There is just under a month of the 2018 MLB season left, so there is no guarantee that just one National League West team is going to make it to the postseason. That possibility is very real, though, even if it didn’t seem that way earlier in the year. That was before the Cardinals dumped Mike Matheny and then went on a tear that vaulted them into a wild card spot.
3 NL West teams might be fighting for 1 postseason spot
The Rockies, Dodgers, and Diamondbacks are going to spend the next month climbing each other for a shot at the top.
Photo by Justin Edmonds/Getty Images
Now, the Rockies are in first place out West with a half-game lead over the Dodgers, who are all of one game up on the Diamondbacks. Los Angeles is one game back of the Cardinals for a wild card spot, the D-Backs two back. If the season ended today, the NL West would have just the one postseason representative, instead of last year’s three.
The season does not end today, however, which is what makes this race so compelling. All three of these NL West clubs need to be in first place, because second and third place might not have the same benefit they did one year ago. Sure, the distance between the Dodgers, D-Backs, Brewers, and Cardinals is minuscule and could be overcome in short order, and we could be writing about how just one NL Central team is going to make it to October, again.
The NL West cannot help but infight for this one spot, though, not with the way the schedule is laid out for the next few weeks. The Rockies wrap their series against the Giants on Wednesday, and then they play three against the Dodgers, followed by four against the Diamondbacks. Then, on the 17th, they take on the Dodgers for the last three games against them of the season, and follow that up with the final series against Arizona. Of their remaining 24 games, 13 are against the two teams they’re fighting against for NL West supremacy.
The Dodgers have those six games against the Rockies, and another three against the D-Backs in their second-to-last series of the season. They also play the Cardinals four more times, which is not something any team should be looking forward to right about now.
The Diamondbacks might have the hardest road of all, and they’re the ones with the most ground to cover. They face the Braves in a four-game series beginning Thursday, then the Rockies for four, then three against the AL West-leading Astros, then three against the NL Central-leading Cubs. After that, Arizona finishes off their season series against both the Rockies and Dodgers, and their prize at the end is concluding their season against the lowly Padres. If they can survive the gauntlet before them, those three games against San Diego could be incredibly meaningful, but getting through this slate in a position to capitalize on the dregs of the West is its own herculean task.
Sometimes, MLB’s unbalanced schedule makes for a mess. In cases like the NL West race of 2018, though, it’s giving us a potentially ridiculous stretch run where all three teams vying for what might just be one opportunity at the postseason have to repeatedly fell their foes. In a season that has lacked drama in too many arenas, this should be a welcome diversion for fans out west or otherwise.
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