Playoff fever hits the United States numerous times throughout the year, meaning fans who follow all the major sports never have long to wait before it’s crunch time yet again. We start the year with the NFL, whose postseason begins in January and ends six weeks later. Over in Basketball, the playoffs kick off in April and run until mid-June. For the NHL, it is early May when the fun begins, with the Stanley Cup being decided by the end of June. Then the calendar year is completed by the MLS, where the postseason is held between mid-November and mid-December.
Of course, amongst all that fun are the MLB playoffs, which are about to get underway. Given that the season began all the way back on the 1st of April, and that each team will have played 162 separate games in the regular season, you could be fooled into thinking that by the time the playoffs started, both the fans and the players would be absolutely exhausted, and if anything they’d rather not make it to the post-season so they could have a bit of a breather.
That couldn’t be further from the truth, as of course the teams and supporters are absolutely pumped for the start of the playoffs. The fans will hopefully have secured tickets for the games, but if not will be watching on at home, constantly checking their baseball betting app to find the latest odds on all the games. Let’s have a look at the sides who have made it to the playoffs, and rate their chances of going all the way to claim the World Series at the end of October/beginning of November.
Big names who have missed out
Before we cover the eight teams who successfully navigated their way through to the postseason, it is important to take note of some of the big sides who haven’t made it. The most obvious omission to the list is the New York Yankees. Given they are by far and away the most successful side in MLB history, with 40 World Series appearances and 27 wins, you always expect to see them still playing come October. However, this season they only made it as far as the American League Wild Card game, where they were easily beaten 6-2 by their old rivals the Boston Red Sox. Yankees fans will be hoping that they can turn this around next season.
Another big side who aren’t there is the Washington Nationals. They were the World Series winners as recently as 2019, but had a terrible time this year, finishing dead last in the NL East conference, with a sorry last ten game record of 2-8. Was 2019, their only World Series title, just a blip? Possibly, we will find out more when the 2022 season kicks off next April.
Can the Dodgers make it two in two?
The current World Series champions are the Los Angeles Dodgers, who picked up their 7th title in a closely contested six-game series against the Tampa Bay Rays. Given that the Dodgers also made it to the World Series finals in 2017 and 2018, they clearly have been one of the dominant sides in Major League Baseball over the past five years.
Despite this, they haven’t been an all-conquering side this year, only making it into the National League Division Series games at the last minute, beating the St. Louis Cardinals in the Wild Card game 3-1 at the Dodger Stadium. They face the San Francisco Giants in the next round of fixtures, which certainly won’t be a simple task. However, the Dodgers have been known to find form at the tail end of the campaign, so we still expect them to make it past the Giants in these next few games.
Who else is a serious contender?
Most of the bookmakers have the Dodgers as favourites, and not far behind them are the Houston Astros and the Tampa Bay Rays. The Astros were the 2017 World Series champions and also made it to the 2019 finals. They have been in great form this season, winning 95 of their 162 games. Their form tailed off ever so slightly at the end of the season, winning just four of their last ten games. Despite this, we still expect them to make it past the Chicago White Sox, and into the American League Championship Series.
We expect their opponents in this game to be the Rays, who should make it past the Boston Red Sox. The Rays will be wanting to make up for not winning the World Series last year, and clearly haven’t dwelt on this disappointment given their regular-season form.
Who out of the Milwaukee Brewers and the Atlanta Braves will make it to the National League Championship Series? It is a close one to call, but we expect it will be the Brewers, who have a strong chance of finding a way past the Braves in the Division Series.
