The calendar has flipped to September, meaning attention has completely shifted to postseason races. We have a good idea of most of the teams that are going to make the playoffs, but there're close races worth keeping an eye on down the stretch in each league, including both Wild Card races and the AL West race.
Such close races make it tough to predict who is going to come out on top. One metric that could be an indicator of which teams are poised to go on a run is run differential, as generally, the teams that score many more runs than they give up tend to have more success. With that in mind, let's take a look at what the standings look like and which teams in the Wild Card race have the best run differentials.
AL Wild Card standings
Team | Record | GB |
|---|---|---|
New York Yankees | 83-62 | +10.0 |
Boston Red Sox | 80-67 | +6.0 |
Cleveland Guardians | 74-73 | - |
Toronto Blue Jays | 73-74 | 1.0 |
Texas Rangers | 72-74 | 1.5 |
Baltimore Orioles | 71-76 | 3.0 |
Minnesota Twins | 69-77 | 4.5 |
The New York Yankees and Boston Red Sox remain in cruise control in the AL Wild Card race, but the race for the final spot remains intense. The Cleveland Guardians hold that final spot right now, but the Toronto Blue Jays are just 1.0 game back while also possessing the tiebreaker. The Texas Rangers hope to win the AL West, but as a fallback, they're just 1.5 games back of a Wild Card spot.
It's tougher to envision teams like the Baltimore Orioles and the Minnesota Twins sneaking in, but with roughly 15 games to go, they are still alive with a somewhat realistic shot at making it. There's a good chance we won't know who the third Wild Card team is until the last weekend of the regular season.
AL Wild Card standings based on run differential
Team | Run Differential |
|---|---|
New York Yankees | +124 |
Boston Red Sox | +82 |
Cleveland Guardians | -16 |
Baltimore Orioles | -27 |
Toronto Blue Jays | -39 |
Texas Rangers | -40 |
Minnesota Twins | -53 |
Much like the actual standings, the run differential standings heavily favor the Yankees and Red Sox, as they're the only teams in Wild Card contention that have scored more runs than they've allowed. There's a good chance that the final Wild Card spot will go to a team with a negative run differential, which is hard to fathom, but this wouldn't be anything new for the Guardians, who won the AL Central last season despite allowing six more runs than they scored in the regular season.
What's most interesting about these standings is that the Detroit Tigers, a team that traded Tarik Skubal at the trade deadline, is 6.5 games back of a Wild Card spot, has a +55 run differential. That's right - the Tigers have the third-best run differential in the American League, yet are an afterthought in the Wild Card race. This goes to show that while run differential tends to help differentiate the good teams from the bad ones, it can also be a flawed metric.
NL Wild Card standings
Team | Record | GB |
|---|---|---|
Philadelphia Phillies | 82-65 | +3.5 |
Chicago Cubs | 81-66 | +2.5 |
San Diego Padres | 78-68 | - |
Arizona Diamondbacks | 78-69 | 0.5 |
Pittsburgh Pirates | 73-73 | 5.0 |
The Philadelphia Phillies and the Chicago Cubs remain in control of their own destinies in the Wild Card race, but inconsistent play of late has tightened things up a bit. They're likely to get in, but it doesn't feel as certain as it did a week ago. Something that has remained the same, though, is the ridiculously tight race for the final Wild Card spot.
Not even a full game separates the San Diego Padres and the Arizona Diamondbacks in the third Wild Card hunt. What's even crazier is that these teams are knotted up in the season series at five games apiece and are set to play each other in the final weekend of the regular season. There's a good chance this race won't be decided until then, and if they can beat each other up, perhaps the Pittsburgh Pirates can find a way to sneak in. A healthy Konnor Griffin should help their cause.
NL Wild Card standings based on run differential
Team | Run Differential |
|---|---|
Chicago Cubs | +128 |
Philadelphia Phillies | +37 |
Pittsburgh Pirates | +34 |
San Diego Padres | +17 |
Arizona Diamondbacks | -1 |
The actual standings have the Phillies ahead of the Cubs by 1.0 game, but are the Phillies actually better than the Cubs? I mean, by run differential, the Cubs are 91 runs better than Philadelphia as of this writing, which is absurd. The Cubs have a higher run differential than the Atlanta Braves, who lead the NL East.
That isn't even the craziest thing when looking at the run differential standings. The Pirates, a team barely hanging on for dear life, have a better run differential than a Padres team in a playoff spot and a Diamondbacks team not even a full game out. Baseball can be a cruel sport sometimes.
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