Sep
8
2008
8
2008
Mets Won The Season Series And More From The Phillies
An article by Former Writers
After yesterday’s doubleheader split, the Mets have 19 games remaining to decide who wins the NL East. They are currently in first place and by two games. More importantly, the Mets have the advantage of winning the head to head matchup with the Phillies this year after finishing 11-7 in the season series. This statistic if extremely important given that if the two teams finish the season tied for the lead, the Mets, not the Phillies and their bandbox of a stadium would host a one game playoff for the NL East crown.
With all that being said, the Mets should, and I repeat should, have the favorable remaining schedule playing the Nationals and Atlanta six more times a piece over the next two weeks, then wrap up the season at home with four against the Cubs, which by that time will probably have their own division locked up and will be resting their starters for the postseason, and finally the games versus Florida to end the regular season.
Philadelphia, on the other hand, has six games remaining with Florida and Atlanta, a huge four game series with Milwaukee, and wrap up their season with the Nationals, who just recently took two of three from them last week in DC.
In order for Philly to tie or even worse, over take the Amazins for first, they are going to have to go 12-9 over their last 21 games while New York only needs to go 11-10 to hold a one game lead on them at the end of the season. So now that the gauntlet has been dropped, the Mets know what they need to do. Just take care of business against the lesser teams, and keep the Phils where they belong…. HOME FOR THE PLAYOFFS!!!
About the Author: Former Writers
3 Comments + Add Comment
MMO Featured Video
Recent Comments
- trs86: on A.J. Burnett Close To Being Traded To Pirates: And yet with each post you do...
- Clayton Collier: on Clubhouse Confidential On Bay’s Struggles: I was considering writing a post about...
- Bayonne Mets Fan: on Clubhouse Confidential On Bay’s Struggles: So you need Brian Kenny to tell...
- Kramer67: on A.J. Burnett Close To Being Traded To Pirates: Dude, this how the world works. 1....
- Baseball101: on A.J. Burnett Close To Being Traded To Pirates: Do you have your thumbs in your...
Recommended Links
Advertisement
Write Your Own Mets Post
Advertisement
We Appreciate Your Help
Affordable Graphic Design
Head to head record DOES NOT determine who gets home field in a one game playoff. A coin flip determines the location of a playoff game. The only time head to head record comes into play is if both teams are guaranteed a playoff spot, the team with the better head to head record would then be awarded the division title while the other team is the Wild Card winner, no one game playoff would be necessary. Since the Wild Card is unlikely to come out of the East in the case of a tie the winner of a one game playoff obviously moves on and the loser goes home.
Odds are the Cubs WILL NOT have the division locked up. Currently they have a 4 game lead. If they maintain that 4 game lead coming into the series with the Mets they would be do to clinch around the 3rd or 4th game of that 4 game series. Cubs would have to have a 7 game lead going into that series to have locked up the division. If they enter that series with a 6 1/2 game lead their magic # would be 1 putting them in a position to clinch in that first game.
I assume you wrote this before yesterday’s double header because each team currently has 19 games remaining they had 21 prior to the double header.
I may have misunderstood what your wrote but from what I got out of the last point is that if the Mets go 11-10 and the Phillies go 12-9 the Phillies would then have a 1 game lead. If that was your point then your math is off. In that scenario it would be the Mets with a 1 game lead not the Phillies. In a 2 game deficit a team needs to have a record that is 4 games better then the team they are trying to catch. For example if the Mets go 2 over .500 the rest of the way the Philies have to go 6 over .500. If the Mets go 1 over .500 the Phillies need to 5 games over .500. If the Mets are 1 under .500 Phillies need to go 3 over .500 to tie.
You can check your math by taking your 11-10 and 12-9 example and check that against the Mets current magic #. Mets magic prior to the double header yesterday was 20 (since your example was based on 21 games I will go with that). Now to clinch obviously you need to get the magic number to 0 and any combination of Mets wins or Phillies losses that adds up to 20 will clinch it. Now by taking you record example for the 21 games you have the Mets with 11 wins and the Phillies with 9 losses. 11 and 9 = 20 thus the magic number is reached thus meaning those records would result in the Mets winning by 1 game.
Christian, his last point actually said that the Mets would end up with the 1 game lead. Although his games remaining was wrong, his math was correct. But thanks for clearing up everything else, as I was a little confused about when the head to head record comes into play.
Mike – That’s what I thought he may have meant but the confusing part was this
“In order for Philly to tie or even worse, over take the Amazins for first, they are going to have to go 12-9 over their last 21 games”
By using the words “tie or over take” would indicate that the record he provided afterwords for the Mets would mean that 11-10 would result in the Phillies overtaking the Mets. But as you said that record combination would result in a 1 game lead for the Mets. So its kind of confusing kinda appears like he combined parts of two sentences in one with some bits missing.