The Dodger Watch

[Frayed Knot]

The Dodgers won their 81st game last night (just in case you weren't sure they'd break the .500 barrier this year) to being their record to 81 - 33
So with 48 games to go it's not too early to start looking at the odds and tracking the progress of them reaching or surpassing several milestones.

- they'd need to go just 19 - 29 from here on out to reach 100 wins. Certainly a modest goal but many seasons wind up with no 100+ win teams.

- they'd need to go at least 28 - 20 to notch 109 wins and replace the '86 Mets (and also '75 Reds) for the best NL record in the 162-game era (and we'll have no one to blame but ourselves)

- and they'd need to go no worse than 36 - 12 to top the 116 wins by the 2002 Mariners as the most wins ever in a single season

And in case you wonder how likely any of these are: over their most recent 48 games they've gone 40 - 8

[Chad ochoseis]

What's funny - or maybe not, because a best of seven series is a very small sample size - is how often the teams that play .650 or better in the regular season don't win the WS.

Since 1950:

That Seattle team (2001, actually, but I had to look it up) lost the NLCS to the Yankees.
The '54 Indians went 111-43 and got swept by the Giants.
The Mets won in 1986, but just barely. Maybe Mookie would have beaten out that grounder anyway.
The '53 Boys of Summer Dodgers lost to the Yankees.
The '69 Orioles were 109-53, and we know how that turned out for them.
The Indians played .694 ball in 1995 and lost in 6 to the Evil Braves.
The '98 Braves played .654 ball, but lost to the '98 Yankees, who had an even better regular season record.

The '61 Yankees, '70 Orioles, '75 Reds, and of course the '86 Mets and '98 Yankees won the WS. So, 11 teams with phenomenal .650+ records since 1950, and only five win the WS. Winning the World Series is hard.

[seawolf17]

Fuckin' Justin Turner, man.
/shakes head sadly

[Benjamin Grimm]

Wow! I had no idea that they were having such a dominating season!

I guess I haven't been looking at the standings at all. The only team (other than, now, the Dodgers) that I could have told you was in first place was Washington.

[HahnSolo]

Braves lost to the Padres in '98.

[Ceetar]

[Frayed Knot]

[fimg=400:a4kc0dar]http://images.amcnetworks.com/bbcamerica.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/09/artful.jpg[/fimg:a4kc0dar]

[Edgy MD]

Benjamin Grimm wrote: Wow! I had no idea that they were having such a dominating season! I guess I haven't been looking at the standings at all. The only team (other than, now, the Dodgers) that I could have told you was in first place was Washington.

We've got a whole unit back in Stockholm dedicated to tracking the standings. Stig and Anders are in charge and doing some really heady stuff. You should check it out.

[Frayed Knot]

Chad Ochoseis wrote: So, 11 teams with phenomenal .650+ records since 1950, and only five win the WS. Winning the World Series is hard.

What's really funny is that, assuming the Dodgers join the .650+ club this year, that'll make it 12 such seasons over the last 68 years and only once were there two in one year (1998)
Meanwhile, the NBA has had 14 such teams just in the most recent Three seasons (nine different teams a total of 14 times - or 15.5% of the time).

[Frayed Knot]

Despite losing today (Sunday) the Dodgers are 6-2 since this thread was started, so now are 87 - 35 and have upped their chances of hitting all of those milestones.

With 40 games remaining:
* they need to go 13 - 27 to hit 100 wins
* 22 - 18 to reach 109 wins
* and no worse than 30 - 10 to set a new record for best regular season


They'd almost have to collapse to not at least reach the first two.

[Frayed Knot]

Dodgers lost their weekend series with the Brewers 1-2, their first series loss since sometime in June.

Things brings them all the way down to 91-38, or a .705 winning pct, on pace for 114.3 wins this season
btw, they won exactly 91 games all of last season

Now 33 games remaining
- they'll need to go 9 - 24 to win 100
- 18 - 15 to win 109
- and no worse than 26 - 7 to set a new season win record



Prior to this weekend, the only game they lost during the week was the one where they threw a no-hitter

[Guest Mets Willets Point]

It will be so satisfying if they lose the NLDS.

[Frayed Knot]

Mets Willets Point wrote: It will be so satisfying if they lose the NLDS.

Them vs the Nationals will be a tough one to root for for most of us. Pick your poison.



Well one thing about having torrid season is that it only takes a small stumble to knock you off your record setting pace and the Dodgers have now lost five in a row and six of eight.
Of course it's nice to 'fall' like that and still be at 50 games over .500 but their current 91-41 leaves them needing to go:
* 9 - 21 to reach 100 wins
* 18 - 12 to reach 109 wins and an NL record (not such a slam-dunk anymore, eh?)
* and a very tough 25 - 5 if they want to merely match the '01 Mariners season of 116 - 46

[Frayed Knot]

Following their 10th inning loss to Arizona last night, the Dodgers are now 1-10 in their last 11 games.
Prior to that they were 50 - 10, essentially taking two months to lose as many as they've lost in the last week and change.


Now 92-46, 100 wins is probably still in the bag (one would assume this kind of losing won't go on forever) as all they'll need is an 8 - 16 finish.
But they'd have to run the table just to match Seattle's 2001 mark of 116 wins, something that at least seemed possible just a short time ago,
and to beat the expansion era NL record of 108 wins now requires that they close the season on a 17 - 7 run so our (shared) record may be safe after all.

[Gwreck]

Over the last 13 games, the Dodgers have gone 2-11 and Arizona has gone 13-0 (including 6 head-to-head wins).

They've just picked up 10 games in the standings...10 more to go to force the Dodgers to the wild-card game.

[Benjamin Grimm]

Did things start to go bad for them when they got Curtis Granderson?

They should really start to worry if they have a 7.5 game lead with 17 to play.

[Frayed Knot]

Grandy as a Dodger is 6-for-60 although 4 of those 6 hits are HRs plus he tosses in 11 walks in just that short time.
Kind of like an exaggeration of all he was here recently.

[Frayed Knot]

The only game the Dodgers had won since August 25th going into last night had been the 1-0 shutout of the Padres on Kershaw's return from the DL last Friday (Kershaw went 6 innings).
Last night was Kershaw's first outing since that win and the Rockies chased him in the 4th inning [4 runs on 6 hits + 3 BBs in 3.2 IP] en route to a 9-1 drubbing.

Arizona was off yesterday so it was a relatively good day for the Dodgers in that they lost only 1/2 game off their lead -- now down to 10.0 games with 22 remaining.
But when your 12th loss in 13 games is also a Kershaw game then it's never a good sign.

[Edgy MD]

I never realized I could be such a Diamondback fan.

[Gwreck]

Not since 2001 at least.

[Guest Mets Willets Point]

Benjamin Grimm wrote: They should really start to worry if they have a 7.5 game lead with 17 to play.

The Dodger franchise has their own history of late-season swooning.

[Frayed Knot]

Now nine straight losses and 14 of 15.
However their lead stayed at 10 games as the DBacks coughed up six in the 9th to lose 8-7. So after sweeping the Dodgers, then the Rox, then the Dodgers again, the Snakes lose two straight to the Padres

[Frayed Knot]

I'm fascinated by this Dodger skid, particularly considering how hot they were leading into it.
After getting blown out (8-1) at home again today to the Rox, they've now lost 15 times in the last 17 days (16 games)
It had taken them 85 days -- May 31 to August 23rd -- to lose their previous 15 games.

DBacks finally won vs SDP so the West lead is down to 9.0 games. It's not yet 7.5 games with 17 to go but it is 9 with 19
And where they once seemed like a reasonable bet to beat the 108 win season of our '86ers (28 - 20 when I started tracking) they'd now have close out the season on a 17 - 2 run

[Centerfield]

And on the other side of the ledger, the Indians have won an improbably 18 straight.

Such extreme winning and losing going on. And people deny climate change.

[seawolf17]

I want more and more for the Dodgers to blow this lead, just so it gets the 2007 Mets off the schneid.

[smg58]

I think a big part of what tilted the market against the Mets at the trade deadline was the first-half performance of the Dodgers and Astros. Teams just weren't willing to give up significant value for a two-month rental that wouldn't make them competitive enough on paper. So naturally, both teams have fallen back to Earth since the deadline.

[Centerfield]

I think it had more to do with the D-Backs and Rockies than the Dodgers and Astros.

And the D-Backs and Rockies have been pretty good. I think if they thought 85 wins or so could grab the second wild card, they would have gone for it with Syndegaard, Harvey and Familia all due back.

Since the WC teams have continued winning, and the returns from injury have been less than spectacular, we probably never had a shot either way.

Not that it looks like we got anything really worthwhile anyway. Maybe 30 years from now when the statue is being built, we will think "Remember how sad we were in 2017? Well good thing we lost all those games and moved up in the draft so we could get (Future-HOF-er-super-awesome-franchise-player)!

[Centerfield]

I can't help but think we had something to do with this. Everything was going fine until we visited Dodger Stadium on August 26. Then the losing streak started.

Also weird, the one game they've won since then was the Friday night game we watched in SD.

I think if I stop rooting for the Mets, all the pitching arms will suddenly heal.

[Benjamin Grimm]

You should have gone to Peru instead of L.A.

[Centerfield]

We went to Wrigley last year, and the Cubs ended up breaking a 108 year curse.

I don't know off-hand the last time Peru won the World Series, but I feel like it's been a while.