MLB Tournament of Champions: Consolation Bracket

I just can't help myself.

The postseason of the MLB Tournament of Champions is in full swing. At this point, we're in the League Championship Series portion of the tournament, and I'll have those results in a week or so. In addition to that, I decided that the 92 (or in the case of the 1998 New York Yankees, 93) games these teams played to narrow the field from 30 to 10 wasn't enough. I wanted to run a consolation tournament similar to what I did for the NBA Tournament of Champions last year.

This is another single game per round, double elimination tournament. It's similar to what the NCAA uses for the College World Series, except with more teams. The fair warning with this (that I discovered after the fact) is that when we hit the championship game, it's a winner-take-all, so even if the team out of the winners bracket loses, that's it. In this sense, it's not a true "double-elimination" tournament, but it's close enough.

I split the teams to keep them in their respective leagues until we hit the end, when I'll hold a three game series between the winners from each league. Home field advantage all throughout this portion of the tournament goes to the teams with the better records from the regular season, and the few ties there were were broken based on records against the team seeded first in the tournament, moving on down until the tie was broken.

Here are the seedings and brackets for each league, beginning with the American League:

1. 1998 New York Yankees
2. 2008 Tampa Bay Rays
3. 1989 Oakland Athletics
4. 1984 Detroit Tigers
5. 1982 Milwaukee Brewers
6. 2015 Kansas City Royals
7. 1991 Minnesota Twins
8. 2002 Anaheim Angels
9. 1993 Toronto Blue Jays
10. 2005 Chicago White Sox

And the National League:

1. 1965 Los Angeles Dodgers
2. 1986 New York Mets
3. 1971 Pittsburgh Pirates
4. 2005 Houston Astros
5. 2011 St. Louis Cardinals
6. 2003 Florida Marlins
7. 2014 Washington Nationals
8. 2010 San Francisco Giants
9. 2001 Arizona Diamondbacks
10. 2008 Philadelphia Phillies

I'm also going to keep stats for this tournament, seeing as there are significantly fewer games to keep track of. You can view those here. All simulations are provided by WhatIfSports.com. Let's play ball!

Wednesday, July 19th

'93 TOR 10, @ '02 ANA 4
W: Morris (1-0) | L: Ortiz (0-1)

@ '91 MIN 9, '05 CHW 4
W: Morris (1-0) | L: Buehrle (0-1)
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@ '10 SF 9, '01 AZ 5
W: Romo (1-0) | L: Schilling (0-1)

@ '14 WAS 5, '08 PHI 2
W: Gonzalez (1-0) | L: Hamels (0-1) | SV: Soriano (1)

Thursday, July 20th

@ '98 NYY 4, '93 TOR 3
W: Wells (1-0) | L: Leiter (0-1) | SV: Rivera (1)

@ '84 DET 9, '82 MIL 0
W: Berenguer (1-0) | L: Haas (0-1)

@ '08 TB 9, '91 MIN 7
W: Wheeler (1-0) | L: Tapani (0-1) | SV: Percival (1)

'15 KC 8, @ '89 OAK 4
W: Cueto (1-0) | L: Stewart (0-1)
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@ '65 LAD 3, '10 SF 2
W: Koufax (1-0) | L: Sanchez (0-1)

@ '05 HOU 10, '11 STL 5
W: Oswalt (1-0) | L: Carpenter (0-1)

'14 WAS 6, @ '86 NYM 2
W: Strasburg (1-0) | L: Darling (0-1)

@ '71 PIT 4, '03 FLA 3
W: Grant (1-0) | L: Pavano (0-1) | SV: Giusti (1)

Friday, July 21st

Losers Bracket

'02 ANA 2, @ '89 OAK 1
W: Washburn (1-0) | L: Moore (0-1)

'05 CHW 10, @ '82 MIL 8
W: Politte (1-0) | L: Bernard (0-1) | SV: Hermanson (1)
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@ '03 FLA 9, '01 AZ 8
W: Almanza (1-0) | L: Sabel (0-1) | SV: Looper (1)

@ '11 STL 5, '08 PHI 3
W: Boggs (1-0) | L: Seanez (0-1) | SV: Salas (1)

Saturday, July 22nd

Losers Bracket

@ '91 MIN 11, '02 ANA 10
W: Erickson (1-0) | L: Shields (0-1) | SV: Aguilera (1)

@ '93 TOR 3, '05 CHW 2
W: Guzman (1-0) | L: Contreras (0-1)
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'03 FLA 1, @ '86 NYM 0
W: Redman (1-0) | L: Gooden (0-1) | SV: Looper (2)

'10 SF 4, @ '11 STL 1
W: Bumgarner (1-0) | L: Garcia (0-1) | SV: Wilson (1)

Winners Bracket

@ '98 NYY 8, '84 DET 5
W: Stanton (1-0) | L: Rozema (0-1) | SV: Rivera (2)

@ '08 TB 10, '15 KC 3
W: Garza (1-0) | L: Volquez (0-1)
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@ '65 LAD 2, '05 HOU 1
W: Miller (1-0) | L: Pettitte (0-1) | SV: Perranoski (1)

'14 WAS 4, @ '71 PIT 2
W: Zimmermann (1-0) | L: Blass (0-1) | SV: Soriano (2)

Sunday, July 23rd

Losers Bracket

'91 MIN 11, @ '84 DET 6
W: Anderson (1-0) | L: Morris (0-1)

'93 TOR 8, @ '15 KC 4
W: Hentgen (1-0) | L: Ventura (0-1) | SV: Ward (1)
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@ '05 HOU 5, '03 FLA 3
W: Clemens (1-0) | L: Willis (0-1)

'10 SF 7, @ '71 PIT 2
W: Lincecum (1-0) | L: Ellis (0-1)

Monday, July 24th

Losers Bracket

'93 TOR 10, @ '91 MIN 9 (12)
W: Williams (1-0) | L: Abbott (0-1) | SV: Ward (2)
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'10 SF 2, @ '05 HOU 1
W: Cain (1-0) | L: Wheeler (0-1) | SV: Wilson (2)

Winners Bracket 

@ '98 NYY 1, '08 TB 0
W: Cone (1-0) | L: Shields (0-1) | SV: Rivera (3)
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'14 WAS 11, @ '65 LAD 5
W: Roark (1-0) | L: Drysdale (0-1)

Tuesday, July 25th

Losers Bracket

'93 TOR 12, @ '08 TB 6
W: Morris (2-0) | L: Kazmir (0-1)
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'10 SF 5, @ '65 LAD 1
W: Sanchez (1-1) | L: Koufax (1-1)

Wednesday, July 26th

Winners Bracket

@ '98 NYY 12, '93 TOR 3
W: Wells (2-0) | L: Stewart (0-1)
*The 1998 New York Yankees win the AL Consolation Tournament*
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'10 SF 5, @ '14 WAS 2
W: Bumgarner (2-0) | L: Fister (0-1)
*The 2010 San Francisco Giants win the NL Consolation Tournament*

Friday, July 28th

Consolation Championship Game 1

@ '10 SF 3, '98 NYY 2
W: Wilson (1-0) | L: Nelson (0-1)

Sunday, July 30th

Consolation Championship Game 2

@ '98 NYY 8, '10 SF 3
W: Hernandez (1-0) | L: Cain (1-1)

Monday, July 31st

Consolation Championship Game 3

@ '98 NYY 8, '10 SF 2
W: Cone (2-0) | L: Bumgarner (2-1)
*The 1998 New York Yankees win the Consolation Championship*

Consolation Tournament MVP

David Cone, 1998 New York Yankees
2 GP (2 GS); 2-0, 0.64 ERA, 0.86 WHIP, .146/.241/.188; 14 IP, 7 H, 1 ER, 5 BB, 16 K