
Was in Vegas a couple weekends ago when the Dodgers were 5 back in the loss column to the first place D-backs. Looked at the Fangraphs odds and thought I could get value on the bet, but to my surprise the Dodgers had the best odds of any NL team to make the WS at the time according to the sportsbook. Their odds to win the whole thing was 4-1.
If both Fangraphs and Vegas are in agreement, who am I to question?
This is an utterly empty article that merely recites the figures we can all see on the playoff odds page while imparting almost no insight into how those figures are derived.
On the other hand, it has a lot of boxes that say MATH.
This link probably should’ve been in the article. However, the projected standings are no secret. The inputs are pretty transparent and I feel like the site frequently covers them. Anyways, here is the result of my 10 second google search for you:
https://www.fangraphs.com/library/interpreting-playoff-odds-and-projected-standings/
Correct. The article should instead be titled “How the Dodgers World Series Odds are so high.” I don’t think anyone was questioning if the math being calculated by a computer checks out, what everyone is questioning is why they are being given such tremendous odds. Especially when Vegas pegs them and the Cubs as virtual equals in terms of odds to represent the NL in the World Series. Per Bovada, the Cubs are +275 and the Dodgers are +250 to win the NL, that comes out to 26.7% vs 28.6%. Meanwhile Fangraphs has the Cubs at 27.5% but the Dodgers at 41.2%. I think an article exploring how Fangraphs has perceived such a large gap between two teams that have almost no gap in most people’s eyes would have been far more interesting.
i’m not totally convinced that the Red Sox / Indians / Astros are *that* much better than the Dodgers. They are all certainly GREAT teams and I’ll agree that they are better than the Dodgers, but they’ve also benefited from a lackluster bottom of the AL.
HOU is 40-37 against teams above .500 while the Dodgers are 50-40 in those game
63 of Boston’s wins are against teams below .500 while the Dodgers haven’t even played 63 games against teams below .500
CLE ranks as the weakest SOS per Baseball-Reference while the Dodgers SOS is the hardest amongst teams leading their division.
Houston is 13-7 vs NL West
Cleveland 12-8 vs NL Central
NYY 11-9 vs NL East
Boston 16-4 vs NL East
Dodgers 12-8 vs AL West. And that’s only because they went 4-0 vs Texas
A lot of the Dodgers 52-40 though has come in September where they’ve been able to swiss army knife their way using 5-6 position batters liberally rather than how it is during the regular part of the year. They won’t have that in the playoffs. They are 10-2 vs winning teams in September, were 42-38 March-August.
Just last night in the fateful 7th. They used 5! pinch hitters in the inning. In the playoffs(or regular games)- that’s the entire bench.
If the Dodgers were able to use 40 man roster in the playoffs- sure they probably wouldn’t get beat. But it’s only a 25 man roster- and they can’t do like April thru August like what they did last night and if it’s a 11 inning game where they blow thur their entire pen- they can’t do roster transactions to replinish their bullpen.
You are probably right on the statistics, but I must say this season FEELS like it’s the Braves year or better yet Acuna’s year. They have to be considered the Cinderella team fairly soon now.
I know people a lot smarter than me are figuring this out but it makes no sense that there is a 56% chance to win the WC and then they have a 60(+)% chance to win each game in their series against the Braves…
Probably a lot of the explanation of stuff like this is simply that teams loaded with very young players, or other kinds of players with short track records of success in the majors (swing changers, new-pitch-throwers, etc.), are going to be systematically underrated by the projection systems. A team of Ronald Acuñas is never going to get good odds against a team of Justin Turners.
The dodgers have a big advantage against the Cards and Brewers? The Cards won the season series against the dodgers 4-3 and the brewers lost their season series 3-4.
The problem with the playoff projections remains that they are too influenced by whether a team is supposed to be good based on player projections. However, at this time of year the teams are what they are. And the players are who they are.
The odds for making the playoffs make sense, but I don’t see how they’re that much better than the other NL playoff teams. Even the Brewers and Cardinals should be able to beat the Dodgers more than 40% of the time!
Furthermore, why aren’t the Cubs’ championship odds just as good or even better? You said yourself they have a comparable talent level, yet they have even better odds both to make the playoffs and win their division.
No matter the projections, this team (which has been intact since the ASB) is 30-25, a .545 winning %. Sure that’s a small sample size.
Pre ASB is when they battled so many injuries, but their winning % was actually higher at .552. Through 151 games this team is what it is. And it isn’t a .600 club.
Keep in mind the projections were still high on the Nats 30-40 games ago also.
The Dodgers have a 60% chance of beating the Braves, one of the best teams in the league, in every game, when the Dodgers have won 55% of their games this entire season, against everyone. Makes sense.
one key for the Dodgers is going to be how much they can set their postseason rotation in the last week. Can they have Kershaw’s last start of the season be an abbreviated one so he’s not entering the playoffs having thrown 110 innings since July 1. Can they get guys like Turner a bit of a break end of next week?
Uhhh, the Indians are kings of the worst division in baseball. I would put their WS odds lower than every other playoff contending team at the moment outside of the Rockies. I have no doubt the Red Sox and Astros are better teams at this point, but every other team I see at least one or two weaknesses.
Whole lot of questionable assumptions flying around this argument, it seems to me.
I get that Kershaw is good. Even the best of this generation, but he isn’t the Kershaw of old. I personally don’t think any team should be scared to face him twice.
cubs are in
brewers are in
braves are in. the kid that beat the cardinals today is a force.
would have to think dodgers chances of getting in are on par with the cardinals and the rox with only a few games left.
the dodgers would still be the favorites if they missed the playoffs.
Ive always found that, beyond final standing odds, specific World Series odds were dumb. teams with between a .540 and .620 win % playing each other is a coin toss. Especially whenever you consider the fact that some teams got better in the second half through trades. Or the fact that some players may be streaking in the right/wrong direction.
take the likelohood of someone winning their division × 12.5% (1/8) and that’s their odds of a world series if they win their division. take their odds of winning the wild card x 50% × 12.5% and that’s the odds of a world series if they are a wild card team.
you don’t suddenly have a 65-70% likelihood of winning (against better competition) in the playoffs. A leadoff HR kills whatever 0.70 FIP advantage an ace has, a random shutdown start (which happens every day) kills whatever 0.5 R/game advantave an offense has.
The Dodgers have the second-highest third order winning percentage in baseball, right after the Astros (https://legacy.baseballprospectus.com/standings/)
It’s perfectly natural that they should have the second-best chance to win the World Series.
It won’t happen but Buehler should lead any series