MLB Playoffs Showdown: The Four Surprising Factors That Could Flip the League Championship Series Upside Down
The quick definition: Our projection model calculates the win probabilities based primarily off the TRACR, which uses advanced metrics and other factors on offense and in run prevention (pitching and defense) to calculate how many runs per nine innings better or worse teams are compared to the league-average club during the season.
Let’s jump in, but please note that the following metrics include the postseason (entering play on Monday).
Aaron Judge’s BIP+ number was just ridiculous in 2024, a typo-looking 301.7. For context, Shohei Ohtani – who had 54 homers and 411 total bases in the regular season – was at 247.8 and only two other players (Marcell Ozuna and Juan Soto) even bested the 200 mark.
We’ve finally arrived at the seven-game series, where it’s harder to hide weaknesses over a longer grind. The Mets are on the low end of the scale after losing Game 1 to the Dodgers, but admittedly advanced analytics have yet to figure out how to quantify the Grimace factor, so don’t count them out yet, either.
Remember that high OPS for the Mets? They had 12 extra-base hits in their four games against the Philadelphia Phillies – five doubles and seven home runs.
Hitters’ best and worst tendencies tend to be on display in October – the extremes play in the postseason – and with the best pitchers working the edges of the zone in the biggest moments, knowing the strike zone is key.
Effective balls in play, those were. That’s a helpful October habit the Mets have picked up.
Starters Command+
- 101.5 – New York Yankees
- 101.3 – Los Angeles Dodgers
- 100.5 – Cleveland Guardians
- 99.1 – New York Mets
The better command+ your starter has, the deeper he can work into the game. We won’t pretend that baseball today is the same as it was a few decades ago, when you could not win in the postseason without at least three or four strong starting pitchers. But, y’know, it sure helps to have at least two or three, especially as we progress into October and move from a best-of-three series to a best-of-five series to the grueling best-of-seven formats in the LCS and World Series.
We have seen some brilliant bullpen work lately, haven’t we? The Yankees’ relief crew didn’t allow a single earned run in the division series against Kansas City, giving up just eight hits and four walks, with 15 strikeouts in 15.2 innings.
Oh, and it does not take contact into consideration – this stat does not reward hitters for slapping a pitch a foot outside the strike zone the opposite way for a double down the line.
The quick definition: Discipline+ measures a hitter’s ability to lay off pitches outside of the zone and swing at pitches in the zone (league average being 100). Basically, how well does this team know what is and is not a strike?
But we’re not satisfied with traditional statistics, of course. We’ve chosen four metrics that go beyond traditional stats, and take advanced data to the next level, too.
Probability of Winning the World Series
- 33.6% – Los Angeles Dodgers
- 30.2% – New York Yankees
- 23.2% – Cleveland Guardians
- 13.0% – New York Mets
In contrast to the other data we’ve used, there just isn’t much of a gap between the team at No. 1 and the team at No. 4, and that’s pretty fascinating, too. The Mets check in last here, but the beauty of October is that, despite most of what we’re talking about today, past performance is not a predictor of the future.
We’ll finish with a fun stat: The Mets struck out more than any other team in the division series round – 44 times in four games – but they also had the highest OPS (by far) of any team in that round, a robust .822.
The quick definition: Command+ rates the ability of the pitcher to throw the pitch in his intended area, adjusted by pitch type. Have a plan and execute that plan. Again, with the league average being 100.
The Mets sit atop this metric as a team, largely because Edwin Diaz’s whiff+ is elite, checking in at 153, and Reed Garrett is outstanding, too, at 134. In the regular season, those two right-handers combined to strike out 167 opposing hitters in 111 innings. Diaz has been alternatively great and mistake-prone in playoff pressure, but he’s the guy the Mets are going to turn to when the game’s on the line, as early as the seventh inning.
And Cleveland’s bullpen? That’s just an elite group of relievers. Sure, Emmanuel Clase gave up that rather shocking home run to Kerry Carpenter, but there hasn’t been a more dominating closer in baseball the past few years.
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