Angels Take Red Sox For 5-Game Ride In Divisional Series; Fall Short

Major League Baseball Playoff Prediction

The Angels finally make it into the Divisional Series, beating out Oakland by a game for the West title. Yes, we know that Los Angeles's record has shown their strength for quite a while now, but the Athletics only this past weekend fell below the level of the Angels. Even though the A's series win against Florida was impressive, the Angels were even more so as they swept Philly in Pennsylvania.

By pure run differential, Oakland is by far superior at 1.226 runs scored per 1 run allowed to Los Angeles at 1.043 runs scored. The basic Pythagorean final record prediction places the A's at 93 wins (current record of .547 plus .592 over the remaining games) and the Angels at 91 wins (.605 now plus .519 the rest of the way), giving Oakland the AL West championship. However - and this is a big however - Oakland's play against strength of schedule and just plain win-loss record does not bear out the prediction that they can win 93 games in 2008. Baseball Playoffs Now employs a "gravitate towards the mean" filter to punish teams who have excellent run differentials but mediocre win-loss records, and to reward teams who have poor differentials but mediocre records.

Adding each team's propensity to actually win games - and not just score runs - Oakland loses 4 wins and Los Angeles loses 1 win, placing the A's at 89 wins and the Angels at 90. Hence, Los Angeles wins the division and the right to lose to Boston in the first round of the playoffs.

American League Divisional Series
No. 1 seed BOS over no. 3 seed LAA in 5 games.
No. 2 seed CHW over no. 4 seed TAM in 5 games.

National League Divisional Series
No. 1 seed CHC over no. 3 seed ARI in 3 games.
No. 2 seed PHI over no. 4 seed STL in 5 games.

American League Championship Series
No. 1 seed BOS over no. 2 seed CHW in 6 games.

National League Championship Series
No. 1 seed CHC over no. 2 seed PHI in 5 games.

*** World Series Projection***
*** No. 1 seed BOS over no. 1 seed CHC in 7 games. ***