NL Run Differential Fun

We all know that MLB will use an exciting playoff system to decide what happens if there is a tie in the NL wild card or division races, but would that really decide who the best team is? Does the regular season really tell who the best teams are? Will the NL's best team make the playoffs? Right now they're a game out of the wild card.

In order to determine true baseball superiority, I've calculated the run differential of all 6 NL playoff contenders PLUS Atlanta (you'll see why). This is because good teams win games by large margins (a display of skill) and lose some close games (which sometimes come down to luck). Meanwhile bad teams win close games and lose blow outs. In other words, run differential is a good way to measure teams with less luck involved. For more info, read The Baseball Economist, by J.C. Bradbury.

Anyway, here are the numbers:

Philly: 878 - 816 = 62
Mets: 786 - 735 = 51
Atlanta: 801 - 725 = 76

Cubs: 738 - 682 = 56
Brew Crew: 783 - 761 = 22

Snakes: 704 - 715 = -11!
Padres: 718 - 639 = 79
Rockies = 834 - 732 = 92

This confirms what we've been thinking all season long: There really is no reason the Diamondbacks should be winning so many games! They've won a lot of close games, and they certainly deserve to make the playoffs, but if we played 162 more games, they would probably find themselves behind the Padres in the standings. I'm not taking anything away from Arizona here. They've done a great job winning games with less talent than a lot of other teams.

The other two surprises are the third place teams that have better differentials than the teams leading their respective divisions. I always thought Colorado was better than their record (mostly because of how badly they pounded the Mets when they played earlier in the year), but their league-high differential is really surprising for me. The Braves' case is a lot less of a shock. Many people suspected that they had the best team in the division when they added Teixeira in late July. It looks as though they have underachieved quite a bit this year. Look out for them in 2008.

I know some people are going to say that this is a silly way of measuring teams, and if you are one of the doubters, I invite you to look at this conversation that I had on the IGN boards back in mid-August (look for "garomaster86" and the PSU logo: that's me).

Besides all the exciting National League action going down tonight, there's also a Big East battle on ESPN2. West Virginia is visiting surprisingly undefeated USF. Should be a good game. I love USF as a home underdog here. Have a good weekend, everybody.