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By Jordan Shusterman
FOX Sports MLB Writer
September is just around the corner, and the American League postseason picture is a glorious mess.
While the Astros and Yankees remain a comfortable distance ahead of the pack, the remainder of the standings leave us with a plethora of possibilities for how the playoff field could shake out.
The AL Central is completely up for grabs, but the teams that miss out on that division crown might not make the postseason at all. The AL East, meanwhile, boasts the opposite scenario, with four teams still within shouting distance of a wild card and a great chance that two of them head to the postseason along with the Yankees.
And then there are the Mariners, desperately trying to end their historic, 21-year postseason drought via one of three AL wild cards.
There’s a lot going on! So after looking at the National League last week, let’s check in on the 10 AL teams still playing with October aspirations.
Arrow pointing: Neutral
Overall: 78-45
Since Aug. 2 deadline: 11-8
Last week: 3-4
Playoff odds (via FanGraphs): 100%
It’s looking like another ho-hum, 100-win campaign for Houston. They haven’t been as downright dominant as their National League juggernaut counterpart Dodgers, but they just keep on chugging along the tracks of the 162-game season, seemingly impervious to the kind of shocking slide the Yankees have been suffering from recently.
Houston’s pitching staff is led by the eternal Justin Verlander and ground-ball machine Framber Valdez, not to mention the recently returned Lance McCullers Jr., who figures to be a significant factor in October. Alex Bregman‘s resurgence only makes the loaded lineup, which has been paced by Jose Altuve, Yordan Alvarez and Kyle Tucker, scarier, and he figures to help make up for the loss of Michael Brantley to a season-ending injury.
Record-wise, the Astros remain in the same tier as the Yankees. As far as confidence about a deep postseason run, Houston is much closer to the Dodgers than New York in the greater MLB landscape.
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Kyle Tucker and Yuli Gurriel help the Houston Astros pick up a 5-4 victory over the Atlanta Braves.
Arrow pointing: Almost straight down
Overall: 74-48
Since Aug. 2 deadline: 5-14
Last week: 2-5
Playoff odds: 100%
I certainly can’t remember watching a team with a .600-plus winning percentage look worse than the Yankees have the past few weeks, as they own baseball’s actual worst record since the trade deadline — a deadline at which they made several legitimately good acquisitions!
Frankie Montas and Andrew Benintendi have disappointed thus far, though Benintendi seems to be heating up recently. We still aren’t quite sure when Harrison Bader will be back, and it doesn’t help that Jordan Montgomery has been thriving with the Cardinals, baseball’s best team since Aug. 2, alongside the Dodgers. Most concerningly, Aaron Judge went nine days without hitting a home run!
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Aaron Judge ended his nine-game homerless streak by taking Max Scherzer yard on his league-leading 47th home run of the season.
Manager Aaron Boone’s table-slamming postgame news conference seemed to spark enough for the team to eke out a sweep-avoiding victory Sunday against Toronto, but the vibes are troublesome right now. The Yankees’ place in the standings seems secure — though home field throughout the postseason might slip away if this skid continues — but it sure has been a while since this looked like a team prepared to make a legitimate World Series push.
Arrow pointing: Slightly up
Overall: 65-55
Since Aug. 2 deadline: 8-10
Last week: 4-3
Playoff odds: 92.2%
Fresh off a series win in the Bronx, Toronto is in good shape heading into the final stretch. The Jays have the easiest remaining schedule of any AL East team and, even more importantly, they currently boast the healthiest roster of the bunch.
Despite Vlad Guerrero Jr. being more “regular All-Star” than “MVP candidate” this season, this is still one of the deeper lineups in the game, with its primary weakness being how overwhelmingly right-handed it is. In the rotation, Alek Manoah‘s and Kevin Gausman‘s excellence has covered up the stunningly disappointing season of Jose Berrios and the maddening inconsistency of Yusei Kikuchi, while the bullpen got reinforced at the deadline with Anthony Bass and Zach Pop.
On talent alone, Toronto makes a good case for being the third-best team in the American League, but the performance hasn’t quite lived up to the massive preseason hype and expectations — at least, not yet.
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Ben Verlander takes a look at the Toronto Blue Jays and what they need to do to reach and make a deep run in the playoffs.
Arrow pointing: Neutral
Overall: 66-56
Since Aug. 2 deadline: 11-7
Last week: 4-2
Playoff odds: 88.9%
It was something of an uneven, three-city road trip for Seattle, sandwiching a sweep of the Angels with series losses to Texas and Oakland. Still, the Mariners have to feel pretty good about their situation heading down the stretch, considering they have by far the easiest remaining schedule of the AL contenders.
Even considering the enormous prospect cost, the Luis Castillo trade has looked like one of the more prudent big-name acquisitions across the league. Mitch Haniger hasn’t looked rusty at all in his return from the injured list, which has been crucial, as All-Star Ty France has scuffled a bit since his return from the IL. Supersonic rookie Julio Rodriguez has also not looked quite as electric since returning from the IL, but he’s still more than capable of putting the team on his back — and this team goes as Julio goes.
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Ben Verlander, Jake Mintz and Jordan Shusterman talk about which teams they think are postseason-bound and whether Mariners rookie All-Star Julio Rodriguez can lead the team to its first postseason appearance since 2001.
A playoff berth (finally!) is right there for the taking — Seattle’s final 20 games come against teams below .500. The Mariners just need to take care of business. But as this past week showed, that’s easier said than done.
Arrow pointing: Slightly up
Overall: 66-55
Since Aug. 2 deadline: 12-7
Last week: 5-2
Playoff odds: 75.3%
The Rays are hanging around, as they always do, and I’m always hesitant to bet against them. That said, 21-year-old phenom Wander Franco, who has been out since early July, recently experienced a setback in his rehab coming back from wrist surgery, which leaves his return in question for a team already dealing with a litany of injuries.
Even more concerning than Franco’s absence is the absolute gauntlet of a schedule Tampa Bay has remaining. After four against the Angels and two against the Marlins next week, the Rays do not play another team completely out of the playoff mix except when they host the Rangers for three games in mid-September. Not only will they be fending off the teams they’re potentially jostling for a wild card (nine games remaining vs. Toronto, three vs. Cleveland), but they’ve also got six more against the Yankees and six more against Houston.
It’s a brutal stretch, but if you’re an optimistic Rays fan confident in your team’s ability to hang on, you could also look at the September schedule as an excellent opportunity for Tampa Bay to make significant strides in the standings — especially against Toronto.
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Ben Verlander looks at the American League standings with an eye on MLB’s expanded playoffs. Will the Yankees, Blue Jays and Rays all make the postseason?
Arrow pointing: Slightly up
Overall: 64-56
Since Aug. 2 deadline: 11-7
Last week: 3-3
Playoff odds: 58.3%
The Guardians quietly overtook the AL Central lead from Minnesota on Aug. 10 and have been clinging to it ever since. As usual, it’s a pitching-and-defense recipe for success in Cleveland, but the bona fide breakouts of guys such as Andres Gimenez, Josh Naylor and Steven Kwan have made this lineup a whole lot more respectable beyond the perennial MVP performance of Jose Ramirez.
The upside when everything is clicking might not be as great as that of the Guardians’ divisional foes, but this is also a much more stable operation — and one I’d bet on hanging on to the division moving forward.
Arrow pointing: Up
Overall: 62-60
Since Aug. 2 deadline: 11-9
Last week: 3-3
Playoff odds: 37.6%
It doesn’t feel like a whole lot has gone right for the South Siders this season, yet here they are, still firmly in striking distance of a wild card, if not the AL Central. They took yet another blow Monday, when right-hander Michael Kopech left his start early due to knee soreness. An extended Kopech absence would be the pitching equivalent to the Tim Anderson injury on the offensive side, and I’m not sure who the pitching equivalent to Elvis Andrus would be in that scenario.
The good news is Jose Abreu has been playing like an MVP for the past two months, Dylan Cease is still a Cy Young candidate, and Johnny Cueto has found the fountain of youth. Chicago’s schedule the rest of the way is fairly easy, but the margin for error is thin; some other guys on this roster are going to have to step up soon.
Yankees’ continued struggles and Tony La Russa’s questionable decisions
Ben Verlander look at the hot topics in baseball, including the New York Yankees’ August struggles and Chicago White Sox manager Tony La Russa’s questionable decisions.
Arrow pointing: Neutral
Overall: 62-58
Since Aug. 2 deadline: 8-10
Last week: 4-2
Playoff odds: 37.2%
Such is the brutal and frustrating nature of our sport that the AL Central team that actually went out at the trade deadline and aggressively tried to improve has played worse since Aug. 2 than the two teams that essentially did squat. Nevertheless, the Twins enter the final stretch as roughly the team most expected them to be: a deep, dangerous lineup with a shaky rotation and an uneven bullpen.
Is that going to be enough to win the division? It might be! Seventeen of Minnesota’s final 33 games come against the Guardians (eight) or White Sox (nine), so the Twins will likely control their division destiny if they can take care of business against their rivals.
Twins turn triple play against Rangers
Watch as the Minnesota Twins turn an incredible triple play against the Texas Rangers.
Arrow pointing: Up
Overall: 63-58
Since Aug. 2 deadline: 11-7
Last week: 4-3
Playoff odds: 4.1%
Baltimore’s playoff odds at FanGraphs have been a running joke since they were 0.0% before the 2021 season — that turned out to be fairly accurate, by the way — but I’m honestly starting to wonder how long the O’s will need to stay in the mix to get this number up to even double digits. Not that the Orioles should or do care what these odds say, but it serves as a reminder of how unlikely this season has been.
This team has simply been a different beast since Adley Rutschman arrived, and his outstanding individual performance and expectations of success have clearly spread to other parts of the roster, most notably the bullpen. Orioles relievers have posted a 3.16 ERA this season, fourth in MLB, just a year after yielding a league-worst 5.70 ERA in 2021.
No matter how this magical ride ends, it has been supremely impressive to watch, and with even more help on the way from a loaded farm system, it’s clear the Orioles deserve to be taken seriously as soon as next season.
Arrow pointing: Slightly down
Overall: 60-62
Since Aug. 2 deadline: 8-10
Last week: 3-3
Playoff odds: 6.4%
Boston is the American League’s version of the Giants: a perfectly solid team that hasn’t performed nearly consistently enough to be taken seriously as a postseason threat. The Red Sox remain in the playoff conversation because they are technically not far enough out of it to completely bury them, but it would take a lot of surprises for them to be playing in October.
The series loss to Baltimore this past weekend dropped Boston to 16-32 vs. AL East opponents on the season, and that’s exactly how you end up in last place in your division. Of course, not all last-place teams are bad teams, especially when they compete in such a challenging division, but it’d be a stretch to call this Red Sox squad a good team. Series this week against Tampa Bay and Toronto could go a long way toward either dooming the Sox’s October fate or helping them climb back into the mix.
Jordan Shusterman is half of @CespedesBBQ and a baseball writer for FOX Sports. He lives in D.C. but is a huge Seattle Mariners fan and loves watching the KBO, which means he doesn’t get a lot of sleep. You can follow him on Twitter at @j_shusterman_.
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