Wild Wrinkles Keep Opening the Door Wider for Twins to Reach Postseason

We all know the situation is dire. The Twins’ chances to make the playoffs are down to a sliver. They started today at 22.9%, and that's already come down substantially. Yet, despite the Tigers and Royals finishing off sweeps of the Rays and Nationals, respectively, things are not over yet. A lot must go right for the Twins, though as colleague Matthew Taylor wrote this week, a Baltimore team with nothing to play for will provide a nice little boost. But the Twins need to take a mile when given an inch, and two more little advantages might swing it all in their favor.

Here’s the Story of a Hurricane
While three AL Central teams battle out for Wild Card spots, the NL Wild Card race has remained extremely tight as well, between the Diamondbacks, Mets, and Braves. The big showcase series of the week was a showdown between the two NL East powerhouses. But after Atlanta took the first game, the impending floods of Hurricane Helene shut down yesterday’s and today’s matchups. Despite desires by MLB to simply move the games to a neutral site, the vanity of owners—who of course moved their stadium outside of the downtown area and made it entirely inaccessible by public transportation for “reasons”—could not imagine lost ticket sales for a pair of games. (Tuesday’s matchup drew over 40,000 people.)

To make it up, MLB has created what can only be called a makeshift “Game 163” day, with the Mets and Braves playing a doubleheader on Monday to decide a trip to the postseason. And if the rains persist on Friday, the Braves might have to do a doubleheader with the Royals on Saturday, as well.

That means the Braves now begin their series with Kansas City Friday, seeing a chance to play first against a weaker team that has looked shaky in recent weeks, rather than a team whose vibes are the stuff memes are made of. The Diamondbacks and Mets will spend their weekend against two tough opponents, in the Padres and Brewers, respectively. Both those teams clinched their seeding earlier this week, but are still unlikely to show much mercy. That gives a Braves team that looks quite different from the powerhouse that began the season a chance to prove their worth.

It also means that the two starters lined up for the Mets series, Cy Young leader Chris Sale and the very good Max Fried, are in play for this weekend, rather than some of Atlanta’s younger and more inexperienced arms. Braves manager Brian Snitker has said his plan is to watch the status of the other games games and make decisions as needed, with Fried getting the start Friday and waiting on what to do with Sale. But being able to toss them against the Royals (not to mention potentially using reliever-turned-starter Reynaldo López as he returns from a brief IL stint) might give the Royals more trouble than they want.

“I'm not dead!...I’m actually getting better!”
The Chicago White Sox have been one of the funniest, saddest and most revealing franchises of modern baseball (you likely only need one guess who is responsible for this one), now tied for the record with the 1962 Mets for the most games lost. And yet, the team is slightly surging in this most dire hour. Chicago’s South Side experiment in lousiness has perhaps decided to show a little life, going 5-5 in their last 10, including their first ever come-from-behind win against the Angels and an extra-innings bloop from Andrew Benintendi to win last night’s affair. Then they jumped out to a 7-0 lead on Anaheim again Thursday. 

Now the White Sox line up against Detroit with their best starter, in Garrett Crochet, as well as rookie Sean Burke. Burke will be making his fourth start, and over three previous ones (against Cleveland, Oakland, and San Diego, all of which have some impressive offensive power) has only allowed 3 runs over 14 innings.

As others have noted, the White Sox can avoid not just the mantle of most losses, but just one win will give them the chance to avoid the worst winning percentage of all time (that belonging to Connie Mack’s 1916 Philadelphia Athletics). Will the White Sox show up in Detroit with something to prove? If they do, they might give the Twins the shoulder they need. 

Who is to say if the Twins can pull this out? These slight advantages, though, give us all a reason to watch and hope, rather than lament.