The State of MLB: Will the Pennant Races Tighten Down the Stretch?

While the National League playoff picture is virtually locked into place, the American League has some gut-wrenching late-season baseball on tap in the final two weeks of the season.

The Philadelphia Phillies will win the NL East, having pulled to eight games in front of the Florida Marlins and on the verge on clinching a title with 14 games remaining.

In the Central, the St. Louis Cardinals fan-base has to be reveling at the laughable situation with rival Chicago Cubs, who now have nothing better to do late in a lost season than worry and debate about Milton Bradley being ridiculous.

The Red Birds sit 10 games in front of the division, and with two aces on their staff and two sluggers in their lineup, they are a tough task for any team to conquer in October.

Out west, the Los Angeles Dodgers did their best to make things interesting entering the final month of the season, but they seem to have righted the ship and found their way.

With two series wins against the San Francisco Giants and a sweep of the Pittsburgh Pirates in the past week, the Boys-in-Blue have rebounded to extend their NL West lead to five games over the Colorado Rockies.

Now, the Dodgers head into a week that pits them against the Pirates again, the Washington Nationals, and finally the powerhouse San Diego Padres.

Basically, L.A. is just counting the days before they pop champagne.

Another result of the Los Angeles beat down of the Giants has been the Rockies.  Despite being unimpressive the past 10 days, they solidified their lead at four-and-a-half games atop the NL Wild Card.

But there are two rays of hope in an otherwise bleak pennant chase.

The AL is seeing a couple of races take interesting plot twists for the final two weeks of the season, and the Central Division certainly seems to be the hot topic at the moment.

The Minnesota Twins made a statement by beating division-leading Detroit Tigers two out of three games this past weekend and pulled to three games back of the Motor-City Nine.

The two teams will meet next Monday for a four-game series in what looks to be the decisive series in the chase for the Central crown.

Additionally, the BoSox have slyly worked back to within five games of the Bronx Bombers at a crucial point in each team’s schedule.

(Just in time for ESPN to salivate at the thought of the Yankees and Red Sox scrapping it out in the final week.)

This could throw a wrinkle into what has seemingly been a playoff picture set in stone for the second half of the season.

The Yankees round up their West Coast swing, which most recently saw them drop two out of three to the Seattle Mariners, with a three-game tilt against the Los Angeles Angels.

This is where the schedule tips: The Sox are in Kansas City for four games with the lowly Royals this week before heading to New Yankee Stadium for a weekend series.

New York gets their chance to beat up on the Kansas City Greinkes next week, but conclude with two games in Tampa Bay.

If the Sox take three of four from the Royals and the Yanks drop two of three against the Angels, this weekend will all of a sudden hold a lot of meaning for each team.

That would position the Red Sox just three-and-a-half back heading into the showdown this weekend. Should they sweep Kansas City in the same scenario, they could be able to pull even with another sweep of the Yankees.

Of course, the Sox (who are on a three-game winning streak) would have to mount a 10-game winning streak when it is all said and done and need the Yankees to continue slumping in the Southland.

Both teams will be heading to the playoffs, no matter what the outcome of the division, as the Texas Rangers ran out of gas when the calendar turned to September, and have fallen to what appears to be an insurmountable eight-game deficit.

The aforementioned Angels have bounced back from tragedy to run away with the AL West, with the Rangers sitting seven-and-a-half games behind the Halos.

Texas will travel to L.A. next week for a four-game series, but it’s highly unlikely that anything will change significantly. The Angels bookend that series with a home-and-away set against last-place Oakland, so it seems all but a formality that Mike Scioscia and the gang are headed to the postseason.

But as far as the Central and East divisions—just ask the Mets about wild endings to the season—anything can happen in the stretch run.

In a year that seemingly has had little drama as far as pennant races go, baseball fans might get their wish if all the cards fall into place these final 13 days of the season.