2019 MLB Tournament of Champions: Group Semifinals Part 2

Just 24 teams are still technically alive in this tournament, though today we're sending eight more home.

We're getting closer to completion of the MLB Tournament of Champions and our quest to find the greatest MLB team of all time. A number of our top teams from the 90 game group play have found themselves out, including three group winners between this round and the last. Some of the best playoff teams from the 2017 tournament are out, including the American League winner in the 2011 Rangers, but our defending Champion of Champions is already on to the Group Finals.

For the first three rounds of the postseason, series are a best-of-five played in a 2-2-1 format. Since I built the brackets around groups, home field advantage goes to the higher seed based on group finish. For any series involving American League teams from 1973 onward, games where those teams are the home team will be played with a designated hitter; all other games will have the pitcher batting ninth based on how my simulator is built out.

All simulations are provided by WhatIfSports.com. You can view the up to date bracket, as well as look back at group play, here. Let's finalize the Sweet 16!

2019 MLB Tournament of Champions: Group Semifinals Part 1

We're down to 32 teams remaining in our quest to determine the greatest MLB team of all time!

I started this project back in April with 128 teams, including every World Series champion. Those teams all played 90 games to cut the field in half, and we're through one round in the attempt to find that greatest team of all time.

Of the 32 teams still remaining, a dozen are from before the color barrier was broken, compared to just five from the current millenium. But the Yankees remain well represented, with 10 of their 27 championship teams still alive. That will definitely go down in this round as they cannibalize themselves a little bit.

We are continuing with the format from last round, as for the first three rounds of the playoffs, the bracket was set up within groups and seeded according to group play finish. Higher seeds get home field advantage for these best-of-five series played in a 2-2-1 format. This only counts for five teams this round, but for any series involving an American League team from 1973 onward, games played at that team's ballpark will use a designated hitter, while all other games have the pitcher batting ninth based on the rules established by my simulator.

You can view the updated bracket as well as group play results here. All simulations are provided by WhatIfSports.com. Let's play ball!

College Football and the 2019 Death to the BCS Playoffs

One of the major running features from the first few years of Confessions of a Sportscaster went on hiatus last year. To an extent, it's doing so again.

I had the idea fresh out of college after reading the book pictured here (a masterpiece, in my eyes) to try and implement the playoff system described by Dan Wetzel, Josh Peter, and Jeff Passan. And so starting in 2012, I was tracking results every week, posting them here, and at the end of the season building a playoff bracket based on their system, then simulating it out.

I ran into a problem in 2017; WhatIfSports, my simulator, had gone up for sale and thus teams weren't getting input like they had been so I wasn't able to maintain my usual pattern of posting results. That meant that I didn't do my usual series of tracking results in 2018. Eventually the 2017 teams did enter the simulator and I did run through that playoff. But the 2018 teams didn't get input until months after the college football season ended, so while I tracked the numbers last season and built a bracket, I wasn't able to simulate the postseason in real time. That feature will come sometime this fall or early winter; possibly as an appetizer to the 2019 Death to the BCS Playoffs that will go on... it's just a question of when.

You can click on the above link for last year's bracket to view how I build out the postseason bracket, but the CliffNotes version is this: all ten conference champions get an automatic bid, with six at large bids to fill out the field. I pick those teams and seed everyone based on a number of metrics: one I built myself for non-conference scheduling, one I borrowed from the IHSA (then a couple that derive from it), and a trio of computer rankings that factor margin of victory into the equation. I'll go into more specifics come December after the championship games are in the books and I'm ready to unveil the bracket.

But before I leave it at that for the fall, I also want to make a couple things clear about eligibility, and to an extent this is where my non-conference metric comes in. I've railed against FCS games to some degree; I get their purpose and in the grand scheme of things they don't hurt anybody. But any team that plays two FCS opponents (except in a circumstance where a game gets cancelled and they need to fill it at the last minute with a second FCS team) will be suspended from the postseason. Additionally, a few other teams are also at least partially ineligible for this year. Ohio State, despite Urban Meyer having ridden off into the sunset and the offending assistant having long since been removed, is currently under an at large suspension from the Death to the BCS Playoffs. This means that if they win the Big Ten, they will make it in, but that is their only route to the playoffs; they cannot be considered for an at large bid. This suspension is in effect through the 2020 season, at which point they will regain full eligibility.

The same can't be said for two other programs, and regular readers of Confessions of a Sportscaster will know where I'm going with this. Baylor is permanently banned from the Death to the BCS Playoffs for a pattern of covering up sexual assault cases to protect the football program. Similarly, (and you know this is the big one), Penn State is permanently banned from the Death to the BCS Playoffs for being a cult that prioritized football over the well being of children. I will still calculate their metrics, and games against these teams will still count for the purpose of metric gathering, but they will not be considered for postseason play.

If you are curious to see where your team might stand at any point in the year, you can view that here. I will do my best to update this weekly. Good luck to your teams this fall!

2019 MLB Tournament of Champions: Group Quarterfinals Part 4

We've got just one more set of games to go in the Round of 64!

I started this ambitious project all the way back in April with 128 teams, including every World Series champion. That number has now shrunk to 40 between the movement to postseason play and the completion of three-quarters of the first round of the postseason.

For this and the next two rounds, we're staying in the groups teams were assigned to when the tournament started. Teams were seeded based on group finish, with the higher seed getting home field advantage in a 2-2-1 format. I've mentioned this elsewhere in this round, but it bears repeating: based on the rules of my simulator, for any series involving an American League from 1973 or later, when that team plays at home a designated hitter will be used; all other games will see the pitcher batting ninth.

You can view the standings from group play, as well as the playoff bracket, here. All simulations are provided by WhatIfSports.com. Let's get to it!

2019 MLB Tournament of Champions: Group Quarterfinals Part 3

The 2019 MLB Tournament of Champions rolls on as we continue postseason play!

I started this very ambitious project back in April, taking 128 Major League teams, including every World Series champion, and put them through the ringer in an effort to find the greatest team of all time. We cut that field in half after a 90 game double round robin period, and now that field of 64 is down to 48 with half of the first round officially simulated and in the books. I'm going through eight more series in this post, with one more part of the Round of 64 to go before we move on to the next one.

I set the bracket up so that the first three rounds were all played within the groups from group play, and teams were seeded according to their finish in group play. Higher seeds get home field advantage for a best-of-five series in a 2-2-1 format. The one quirk of this tournament is that for any series involving American League teams from 1973 onward, when said team is at home the designated hitter will be used; for all other games the pitcher bats ninth.

All simulations are provided by WhatIfSports.com. If you want to view the full bracket, plus look at how group play went, you can view that here. Let's play ball!

2019 MLB Tournament of Champions: Group Quarterfinals Part 2

The postseason of the MLB Tournament of Champions rolls on!

Back in April, I started with 128 teams, including every World Series champion, vying for the title of Champion of Champions. After a 90 game schedule, the field was cut in half, and we're onto brackets now.

That field is down from 64 to 56 following the first part of this round. I broke it up this round into four parts because of the sheer number of games, but I'm not advancing to the second round until this round is complete. So far, we've had mostly chalk, though a pair of six-seeds have advanced already.

For this round and the next two, home field advantage goes to the higher seed based on group finish in a 2-2-1 format. Based on the rules of my simulator, lineup rules are determined by whoever the home team is, so any game hosted by a 1973-or-later American League team will use the DH; every other game will have the pitcher hitting ninth.

You can view the bracket, plus results from group play, here. All simulations are provided by WhatIfSports.com. Let's get to it!

2019 MLB Tournament of Champions: Group Quarterfinals Part 1

The field is set, the participants are ready... let's get to some playoff baseball!

I spent three-plus months (or what in real time would have amounted to through mid-July) running through 90 game mini-seasons for 128 of Major League Baseball's best teams in history. Half of them failed to make it this far, with the 2010 Texas Rangers taking the consolation crown. But now we seek to find the champion of champions.

Over the next three rounds, we're going back into the eight groups, but in bracket form. We're onto single elimination, but in best-of-five format. The higher seeds based on group finish get home field advantage in a 2-2-1 format. One thing I want to make clear is the use of the designated hitter: my simulator goes based off of the league rules of the home team, so any games hosted by American League teams from 1973 or later will utilize the designated hitter; all other games will have the pitcher automatically bat ninth.

Because of the sheer number of games that are going to be taking place for these first few rounds, I'm going to break this round up into multiple parts focusing on just a couple of groups per each post. All simulations are provided by WhatIfSports.com. You can view the bracket, as well as scores and standings from group play, here. Let's play ball!

2019 MLB Tournament of Champions: Consolation Bracket

I really can't help myself.

I think I'd mentioned that I had the idea of pulling off a consolation tournament for the aforementioned MLB Tournament of Champions, but I hadn't officially started to set anything up until I finally worked my way through group play. The field of 128 was cut in half, but the half that missed the cut gets a chance to redeem themselves.

I'm going to run this one like I ran the unofficial consolation tournament in 2017: this will be a double elimination tournament with one-off games for each round. Seeding has been determined based first off of group finish (teams that finished ninth are the top eight seeds, followed by teams that finished tenth, and so on), then by record in group play, and finally by run differential in group play. Higher seeds host until the championship round, when the team out of the winner's bracket will get home field advantage against the team out of the loser's bracket. Any games hosted by an American League team in the DH era will be played with a DH.

You can view the full bracket here. All simulations are provided by WhatIfSports.com. Let's play ball!

2019 MLB Tournament of Champions: Postseason Introduction

Every team has played 90 games, and with that, it's time to cut the field in half.

I had minimal shenanigans in terms of imbalance among groups. 48 wins guaranteed advancement, and there's only one flagrant lack of advancing issue that I'm not thrilled about. The 2015 Kansas City Royals went 47-43, but eight other teams in that group had 48 or more; elsewhere I only had one sub-.500 team advance in the 1960 Pittsburgh Pirates. Elsewhere some .500 teams made it, while others didn't depending on how everything lined up. Even so, the records ended up distributing how they would in a normal baseball season. All but one team reached at least 30 wins, while just three teams hit the 60-win plateau; 61 of the 128 teams had between 40 and 49 wins.

So with those thoughts in mind, here's the bracket going into the postseason. The first three rounds will be played entirely in groups. All rounds will be best of 5 with the higher regular season finish getting home field advantage in a 2-2-1 format. For the quarterfinals onward, it will become best of seven in a 2-3-2 format, with home field advantage going first to the higher seed (based on group finish), with overall record, then run differential breaking ties.

Let's take a look at who advanced based on decade, franchise, and other criteria.

2019 MLB Tournament of Champions: Group Play Round 30

It all comes down to this. The 128 team field will officially be cut in half following this group of three game sets.

I started this tournament back in April and have been hard at work running through the gauntlet to start things off. Eight groups of 16 teams have been battling it out in a double round robin format, and complete their schedules in this set. From here, the top eight in each group will advance to the postseason.

To date, 47 of the 64 postseason spots have been clinched, and the 17 that remain are all tight races to grab those spots. The nice thing from what I can tell is that our worst postseason team shouldn't be far under .500. I'll have a full breakdown of that after group play is completed.

You can view the scores from the first 29 rounds, as well as the complete standings, here. All simulations are provided by WhatIfSports.com. Let's finish up the group stage!

2019 MLB Tournament of Champions: Group Play Round 29

We're down to the final week of group play in the MLB Tournament of Champions!

128 teams have played 84 games apiece, with six to go until we cut the field in half. We went from 13 spots having been clinched to, by my rough count, 25 teams having punched their tickets to the postseason. We're still stuck on two group winners in the 1927 Yankees and 1967 Cardinals, though we'll probably see at least one or two more groups determine winners in this round. There are a lot of tight races, but my favorite probably has to be the three way tie between the 1975 Reds, 1924 Senators, and 1952 Yankees at 54-30 atop Group D.

Meanwhile, there is still a fight for the top record in the entire tournament. The aforementioned '27 Yankees and '67 Cardinals are currently in the lead with 59-25 marks through 84 games. Those 59 wins match what the 2016 Cubs pulled off in the 2017 tournament and barring neither team caring about the final six games, both will top 60 wins, with the '44 Cardinals can hit that plateau with a .500 week and a few other teams if they win out can hit 60 as well.

You can view the full schedule for the remainder of the week, plus scores from prior games as well as standings, here. All simulations are provided by WhatIfSports.com. Let's play ball!

2019 MLB Tournament of Champions: Group Play Round 28

We're now 90 percent of the way through the group stage of the MLB Tournament of Champions, and each team has just nine games left to try and position themselves for a run at the Championship of Champions!

By my quick count, 13 of the 64 postseason berths have been clinched to this point; these teams are guaranteed at worst a top-eight spot in their respective group. If this stage ended today, every team with at least 42 wins would make the postseason, though some 41-40 teams would miss the cut while at least one below .500 team would advance in their group. As for the tops of each group, the 1927 Yankees and 1964 Cardinals have clinched their respective group titles and thus home field advantage for at least the first three rounds of the playoffs. Our worst group leader sits at 49-32, while the '27 Yankees lead the tournament with a 59-22 mark.

You can view the full standings, plus see the remaining schedule and scores from all games here. All simulations are provided by WhatIfSports.com. Let's play ball!

2019 MLB Tournament of Champions: Group Play Round 27

We're down to the final two weeks of group play in the 2019 MLB Tournament of Champions!

I started this project all the way back in April with every World Series champion, plus at least one representative of every other franchise totaling 128 teams. Each of those teams have played 78 of their scheduled 90 games to date, which makes these last two weeks all the more critical.

I split the field into eight groups of 16 teams, and the top eight from each group will advance to postseason play. If group play ended today, a 41-37 record would guarantee a postseason berth, though depending on the group, a 38-40 teams could still advance. To lead a group, anywhere from 46 to 56 wins is the bar to reach. I just feel bad for the 1987 Minnesota Twins, who are sitting at an abysmal 19-59 record.

You can view the full standings, plus scores from prior games and the upcoming schedule, here. All simulations are provided by WhatIfSports.com. Let's get to it!