AL West Standings Update (125 Games)

Where the Astros stand with 37 games to go

With 37 games left in the Astros’ regular season, here’s information on the AL West, the standings, probabilities, and projections, separate from the stats projections.

First, let’s take a look at what fangraphs.com says about a potential playoff run (through games of August 16):

Projected Remaining Record: 19-18 (Previous 20-20)

Projected Final Record: 82-80 (Previous 82-80)

Win Division: 52.2% (Previous 52.4%)

Wild Card: 10.2% (Previous 10.6%)

Make Playoffs: 62.2% (Previous 63.0%)

To summarize: Odds of winning division or earning wild card spot down slightly after losing two of three to the Mariners.

Still trending toward division champs OR non-playoff team.

Expected Wins (as of August 16)

First, the big picture.

This chart tells you about the entire season, but it doesn’t tell you a whole lot about recency, because it’s 125 data points all jammed together.

So, I created these two that start after the All-Star Break.

These two contain the same information, in a different format.

The important thing is, you can clearly see the Astros rise from a projected 76 wins to the current 81.

The AL West Race

So far, we’ve been looking at the Astros in a vacuum, without regard to any other team, but that’s not how this works.

Here is my traditional look at the AL West.

So, I’m projecting a 18-19 finish for Houston, not the 19-18 that Fangraphs projects.

I use a formula I created that blends the Pythagorean formula with actual wins and losses over the course of the season, weighting wins and losses more heavily as the season progresses.

When I do that to this point in the season, I get these results:

How to read these: My formula says the Astros “should be” 62-63 - they have overperformed by a game. The Plus/Minus column tells you these standings have 1 less win than the actual standings.

What this graphic also shows you is how close my formula correlates to the actual standings, with no team more than a game off the actual standings 125ish games into the season.

Using the PCT column above we can extrapolate the entire season to a final of:

A note - the win totals are rounded. A .498 winning percentage = 80.676 wins. Obviously, the Astros won’t have 80.676 wins, so we round to the closest whole number, 81 in this case.

MLB Expected Wins (as of August 16)

Brewers back to 100 xWins.

I plan on being back tomorrow with the regular updates.

Thanks for reading!