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1 Bold Prediction for Every MLB Division the Rest of the Way
Major League Baseball's 2025 regular season will be over in a month, and all eyes will be upon what could be a roller coaster of a wide-open October of postseason play.
An awful lot can happen in a month, though, and we're offering up one bold prediction for each of the six divisions on things that could unfold over the course of these final few weeks.
We'll leave the forecasting of who lasts how long in the playoffs for another day, but a surprise team making the playoffs and some perhaps unexpected roles for pitchers in the postseason were certainly on the table as topics here.
Unless otherwise noted, statistics and records are current through the start of play on Thursday, August 28.
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AL East: Roman Anthony Wins AL Rookie of the Year
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Six months ago, this would not have been a bold prediction in the slightest. Heading into spring training, it was pretty much a toss-up between New York's Jasson Domínguez and Boston's Roman Anthony for best odds of winning 2025 AL Rookie of the Year.
While the Red Sox let Anthony marinate in Triple-A for a few months, though, the race for AL ROY turned into a two-man battle in West Sacramento between Jacob Wilson and Nick Kurtz.
By the time Anthony made his MLB debut on June 9, Wilson was batting .372 and on his way to the All-Star Game, while Kurtz had homered five times in his previous 12 games, gearing up to take MLB by storm over the next couple of months.
And at this point, Kurtz is a near-foregone conclusion to win it. When Yordan Alvarez won unanimously in 2019, he triple-slashed .313/.412/.655 with 27 home runs in 87 games played. Well, in Kurtz's first 87 games in the majors, he triple-slashed .315/.404/.650 with 26 home runs—and should end up playing around 120 games by season's end. He is listed at -10000, per Vegas Insider, with Anthony at +1800 as the only player left with a remotely realistic shot at catching him.
Dating back to July 4, though, Anthony has not-so-quietly triple-slashed .323/.431/.518, becoming the brightest star of a team that actually matters in the playoff chase.
That latter part could be what keeps this interesting. Goodness knows the 23 percent of voters who gave Jackson Merrill a first-place vote over Paul Skenes for NL ROY last season did so in part because Merrill anchored a 93-win playoff team while Skenes dominated for a last-place club.
And while Merrill was great from Day One in San Diego, calling up Anthony is what turned Boston's season around. The Red Sox were three games below .500 when he made his debut, but they've gone 42-25 since then, good for the best winning percentage among teams not named the Milwaukee Brewers.
If Anthony continues to thrive and they manage to overtake Toronto to win the AL East, got to like his chances for ROY.
AL Central: Kansas City Sneaks into Playoffs for Second Straight Year
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Notably, we will not be including in this bold prediction an official guess at which team currently ahead of Kansas City is the one that stubs its toe down the stretch to leave this door ajar.
Seattle, currently holding the AL's No. 6 seed, is three games ahead of the Royals. The Yankees and Astros are each 4.5 games ahead, and the Red Sox are five ahead. Historically, at least one of these leading teams often collapses in September.
Last year, it was Minnesota going 9-18 down the stretch, paving the way for Detroit to make the playoffs. In 2023, both the Mariners and Cubs went 12-17 while the Giants went 9-19, all three missing the playoffs. And who can forget the 2021 Padres, going 4-18 in their last 22 games, turning what was a four-game lead over St. Louis into a "missed the playoffs by 11 games" disaster.
So, if the Royals take care of their own business, there's a good chance one of those four teams will help them out.
To that end:
- Michael Massey just returned from 10 weeks on the IL and delivered a massive game-tying, ninth-inning hit in Tuesday's come-from-behind victory over the White Sox
- Jac Caglianone has posted a 1.162 OPS on his current rehab assignment and might be ready to actually produce in the majors in September
- Cole Ragans is working his way back to the mound and just might be a major contributor in the final weeks of their playoff push, and
- The Royals have already gone 30-19 since the beginning of July, good for the fourth-best record in the majors.
What had been the lowest-scoring offense at the end of June (3.28 runs per game) has been a completely different animal since (4.98 runs per game)—and that could get even better if wunderkind Caglianone starts living up to the hype.
What the Royals really need, though, is for Seth Lugo to lock back in.
He had a 2.67 ERA at the All-Star break, becoming one of the trendiest names on the trade block. He has been a mess in the second half, though, with a 7.24 ERA in his last eight starts.
If Lugo rallies and Ragans returns for a couple of starts at anything close to his former level of excellence, game on.
AL West: Cal Raleigh Gets to 63 HR, Wins AL MVP
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The MVP portion of this one isn't bold in the slightest, as the betting markets view it as a dead heat between Cal Raleigh and Aaron Judge at this point.
Breaking Judge's AL record for home runs in a single season, though, sure would figure to make the Big Dumper the clear choice.
With 50 home runs through 134 team games, Raleigh is on pace for 60.4.
However, he definitely hasn't been the same as of late.
What was a 1.022 OPS through July 11 has turned into a .748 OPS over his last 39 games played. He does still have a dozen home runs during that time, good for a 162-game pace of 50. If he keeps that up for another month, he would get to 58 or 59.
But we're betting he has one more September flourish in him.
Last year, Raleigh entered Labor Day with a .712 OPS, before becoming a big part of Seattle's late-season offensive explosion with a .917 OPS the rest of the way.
In 2022, his OPS jumped from .729 at the end of August to .959 in his final 80 plate appearances, along with eight home runs.
And, well, for Raleigh to have another more-than-200-points surge in OPS this September, surely quite a few four-baggers will be part of the equation.
The good news for his historic quest is that intentional walks simply have not been a problem. Raleigh did receive seven free passes in June, but he has zero thus far in the second half, and it's hard to imagine that changes with all of Julio Rodríguez, Josh Naylor and Eugenio Suárez directly behind him.
Judge was intentionally walked 13 times after the All-Star Break when he got to 62 three years ago. Getting to avoid that treatment just might be enough to get Raleigh across the finish line.
NL East: Nolan McLean Starts New York's First Game of Postseason
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It wasn't even 100 hours ago that I had the Mets missing the postseason altogether. But after they swept the Phillies while the Reds were getting swept by the Dodgers, that ship appears to have sailed.
Per DraftKings, New York entered Thursday at -1100 to make the playoffs. The implied odds there are 91.67 percent, while both FanGraphs and PECOTA were in the 97 percent range.
Mets fans know as well as anyone to never count those chickens until they hatch, but making the postseason is looking to be a safe assumption right about now.
What their postseason rotation will look like, though, is a drastically different story.
Kodai Senga started strong as the Mets' ace with a 1.47 ERA during their 45-24 start. However, after missing a month with a hamstring injury, he hasn't recorded a win or a quality start since early June.
Sean Manaea was supposed to be the ace here on his three-year, $75 million deal, but he missed New York's first 96 games and has a 5.01 ERA since his return. Frankie Montas (two years, $34 million) was Plan B in the ace equation, but he also missed the first few months, struggled his way to a demotion to the bullpen and is done for the year with a UCL injury.
The likeliest choice to start Game 1 of the postseason has become David Peterson, responsible for eight of this team's MLB-worst 11 quality starts dating back to June 11. Despite getting roughed up for six earned runs against Atlanta earlier this month, he has a 2.96 ERA since the beginning of July.
But could they instead dare roll with their scorching-hot rookie as a Game 1 starter, on what would be the 45-day "anniversary" of his MLB debut?
Much like Jacob Misiorowski's triumphant arrival in June, New York's Nolan McLean has been an instant sensation just three starts into his career, punctuated by an eight-inning gem against the Phillies on Wednesday.
Save for Ronald Acuña Jr. tattooing one to dead center off him, McLean has been almost flawless, with a cumulative pitching line of 20.1 IP, 10 H, 2 ER, 4 BB, 21 K. He completely shut down both the Mariners and the Phillies, both of which could be previews of what's to come in October.
It's likely that the 24-year-old's next two starts will come on the road against Detroit and Philadelphia. And if McLean continues to shove against those teams, don't you just about have to put him out there in the first game of the postseason?
NL Central: Jacob Misiorowski Closes for Milwaukee in the Postseason
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Jacob Misiorowski serving in a relief role in the postseason always has been a strong possibility for Milwaukee.
He threw 71.1 innings in the minors in 2023, 97.1 last season, and he is already at 107 innings this year with a month left. At five innings per start, he's on pace for about 130 innings in 2025.
We can save the "They don't make 'em like they used to" conversations for another day, but surely there is a reluctance in Milwaukee to overwork its flame-throwing 23-year-old.
The Brewers have already been rolling with a six-man rotation, and with Freddy Peralta, Jose Quintana and Brandon Woodruff all boasting a sub-3.40 ERA for the year, it's not like they need The Miz in the rotation to have a real chance of winning it all.
And with closer Trevor Megill landing on the IL with a flexor strain, the door is open for Misiorowski to serve in more than just "a relief role" in the postseason.
The hope is Megill will be back by mid-September and good to go for October, and that some combination of Abner Uribe and Shelby Miller will have no problem holding down the fort in the meantime.
What if it doesn't work out that way?
CBS Sports' RJ Anderson pointed out on Wednesday that the median timetable for returning from a flexor strain is 49 days. Well, Game 1 of the NLDS comes 38 days after Megill was placed on the IL. And though Miller did tally 10 saves this season with the Diamondbacks, he and Uribe have combined for 20 saves in their careers and might struggle to lock things down in the ninth inning.
Could they unleash Misiorowski in a high-leverage role in October, leaning into the fact that he has a line of 10.0 IP, 8 H, 4 ER, 4 BB, 19 K with a .590 OPS against in the first inning of his 10 MLB appearances? (Tack on an additional scoreless inning if you want to count what he did in the All-Star Game.)
Also, remember Robert Gasser?
The southpaw made quite the first impression in the majors last season with a 2.57 ERA in five starts before undergoing Tommy John surgery, and he has a 2.29 ERA in 19.2 innings pitched during a rehab assignment that began a little over a month ago.
Could he, too, be in the mix for a critical, late-innings role in the postseason?
Milwaukee's future 1-2 punch in the rotation saving games that Devin Williams could not in recent Octobers?
NL West: Rockies Break Modern Record for Worst Run Differential...by Triple Digits
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We never said these would all be glass-half-full bold predictions.
The good news for Rockies fans is that it's looking like they're going to be able to avoid the really dubious history. It was more than a little dicey for quite a while, entering the All-Star break on pace for a 37-125 record. But after a 15-16 "surge" to open the second half, they merely need to win four of their final 28 games to avoid matching (or exceeding) the White Sox's loss total from last season.
Granted, this is a team that went 6-41 over nearly two months earlier this season. Against teams with a winning percentage above .485, the Rockies are 12-65—a worrying trend, especially since 22 of their last 28 games are against such opponents. We'll assume they've avoided 122 losses when it actually becomes mathematically impossible to get there.
The history they're almost certainly not going to be able to avoid, though, is the worst run differential in a season since before 1900.
Presently, that record belongs to the 1932 Boston Red Sox, who went 43-111 with a run differential of minus-349.
Even last year's ChiSox weren't all that close to that record, ending up a minus-306.
But the Rockies are, depressingly, already there. They finished Thursday's series finale against Houston at a minus-349.
At this point, it's really just a question of how emphatically they are going to smash Boston's record in futility, and whether they'll also set a franchise record for runs allowed in a single season.
If current full-season paces hold, they would end up with a run differential of minus-424, allowing 1,029 total runs. At 1,028 runs allowed in 1999, the Rockies were the most recent team to allow at least 1,000 runs in a single season. The only other case dating back to 1940 was the 1996 Detroit Tigers allowing 1,103 runs—which, with any luck, the Rockies will be able to avoid matching.
From July 26 through August 22, though, they allowed 8.1 runs with a differential of minus-3.65 runs per game. A repeat of that against a formidable remaining schedule would bring them to about 1,080 runs allowed and a differential of minus-454.
At least the beers are fresh and reasonably priced.
