They play almost every day for six months, and then at the end, it all happens so fast. It’s not enough to merely follow one game at a time. There’s too many people making too many problems. It’s a land of confusion — and not many spots to go around.
“We’re calling the game and because of MLB.TV, we have iPads all over,” said Eduardo Pérez, describing the scene in the booth at Wrigley Field on Wednesday.
“We’re calling the Chicago game, but we’re watching what’s going on in Cincinnati, we’re watching what’s going on in New York. We’re watching what’s starting in Arizona. We were watching the game in Seattle with the Dumper. We have no idea where we’re going (next week), so we haven’t made any flight plans at all.”
Eight teams have qualified for the postseason: the Milwaukee Brewers, Philadelphia Phillies, Los Angeles Dodgers, Chicago Cubs and San Diego Padres in the National League, and the Toronto Blue Jays, New York Yankees and Seattle Mariners in the American League. That leaves four spots — one in the NL and three in the AL — available with three games remaining.
For now, those spots belong to the New York Mets in the NL and the Boston Red Sox, Cleveland Guardians and Detroit Tigers in the AL. Three other teams are still alive: the Cincinnati Reds and Arizona Diamondbacks in the NL and the Houston Astros in the AL.
No team clinched a spot Thursday, but the Dodgers secured the NL West title with their 8-0 win in Arizona. The Dodgers are also the only playoff-bound team certain of its seed, as they are currently No. 3 in the NL and will host a best-of-three wild-card series in Los Angeles next week.
The Brewers and Phillies will have first-round byes in the NL, and the AL East winner and the Mariners will have byes in the AL. Those seedings are still in play, though Milwaukee’s magic number is one to clinch the NL’s top seed and home-field advantage through the World Series.
The Blue Jays and Yankees are tied atop the AL East at 91-68, with Toronto holding the tiebreaker. One of those teams will get a bye, and the other will host a wild-card series.
The AL Central is also even, with Detroit and Cleveland at 86-73, and the Guardians holding the tiebreaker.
The Cubs and Padres know they’ll meet in an NL wild-card series, and the Cubs have a magic number of two to host it. If they finish even, the tiebreaker will come down to the intradivision record.
(Here’s the official breakdown from MLB.com with all the scenarios and tiebreakers.)
Only four series this weekend — Chicago White Sox/Washington Nationals, Pittsburgh Pirates/Atlanta Braves, Kansas City Royals/Athletics and Colorado Rockies/San Francisco Giants — have no possible impact on the field or matchups. Eleven series could make a difference in what we’re watching next week.
Ticket orders, TV schedules, travel plans — everything is on hold until the players sort it out on the field. Even front offices, ever-growing in size and influence, are all but powerless to help their rosters.
“We might be able to tap into our minor league depth,” said Jerry Dipoto, the Mariners president of baseball operations, as he watched his team play in Philadelphia last month. “But by and large, I guess as Gene Hackman said in ‘Hoosiers’: ‘Our team is on the floor.’”
The Mariners were stumbling then, losing seven of nine on an East Coast trip. They nearly repeated that futility on another long trip soon after — and then, just like that, they forgot how to lose.
It’s happened before. In 1995, the Mariners trailed the California Angels by 13 games in early August, then erupted down the stretch to win the division in a one-game playoff. Pérez, a September call-up for the Angels, made the second-to-last out against Randy Johnson in a roaring Kingdome.
For teams that swoon down the stretch — like the Tigers and Mets, whose once-certain playoff spots are in peril — the pennant race can be torture.
“Everybody looks around trying to figure out how we’re gonna get out of this, and the moment that something goes south in the next game, you’re like, ‘Oh crap, here we go again,’” Pérez said. “So you try not to lose instead of trying to win. You’re trying not to make mistakes, and little things just happen that you’re like, ‘Oh jeez.’”
For struggling contenders, Thursday was a chance for catharsis. The Reds, who had lost twice at home to Pittsburgh, got a game-saving catch in the ninth inning by right fielder Noelvi Marte. (He channeled Glenn Braggs, right down to the inning, opponent and score.)
The Blue Jays, who had lost six of seven games, thumped the Red Sox, 6-1. The Mets, who had lost 12 of 17, outlasted the Cubs 8-5. The Tigers snapped an eight-game slide by stifling Cleveland 4-2 behind five relievers and a rookie starter, Troy Melton, who didn’t seem to mind being pulled in the fourth.
“He was singing ‘All The Small Things’ by Blink-182, that they were playing in the ballpark as he was leaving the mound in the middle of this high-tension moment!” said an incredulous Jason Benetti on the Tigers’ telecast.
“You talk about being prepared to do your job, he became Tom DeLonge on the way off the mound, and then he’s just yukking it up with Tarik Skubal.”
Few in Cleveland could have expected to put such a scare into the Tigers, not after trailing by 15 1/2 games in early July. But Pérez can relate to the Guardians’ late-summer surprise. He was 13 years old in 1983 when his father, Tony, played for the Phillies. After losing nine of 10 in August, the Phillies stood just one game over .500.
“We were in uniform all summer, and we go back to school in Puerto Rico thinking, ‘OK, my dad’s coming back soon,’” Pérez said. “Then all of a sudden — we followed every game and we’re going, ‘Oh, my God! Now we’re going to the postseason!’ And I missed a lot of school because of that postseason run.”
Pérez got a different kind of education, dressing for the World Series as a bat boy just six weeks after giving up hope. That’s the power of the pennant race.
(Top photo of the New York Mets celebrating after Thursday’s win in Chicago: David Banks-Imagn Images)