The playoffs are nearly upon us for baseball. After 162 grueling contests, the best teams finally get to duke it out for the World Series trophy. I say best, but really I should say hottest. Like having an unbeatable goalie in hockey, momentum entering the postseason is one of the most dangerous tools in baseball. No team has more momentum right now than the AL-leading Indians. No team has less than the NL best Dodgers. These two clubs have had streaks in opposite directions over the past month as we head towards the playoffs. The bad may have ended, and the good still lives on, but let’s see how each streak has molded each team in their run to the title.
I was in Cleveland over this past weekend. The atmosphere was raucous and with good reason. Their team rattled off sixteen straight wins and completely battered their opposition in the process. It has been a splendid time to be a member of the Tribe and I myself enjoyed every second of being an honorary member. The streak reached 22 last night, further breaking the AL record set by the 2002 Oakland A’s and passing the 1935 Cubs for best ever in the Modern era. Cleveland shows no signs of letting up.
On the flip side, there was my “actual tribe”, the Los Angeles Dodgers. A month ago the Dodgers basically saw themselves anointed champions by default. They had several impressive streaks of their own en route to being 50 games over .500 by the start of September. But since then it has all fallen apart. LA lost 16 of 17, including 11 in a row, mostly to divisional opponents. The words epic collapse came across my Twitter timeline these past two weeks more than Ted Cruz porn memes in the past twenty-four hours.
But the two streaks have strengthened the clubs in different ways. The Indians’ has vaulted them to the top of their league, bringing the club’s confidence to its absolute apex. The Dodgers’ further galvanized a clubhouse with many new pieces entering a territory where they have been historically expected to fail.
Cleveland hasn’t cherry picked during their 22 game win streak. They’ve beat bad teams. The better ones felt equal brutalization. Late inning heroics, home run derbies, and a couple of pitching duels sprinkled in mark this past twenty games. It was a joy to watch in person (even if I don’t remember the first game of my weekend in the ‘Land) and just as joyful to watch from afar. They possess one of the greatest winning streaks in the history of baseball, poised as the AL’s latest team of destiny for the World Series.
The Dodgers can’t help but find this past stretch beyond humbling. Still, they hold a seemingly insurmountable advantage in the division and just clinched a playoff spot last night. That is a testament to how great their season was going until the doom and gloom set in. The “one of these things is not like the others” tag on this little diddy puts it into a jolly perspective.
Would you be surprised if either team did or didn’t make the World Series though? The 2002 A’s got hot at almost this exact time and still got bounced by the Twins in the ALDS. The 2006 Cardinals had three months under .500 and still won the title. Winning and losing streaks only have relevance if the end game is mismatched. Nobody remembered the 2002 A’s until the Indians went on this run because Moneyball didn’t put silverware on their shelves. I bet you if I try a personal rundown of World Series champions during my lifetime, the 2006 Cardinals are the hardest pull of the bunch.
I would be fascinated to see a Dodgers/Indians World Series just to see these two streaks get a rehashing. Seeing two teams that went off and turned off in a showdown for the crown sounds like good television to me. I know if that happens the only streaks that’ll matter won’t be 22 games or 11 games long.