How do we calculate these statistics? Basically we simulate the rest of the season millions of times, based on every team's performance to date and its remaining schedule. We then look at how many "seasons" a team won its division or won the wildcard, and voila - we have our numbers.
The trick, of course, is to determine what chance each team has of beating every other team. Our method is to use simple team statistics (e.g. runs scored and runs against) to predict how each team will fare against all others. For those of you familiar with baseball prediction, we use a variation of the Bill James "Pythagorean Theorem" to predict results.
According to their current standings, which they update here, the Giants right now have a 37.7% chance of winning the division, 13.6% chance of winning the wild card (when not winning the division), for a total of 51.3% of making the playoffs. That is only 5th, though in the NL, as the Reds have a 96.2% chance of making the playoffs, almost entirely through the division title, the Braves have a 87.4% chance, the Phillies 67.6%, and the 'Dres 65.5%.
With only 24 games left for the Giants, that theoretically makes it hard for them to make the playoffs, but if the 'Dres starting pitching is finally imploding like I have been predicting, there is no way they go forward winning like they did earlier in the season, which is a key assumption of the analysis (and LeBlanc has already been removed from their rotation). Particularly since the Giants still have 7 games left to play against them. The key to winning is in their hands, if they can dominate San Diego in those 7 games, and go at least 5-2, that is probably enough to win the division, assuming they match the record for the other games plus that the D-Rox don't go on a crazy win streak and win 23 of their 25 remaining games, or something crazy like that.
Whoever wins the division will need to hold off the on-rushing D-Rox this season, stop them cold in some way, or their ego will be unmatched and they will be fearless for years, as they have been doing this for the past few years - basically winning every game in September. Unless someone can stiff-arm them out of the playoffs this season, they will think it is no big deal to win so many games at the end and make the playoffs, as it is when players start thinking about things that typically gets them out of their rhythm and not play up to their abilities, like Lincecum in August. The pressure gets to them in some way, that is why you want vets on your team at this time of the season, they are used to dealing with the pressure (generally, relative to young players).
Forgot to note that the Giants have now won 5 of their last 6, so it was not like they did nothing in almost catching up with San Diego, as some have implied regarding SD's 10 game losing streak.
ReplyDeletePlus, this ignores the great July they had when they went 20-8 to get themselves into this position.
Though the Giants put themselves in this position of needing the 'Dres to lose games via their own losing streaks during the season, like the 7 game one that they had in June, they at least took advantage by going on a win streak while SD was losing, just like SD took advantage and won when SF was losing.
In any case, San Diego was due for an extended losing streak, because their pitchers were not as good as they were performing, they had over performed earlier in the season, and finally are regressing to their mean, plus they were reaching their prior seasonal highs and for all of them to perform over their talent level while also exceeding their prior seasonal highs would indeed be a miracle season.