MLB Playoffs: The current state of the National League Wild Card race
By Paul Ashley
The 2018 National League Wild Card game will take place on October 2nd to open the MLB playoffs at either Wrigley Field, Coors Field, Dodger Stadium, Busch Stadium, or Miller Park.
The Atlanta Braves are the only National League team to have clinched a MLB playoffs spot at this time. Out of the teams currently outside of the playoff picture, the Colorado Rockies are the only team remaining that have not been eliminated from contention. Nonetheless, there are still many possible Wild Card scenarios that have yet to be determined.
The Rockies are currently 1.5 games behind the Los Angeles Dodgers for first place in the NL West. Colorado is also 1.5 games behind the St. Louis Cardinals for the second Wild Card spot and 3.5 games behind the Milwaukee Brewers for the first Wild Card spot. If the Dodgers were in the Wild Card picture, they would be 2.0 games behind the Brewers and tied with the Cardinals.
Bud Black and his Rockies have seven home games remaining in the regular season. Four of the games are against the Philadelphia Phillies and the remaining three are against the Washington Nationals.
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The Dodgers have six road games remaining in the regular season. Three of the games are against the Arizona Diamondbacks and three are against the San Francisco Giants. Dave Roberts and his Dodgers have a good chance to at least earn a Wild Card spot as the contending NL Central teams all have one series remaining against each other.
The Chicago Cubs currently hold a 2.5 game lead over the Brewers and a 4.5 game lead over the Cardinals for first place in the NL Central. Chicago has seven home games remaining with four against the Pittsburgh Pirates and three against the Cardinals.
The Brewers have six games remaining with three on the road against the Cardinals and three at home against the Detroit Tigers. As previously mentioned, the Cardinals will end the season with three home games against the Brewers and three road games against the Cubs.
As there are five teams bunched together heading towards the end of the season, there is a possibility that we could see numerous tiebreaker games take place prior to the one game Wild Card playoff. Tiebreaker games can take place if two or more teams are tied for the division and/or if two or more teams are tied for the second Wild Card spot.
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The last thing teams want at this point of the season is to add to their travel, or burn through their top starters in order to advance through one game MLB playoffs, so the remaining games above should all be very entertaining. Even though many of the opponents listed above are out of contention, they would most likely enjoy to play the spoiler role for another team.