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Throughout the season, the CBS Sports MLB experts will bring you a weekly Batting Around roundtable breaking down pretty much anything. The latest news, a historical question, thoughts about the future of baseball, all sorts of stuff. Last week we debated the contender that needed to do the most at the trade deadline<\/a>. This week we’re going to tackle teams that could make a surprise run.<\/p>\n Which team has the best chance to be this year’s Tigers<\/a> and reach the postseason after selling at the trade deadline?<\/p>\n R.J. Anderson: It’s probably the Guardians<\/a>, right? They’re closer to a playoff spot than the Rays<\/a> or the Cardinals<\/a> are, making it easier to foresee them actually getting in; they’ve played well over the last month; and they have a relatively weak remaining strength of schedule. They also have the capacity to improve through internal means (e.g., giving C.J. Kayfus<\/a> some at-bats that would’ve gone to struggling offensive players) that gives them an advantage now that the deadline has passed. <\/p>\n Dayn Perry: I guess I’ll go with the Giants<\/a>, who stripped their bullpen for parts leading up to the deadline. They have one of the easiest remaining schedules in all of MLB, and Rafael Devers<\/a> has shown signs of returning to his accustomed form at the plate lately. As well, Justin Verlander<\/a> has looked much better lately, in terms of top-line and underlying results and fastball velocity. They’ve got a big deficit to make up, but the schedule presents an opportunity.\u00a0<\/p>\n Matt Snyder: I don’t think any will, but I’ll agree with R.J. that it’s the Guardians. I maintain my stance that it was pathetic to dump Shane Bieber<\/a> just to save ownership money when the team could use another starting pitcher down the stretch — and it’s entirely plausible that they’d make the playoffs with him pitching at an ace level — but the team is playing well. It isn’t their fault ownership is a joke. Since that 10-game losing streak the Guardians are 19-7 and right on the cusp of playoff position.\u00a0<\/p>\n Mike Axisa: I’m with Dayn. I think it’s the Giants. Their biggest trade deadline subtractions were two relievers (Camilo Doval<\/a> and Tyler Rogers<\/a>), and while they are two very good relievers, bullpens are weird. It wouldn’t be completely shocking if two relievers come out of nowhere and outpitch Doval and\/or Rogers the rest of the way. Devers and Verlander have looked better the last few weeks and their remaining schedule is not especially imposing. Seven games remaining with the Padres<\/a> gives the Giants a chance to take matters into their own hands and gain ground with head-to-head wins too.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Getty Images Throughout the season, the CBS Sports MLB experts will bring you a weekly Batting Around roundtable…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":50829,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[558],"tags":[64,63,591,85],"class_list":["post-50828","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-mlb","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-mlb","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/50828","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=50828"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/50828\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/50829"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=50828"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=50828"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=50828"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}