Each MLB Contender's Biggest Roadblock to Reaching the 2014 Postseason
There are less than two weeks to go in the 2014 MLB regular season, and while teams have begun to punch their tickets to October, a number of playoff spots are still up for grabs.
The Baltimore Orioles, Los Angeles Angels and Washington Nationals have all secured their spots in the postseason, and the Los Angeles Dodgers are not far behind, as their magic number shrunk to four Wednesday night.
That leaves six spots up for grabs, three in each league, and entering play on Thursday, four teams on each side appear to be battling for them.
There is at least one area that can be pointed to as a clear issue for each of those eight teams. With that in mind, what follows is a look at the biggest roadblock to each MLB contender reaching the 2014 postseason.
Teams That Are Not Concerned with Roadblocks at This Point
1 of 10
National League
- Washington Nationals (clinched NL East)
- Los Angeles Dodgers (postseason magic number: 4)
American League
- Baltimore Orioles (clinched AL East)
- Los Angeles Angels (clinched AL West)
Teams That Have Time as Their Biggest Roadblock
2 of 10
National League
- Atlanta Braves (5.5 games back in NL Wild Card, 10 games to go)
- Miami Marlins (7.0 games back in NL Wild Card, 11 games to go)
- New York Mets (9.0 games back in NL Wild Card, 9 games to go)
- San Diego Padres (10.0 games back in NL Wild Card, 11 games to go)
Eliminated Teams: Arizona Diamondbacks, Chicago Cubs, Cincinnati Reds, Colorado Rockies, Philadelphia Phillies
American League
- Cleveland Indians (5.0 games back in AL Wild Card, 11 games to go)
- Toronto Blue Jays (6.0 games back in AL Wild Card, 11 games to go)
- New York Yankees (6.0 games back in AL Wild Card, 11 games to go)
- Tampa Bay Rays (10.0 games back in AL Wild Card, 9 games to go)
Eliminated Teams: Boston Red Sox, Chicago White Sox, Houston Astros, Minnesota Twins, Texas Rangers
NL Contender: Milwaukee Brewers
3 of 10
Biggest Roadblock: An inconsistent starting rotation of late
Rock-solid starting pitching was a staple of the Milwaukee Brewers' impressive 159-day stint atop the NL Central standings, and it's also been a big reason why they've scuffled of late.
They were fortunate enough to enjoy some terrific health on the mound, prior to Matt Garza missing 24 games in August with an oblique strain.
Even when they were forced to give a struggling Marco Estrada the hook, they struck gold by adding Mike Fiers (8 GS, 6-2, 1.68 ERA) to the mix in his place.
However, the four rotation staples of Yovani Gallardo, Kyle Lohse, Wily Peralta and Garza have all seen their production noticeably dip since the beginning of August, right about the time the wheels started to come off on what was a fantastic season.
| Yovani Gallardo | 22 GS, 6-5, 3.38 ERA, .246 BAA | 8 GS, 2-5, 4.23 ERA, .296 BAA |
| Matt Garza | 22 GS, 7-7, 3.74 ERA, .232 BAA | 4 GS, 1-1, 3.79 ERA, .257 BAA |
| Kyle Lohse | 22 GS, 11-5, 3.07 ERA, .240 BAA | 7 GS, 1-4, 6.88 ERA, .317 BAA |
| Wily Peralta | 21 GS, 12-6, 3.56 ERA, .259 BAA | 9 GS, 4-4, 4.05 ERA, .277 BAA |
If this club is going to right the ship and salvage the season, it's going to have to start with improved consistency from the above foursome.
.png?w=256)
NL Contender: Pittsburgh Pirates
4 of 10
Biggest Roadblock: Struggles on the road this season
The Pittsburgh Pirates have held one of the bigger home-field advantages in baseball this season, as they've gone 48-29 on the year while playing in the picturesque PNC Park.
While it's nice to hold a significant advantage at home, the team has gone just 33-41 on the road, and doesn't it figure that its last seven games are all away from Pittsburgh.
After the Pirates finish out their current series with the Boston Red Sox, they welcome the Milwaukee Brewers to town, with their home finale on Sunday. From there, they head to Atlanta for four games and Cincinnati for three to close out their regular-season slate.
According to ESPN Park Factors, PNC Park has played with a slight advantage to pitchers this season, coming in at 0.995 runs and 0.718 home runs based on a league average of 1.000.
The most drastic home/road splits belong to pitchers Charlie Morton (2.41 ERA/4.90 ERA) and Gerrit Cole (3.48 ERA/4.42 ERA), while at the same time ace Francisco Liriano has actually been far better on the road for whatever reason (4.35 ERA/2.36 ERA).
Offensively, the Big Three of Andrew McCutchen, Josh Harrison and Neil Walker have hit regardless of where the games have been played. The most notable split there belongs to Russell Martin (.345 BA, .932 OPS/.254 BA, .766 OPS), who has significantly better numbers at home.
So what does all of this mean?
With the way the Pirates have been rolling of late, it may not mean much, but it's something worth keeping in mind before overlooking that final week's slate of games against a pair of teams out of the race.
NL Contender: San Francisco Giants
5 of 10
Biggest Roadblock: The San Diego Padres plus pitching staff
In an interesting bit of scheduling, the San Francisco Giants will play the San Diego Padres seven times over their final 10 games. The two teams have split the season series 6-6 at this point.
The Padres have been stymied by the worst offense in baseball all season, but their pitching staff has been one of the best, currently ranking fourth with a 3.28 team ERA.
Granted, they have fallen off a bit this month, as that number sits at 4.17 in September, but nevertheless, this is not a pitching staff to be taken lightly with a postseason berth hanging in the balance.
In Wednesday's article, we broke down the potential pitching matchups the rest of the way for each contender. The Giants will square off against veteran Ian Kennedy and Andrew Cashner twice each, as well as closing out the season against All-Star Tyson Ross, who is expected to return to the rotation after having his last start pushed back.
The San Francisco offense has been clicking of late behind a red-hot Buster Posey, and the Giants will need to keep swinging the sticks against an underrated Padres pitching staff if they hope to make a run at the NL West title or at the very least secure the No. 1 wild-card position.
NL Contender: St. Louis Cardinals
6 of 10
Biggest Roadblock: A cloudy starting rotation situation
Entering the season, the St. Louis Cardinals almost looked to have too much pitching.
Adam Wainwright, Michael Wacha, Shelby Miller, Lance Lynn, Jaime Garcia, Carlos Martinez and Tyler Lyons were fighting for five rotation spots, and depth was once again an area of strength.
Fast-forward to the trade deadline, and the team was pulling the trigger on a pair of deals to acquire John Lackey and Justin Masterson in an effort to bolster the staff.
That happened after Garcia was lost for the season, Wacha was shelved with a shoulder injury, Miller struggled to consistently pitch deep into games and Martinez just plain struggled in moving from the bullpen to the rotation.
The Cardinals have seemingly hit their stride as a team in the past month or so, overtaking the Milwaukee Brewers in the NL Central and building a nice 2.5-game lead to boot.
Wainwright is over the dead arm he was dealing with last month, and Lynn and Miller have both been throwing the ball well in the second half.
However, Lackey is now dealing with dead arm, and Wacha is still trying to shake off the rust of missing 68 games. That has left Marco Gonzales pitching some big games down the stretch, and while he's thrown the ball well, relying on him to keep doing so is a risky proposition.
This team may be able to squeeze out a division title despite the aforementioned issues, but if the Cardinals are going to be a serious contender come October, they need Lackey and/or Wacha firing on all cylinders.
AL Contender: Detroit Tigers
7 of 10
Biggest Roadblock: The bullpen
This is the same tune we've been singing about the Detroit Tigers all season, but it's still a serious concern here in the middle of September after closer Joe Nathan blew his seventh save of the season Tuesday night.
For the year, the Tigers bullpen ranks 27th in all of baseball with a 4.28 ERA. The team has converted just 38 of 54 save chances in 2014.
The team paid a hefty price to acquire Joakim Soria at the trade deadline, but he ended up missing 31 games with an oblique strain, and he's now trying to shake off some rust in the middle of a pennant race.
Jayson Stark of ESPN shared his thoughts on the Tigers' closer situation on Buster Olney's podcast earlier this week (h/t Detroit Free Press):
"I know they want (Nathan) to do this job. Everything sets up better if he does this job. He has pitched a little better in the second half, but you take a step back. Seven blown saves and a 5 ERA. And you think about the games that team played last October, and the October before that, and how often those games end up in the hands of the bullpen. They've got to find a way to finish games. Whether it's (Nathan), whether it's Soria. ... They've got to figure this out. Between now and the first time they got a 1-run lead in the 8th or 9th in October, they've got to have somebody in place who can close those games out.
"
Making matters even worse, setup men Joba Chamberlain (11 G, 5.91 ERA) and Jim Johnson (12 G, 6.17 ERA) have also been hit hard over the past month.
Outside of veterans Phil Coke and Al Alburquerque, there aren't many arms that manager Brad Ausmus can hand the ball to in that bullpen and feel comfortable in a close game.
AL Contender: Kansas City Royals
8 of 10
Biggest Roadblock: The AL Central aces
The health of Danny Duffy could easily be pointed to as the biggest roadblock for the Kansas City Royals right now, as Liam Hendriks (2 GS, 5.1 IP, 10.13 ERA) has been shelled attempting to bridge the gap to his return to the rotation.
Duffy, who is 7-10 with a 2.44 ERA in 23 starts this season, is scheduled to return to the rotation for the team's series opener with the Cleveland Indians on Sept. 22, according to Blair Kerkhoff of The Kansas City Star.
However, it would appear that a bigger issue for the Royals is not their own pitching staff, but the pitchers that they are slated to face over the final week-and-a-half of the season.
Wednesday's article laid out the probable pitching matchups the rest of the way, showing the team matched up against Max Scherzer in the Tigers series, Corey Kluber in the Indians series and Chris Sale on the final day of the regular season.
Those are three of the best pitchers in the game; they could affect things beyond their own starts if they pitch deep into games and give the bullpen a day off in the process.
Granted, that's just three games, but with only 10 left on the schedule (plus one suspended game to finish), the Tigers a half-game ahead in the division and the Seattle Mariners just two games back in the wild-card standings, three games are not insignificant.
As things line up now, Duffy will be facing off against Kluber in his return, so he may yet be the key to this final stretch of games.
AL Contender: Oakland Athletics
9 of 10
Biggest Roadblock: Continued below-average offensive production
We're going to say a lack of consistent offensive production, but perhaps momentum is the biggest roadblock for the Oakland Athletics at this point.
Wednesday night may have been rock bottom for Oakland in its second-half slide. The A's took a 1-0 lead into the ninth inning, only to allow six runs to the MLB-worst Texas Rangers and walk away with a loss, leaving them tied atop the wild-card standings.
"It's going to be a turning point one way or another," closer Sean Doolittle, who blew the save, told reporters. "After the season is over, are we going to look back and point to tonight and be like, 'This is the game where finally the wheels came off for good,' or are we going to pick ourselves up, dust ourselves off and talk about how resilient we are as a team and how we were able to overcome a game like this and still get it done?"
Obviously, the bullpen needs to lock down these close games, but getting back to the main point about offensive struggles, the team should probably be good for more than one run against a Rangers team that ranks last in the AL with a 4.63 team ERA.
Over the first four months of the season, the A's averaged an impressive 5.05 runs per game and posted a 66-41 record as a result.
However, since the beginning of August, that number has plummeted to 3.50, and they have struggled to a 17-27 record in the process. That has obviously put a lot of pressure on the pitching staff, and it too has struggled.
Pointing to the Yoenis Cespedes trade is an easy excuse, but it doesn't help any that Brandon Moss and Coco Crisp have completely stopped hitting and Stephen Vogt has missed significant time with an ankle injury.
There's no easy answer for this team right now, but it's time to dig deep and rally from a tough loss on Wednesday, or Oakland is in serious danger of authoring perhaps the worst collapse in baseball history.
AL Contender: Seattle Mariners
10 of 10
Biggest Roadblock: The recent struggles of Hisashi Iwakuma/Chris Young
Even with the addition of Robinson Cano and a breakout season from Kyle Seager, the Seattle Mariners still rank just 10th in the American League at 3.93 runs per game.
No, it's pitching that has been the key to their impressive turnaround this season, and pitching will be the key for them down the stretch.
They currently lead all of baseball with a 3.04 team ERA, and that includes a 2.40 mark from a bullpen that has been the best in baseball this season top to bottom.
However, there are some legitimate concerns about the starting rotation, in particular the recent performance of veterans Hisashi Iwakuma and Chris Young.
Young has been a nice story this season, going 12-8 with a 3.33 ERA after not pitching in the majors in 2013 and entering camp as a non-roster invitee.
However, his 4.74 FIP is evidence that he's been pitching over his head all season, and it would appear that is finally starting to catch up with him when it matters most.
The big right-hander is 0-2 with a 5.87 ERA, 2.02 WHIP and .317 opponent batting average in his last four starts, and he is currently slated to take the ball for at least two more starts this year.
Meanwhile, Iwakuma again looked like a second ace for much of the season, going 13-8 with a 2.57 ERA in his first 21 starts and ranking among the league leaders with a 0.95 WHIP.
Things have gone south of late, though, as he has a 9.28 ERA and just one quality start in his last five outings. His WHIP is at 1.69 over that span, as opponents are hitting .323 against him.
Rookie James Paxton has stepped his game up in the second half, emerging as the second ace Iwakuma was supposed to be, but the team still needs the veteran right-hander on top of his game if it hopes to reach the playoffs for the first time since 2001.
All stats courtesy of Baseball-Reference unless otherwise noted and reflect games through Wednesday, Sept. 17.
.png?w=480)
.jpg?w=600 "Colts Release Kenny Moore")
