I just thought the AL West was tight yesterday, when I had the Rangers two hundredths of a percentage point ahead of the Astros, then last night both teams won by two runs, which made it even closer.
More on that in a minute, but first let’s update a couple things quickly.
First, the batters. Quite the night from Lucas Spence.
Here are the pitchers, with Miguel Ullola picking up two wins in the last few days.
Wins are fleeting, just ask Peter Lambert, but Ullola has pitched well with the exception of his second opener appearance.
September wRC+
Spence aside, there are some real stragglers here as Pena, Smith and Walker continue to struggle.
Win Shares
Likely the last update until season end.
AL West Race
It’s easy to laugh at the AL West, with the winner potentially finishing under .500, but it has turned out to be fantastic drama with 3 games to go.
First, let’s take a look at what fangraphs.com says about a potential playoff run (through games of September 24):
Projected Remaining Record: 2-1 (Previous 2-2)
Projected Final Record: 81-81 (Previous 80-82)
Win Division: 70.7% (Previous 71.2%)
Wild Card: 0.0% (Previous 0.1%)
Make Playoffs: 70.7% (Previous 71.2%)
I project a 1-2 finish and an 80-82 record, with the team making the playoffs as the AL West Division winner.
They are listed second below because the Rangers project to go 80.42 wins and the Astros 80.41 wins. However, that rounds to 80 and if the season ended with both teams at 80, we know the Astros have the tiebreaker.
xWins and GB are rounded.
Both the Astros and Rangers won by 2 runs last night, but the Astros scored 7 to the Rangers’ 3 - that’s why they inched closer and now are .01 “game “ behind the Rangers.
This is fun (for me, at least) to look at, but as mentioned above, if the teams end up tied, the Astros advance to the playoffs.
The standings will sort themselves out over the final three games.
Thank you for reading!