2021 AL West Preview

Happy Opening Day Eve!

With the Major League season kicking off tomorrow, I have one day left to get this in. The past couple of days, I've gone through both East and Central divisions for the upcoming season, leaving us with just a pair of divisions to go today.

So before we tackle our defending champion, let's take a look at the American League West.

2019 MLB Tournament of Champions: Group Finals

I'm breaking from football again for a little bit because the 2019 MLB Tournament of Champions is still rolling on!

We've managed to narrow the field down to 16 teams from the original 128, including every World Series champion. It's a little amazing when in other sports that I've done Tournaments of Champions for it's all more modern teams, while here, half the remaining field is from before Jackie Robinson broke the color barrier. Our two highest seeds from group play, as well as our defending Champion of Champions from 2017 are all still in contention.

So today I'm going through the third round, which is the last set of series that will be played within the confines of the groups I set up at the beginning of the tournament. It's also the final round of a best-of-five. Home field advantage goes to the higher seed based on group finish in a 2-2-1 format. This is only a factor for three teams and thus three series, but any home games for American Leagues from 1973 onward are played with a designated hitter; all other games have the pitcher batting ninth.

You can view the bracket so far, as well as go back to see how group play went, here. All simulations are provided by WhatIfSports.com. Let's set up the Elite Eight!

2019 MLB Preview: AL West

We're staying out west for the second post of the day.

Earlier today I kicked off my series of MLB preview posts with a look at the NL West. Like last year, especially with the regular season starting on a Thursday, I need to get this series expedited, so I'm covering two divisions a day. This means for the afternoon portion, we're going to take a look at the AL West.

2018 MLB Preview: AL West

And so we've come all the way across the country. Five divisions down, one to go.

I broke one tradition with my 2018 MLB previews in condensing this down from six days of posts to three. But one tradition I didn't break was the alternating of leagues and working across the country.

And now, we conclude with the division that contains our defending champion: the AL West.

MLB Tournament of Champions: ALDS Series 2

The MLB Tournament of Champions continues as we resume the Division Series round of the playoffs!

Every series has gotten its own post for each series to get the spotlight, and giving me a chance to go in depth on each game, something I couldn't do during the regular season due to sheer volume. Here in a short series though, it's easy to bring focus onto a handful of games, especially in this critical series.

The 2001 Seattle Mariners are one contender in this set, fresh off a two game sweep of the 1970 Baltimore Orioles thanks to a walk off walk in Game 2 of the Wild Card Series. They won 52 games in the regular season and threatened the AL West title, but couldn't quite pull it off. The sweep puts them just 11 wins away from the promised land, something they fell short of in that legendary 2001 campaign.

They take on the 1995 Cleveland Indians, the best team in the American League from the regular season. Cleveland spent much of April in second place looking up at the 1984 Detroit Tigers before surging into first place in May, then running away with the division, ending up as the first team to punch their postseason ticket, and the first to clinch their division. They even spent some time with the best record in the tournament thanks to a potent lineup and strong starting rotation.

Like many of the postseason matchups, the Indians and Mariners ended up splitting their six games in the regular season, which means this is anyone's series. However, by virtue of having the best record in the AL, the Indians have home field advantage, which will be played in a 2-2-1 format. I am also keeping stats this postseason, which you can view by series and in aggregate here. All simulations are provided by WhatIfSports.com. Let's play some playoff baseball!

MLB Tournament of Champions: AL Wild Card Series

The field is set, and now the postseason portion of the MLB Tournament of Champions can begin!

I'm running the format of the postseason almost identically to how Major League Baseball runs its postseason every year, with one exception. The Wild Card round is being expanded to a three game series instead of a single winner-take-all game. These teams just spent 15 weeks fighting to make it this far, and if I'm trying to find arguably the greatest team of all time (or at least, the past 50-plus years), I need to minimize the factor luck plays.

We work our way over to the American League, where it took an extra day to determine this matchup. The higher seed was locked in a week and a half ago in the form of the 2001 Seattle Mariners, a team who struggled to get off the ground in the first three and a half weeks. But they figured things out, even temporarily grabbing a hold of first place in the West for a short stretch before surrendering that lead to the Oakland Athletics. They hung within striking distance though, even when they fell into third place towards the end of May. Eventually though, the Athletics collapsed and after a brief stint in first again, the Mariners would fall into place as the top Wild Card in the American League.

Seattle's opponent and destination for Wednesday required a 93rd game, as the 1970 Baltimore Orioles and 1998 New York Yankees were tied at 48-44 at the end of the regular season. The Orioles beat the Yankees 6-3 on Monday to advance to this stage after spending the entire tournament in contention, leading the East for the first few weeks before sliding a little bit. Baltimore nonetheless remained within striking distance of the Yankees for second in the division and a Wild Card berth, but needed to make up a game on the final weekend of the season and did so to force that winner-take-all game that they won. And here they are, without the benefit of the DH at home because they played before the advent of the designated hitter, against a team they split their six games with during the regular season.

They get that lack of benefit, if you want to call it that, at home in Game 1 before heading to Seattle for Game 2 and if necessary, Game 3, because of Seattle's better regular season record. With this series starting on Wednesday, it allowed for the teams to set up their rotations to some degree, though the O's had the disadvantage of needing to play that aforementioned Game 93.

I will also be keeping stats for this and all postseason series, with the intent of creating an All Tournament Team when the dust clears. Those stats can be viewed here. All simulations are provided by WhatIfSports.com. Let's play ball!

2017 MLB Preview: AL West

Happy Tuesday! We're onto Day 3 of MLB previews. We're less than a week from the start of the season, though a few teams will officially kick off the year a week from today. A week from today is also the second day of the MLB Tournament of Champions, which I hope you'll check out.

We're going from one coast to the other, as we swap leagues again and preview the AL West today.

2016 MLB Predictions: AL West

Day 2 of baseball previews is upon us, and I'm back with a look at another division.

I'm starting out on the western edge of the country before swinging out east and then coming back to the heartland of the country this weekend to look at our defending champions as well as some of the other major contenders. Today, however, I remain out towards the Pacific with a look at the AL West.

2015 MLB Preview: AL West

Happy Good Friday and Almost Opening Day! We've almost wrapped up with our look around Major League Baseball in anticipation of the 2015 season.

Today we make the trek out west to finish out the previews, starting in the American League. If you want to refer back to my predictions from last year, you can view them here.

Let's take a look at the 2015 AL West.

2014 MLB Preview: AL West

I'm onto Day Two of doing MLB previews now, as we're just a few days away from the stateside start of the season. After having done the NL West, we've covered the two teams that have already played, so I've already got a decent head-start on my predictions with the Dodgers being 2-0, though Arizona at 0-2 isn't as great a start. As people are fond of saying though, it's a long season, and April is a time of hope for basically every team. You know, unless you're the Cubs. I'm going to go cry in the corner now.

As for today, I'm looking at the AL West, where I've been pretty wrong two years running. I'm not going to be fooled again. Of course, this probably means I'll still be wrong knowing how my luck with these things go. We'll see. Here's how I predict the race will go.