MLB playoff odds Sept. 24: Nationals eliminated, Royals hanging by a thread

Taking a look at the latest MLB post-season odds from Cool Standings and Baseball Prospectus.

Sep 24, 2013, 2:38 PM UTC

Jamie Squire

The playoff picture cleared up considerably on Monday, which is either good or bad news depending on where your allegiances lie. With all four of the NL’s berths decided, the AL Wild Card is the only real race left. And the three clubs hanging on for dear life there need some serious help from the teams ahead of them in the season’s final few days.

Let’s look at the updated odds in the AL:

y-clinched playoff spot, x-clinched division

			CoolStandings.com			Baseball Prospectus
Team	Wins	Losses	Div	WC	POFF	Div	WC	POFF
Red Sox-x	95	62	100	0	100	100	0	100
Athletics-x	94	63	100	0	100	100	0	100
Tigers	91	66	99.8	0.2	99.9	99.9	0.1	100
Rays	87	69	0	81.0	81.0	0	92.6	92.6
Indians	86	70	0.2	81.1	81.4	0.1	63.3	63.4
Rangers	85	71	0	33.2	33.2	0	42.2	42.2
Royals	83	73	0	3.9	3.9	0	1.5	1.5
Yankees	82	74	0	0.6	0.6	0	0.3	0.3
Orioles	81	75	0.0	<0.1	<0.1	0	0.0	0.0

The Rangers, Royals, and Yankees are still alive in the hunt for a Wild Card spot, but they’re not going to get there if the Indians continue to win.

All three clubs made up half a game in their quests by winning with the Tribe idle on Monday, but only Texas saw its odds increase as a result. Kansas City and New York need to win out the final six games of the season if they want any real shot at that final playoff berth.

The Orioles are not quite eliminated according to the math, but they may as well be. Monday afternoon’s devastating loss to the Rays was essentially the nail in the coffin for the club, made all the worse by Manny Machado’s gruesome knee injury.

Now over to the National League:

Team	Wins	Losses	Div	WC	POFF	Div	WC	POFF
Braves-x	92	64	100	0	100	100	0	100
Cardinals-y	92	65	88.2	11.8	100	83.1	16.9	100
Dodgers-x	90	66	100	0	100	100	0	100
Pirates-y	90	67	7.0	93.0	100	3.9	96.1	100
Reds-y	90	67	4.8	95.2	100	13.1	86.9	100
Nationals	84	73	0	0	0	0	0	0

Washington’s late-season run at a playoff spot has officially come to an end after their Monday loss and wins from the Pirates and Reds. Pittsburgh and Cincy have clinched at least a Wild Card spot, but both also have a chance of catching St. Louis and avoiding the play-in game.

If the season were to end today, the Cardinals would take the division. Because the Bucs and Reds are tied, and are 8-8 against each other, home-field advantage for the Wild Card play-in game would come down to which of the two had the better intra-division record (the Pirates, in this case).

The pair face off for their final three games of the season, so one of the clubs is going to come out on top in the head-to-head match-up. If St. Louis is unable to take care of business against the Nats and Cubs, there's still a chance that chaos will reign in the form of a three-way tie. Go #TeamEntropy.