It’s that time of year again.
The final month of MLB’s regular season is here, and the Orioles are in striking distance of clinching a playoff berth. They enter Monday with an 82-62 record and half a game behind the New York Yankees (82-61) for first place in the American League East.
If Baltimore makes the postseason, it will be the club’s first time doing so in consecutive years since 1996-97. If the Orioles win the AL East, it will be their first time claiming the division crown in back-to-back seasons since 1973-74.
Here’s where the Orioles stand in their playoff chase:
What is the Orioles’ magic number to secure a playoff spot?
Entering Monday, it’s 10. That number will fall by one with each Orioles win and can also drop with losses by the best team not in a wild-card spot.
Magic numbers can be confusing (stick around for more on that) but the easiest way to think of them is by what win total guarantees the Orioles a playoff spot. That can be done by adding the Orioles’ magic number (10) to their win total (82). Effectively, there is no scenario in which Baltimore finishes with 92 wins and misses the playoffs.
When is the earliest the Orioles could clinch a playoff spot?
Saturday, though that’s unlikely. That scenario includes the Orioles winning their next five games, which would be the club’s longest streak since mid-June, as well as the Detroit Tigers, Seattle Mariners and Boston Red Sox losing all of their games through Saturday. Fittingly, Baltimore travels to Boston for a three-game series beginning Monday and finishes the week with a three-game set versus the Tigers.
It’s more likely the Orioles clinch a playoff spot — and perhaps celebrate like they did last year — sometime during their next homestand Sept. 17-22 against the San Francisco Giants and Tigers.
How is Baltimore’s magic number calculated?
In its simplest form, the magic number is used to show how close a team is to clinching a playoff spot or a division title.
In most scenarios, it is determined by adding the number of wins of the team in a playoff spot to the number of losses of the first team out, then subtracting that sum from 163, or the number of games in a season plus one. In the division race, it’s easy: Add the first-place Yankees’ wins (82) and the second-place Orioles’ losses (62), subtract that sum by 163 and voila: New York’s magic number is 19.
It can be more convoluted to figure out the Orioles’ magic number for a playoff spot, especially with three wild-card teams in each league. That’s because of complicated tiebreakers — potentially including three or more teams — and several clubs in the hunt for the final wild-card spot. Entering Monday, the Kansas City Royals (79-65) and Minnesota Twins (76-67) are likely to be the second and third wild-card teams, respectively, with the first expected to go to the AL East’s runner-up. But the Red Sox, Tigers, Mariners and Tampa Bay Rays — a quartet of clubs all within 1 1/2 games of each other — could still theoretically make a run at usurping the Royals or Twins.
To figure out Baltimore’s magic number for a playoff spot, Detroit, Seattle and Boston are the teams involved in the calculation since they each have 71 losses and are on the outside looking in of a wild-card spot. Taking the Orioles’ 82 wins and the Tigers/Mariners/Red Sox’s 71 losses results in a magic number of 10. To view it another way, if any of those teams win the rest of their games, they would end the regular season with 91 victories. That means the Orioles must end the year with 92 wins — 10 more than now — to ensure they finish ahead.
Baltimore has already won the season series over Boston and Seattle to earn the head-to-head tiebreakers over those teams. The Orioles have yet to play Detroit with six games against the Tigers later this month. As of now, the tiebreaker advantage does not lower Baltimore’s magic number to nine because of potentially messy three-way ties that include other teams currently in playoff positions, specifically the Houston Astros and Cleveland Guardians, two clubs that have won their season series over the Orioles.
It’s important to remember that it’s highly unlikely a 91-win Orioles team misses out on the postseason. In fact, FanGraphs already considers it virtually a guarantee, giving Baltimore a 99.8% chance of playing in October. But the scenario does technically exist, which is why the Orioles’ magic number to make the playoffs is 10.
What is the state of the AL East race?
Simply making the postseason is an accomplishment, especially for a franchise that suffered a 14-year playoff drought from 1998 to 2012. But winning the AL East is the real prize — one that comes with the significant reward of skipping the AL Wild Card Series and advancing straight to the Division Series.
After the Orioles and Yankees both lost Sunday, Baltimore entered Monday half a game back of New York for first place in the AL East. The Orioles and Yankees have been tied or within two games of each other since July 10 — 60 straight days.
Both teams have been playing about .500 baseball over the past few months, and neither has been able to pull away from the other. That makes it quite likely this race will go down to the wire. New York and Baltimore face off in the regular season’s penultimate series — a three-game set that could very well decide who claims the division crown.
With how close this race has been, who owns the tiebreaker is pivotal. The Orioles will catch the train to the Big Apple later this month with a 6-4 record against the Yankees. That means one Orioles win that series would clinch them the tiebreaker — essentially providing a one-game advantage over the Yankees.
If the regular season ended Sunday, who would the Orioles face in the playoffs?
As the top wild-card team, the No. 4-seeded Orioles would host No. 5 Kansas City in the best-of-three Wild Card Series Oct. 1-3.
If Baltimore wins that series, it would face the top-seeded Yankees in the ALDS Oct. 5-12. The winner would advance to the AL Championship Series Oct. 13-22 against one of the following teams: No. 2 Cleveland, No. 3 Houston or No. 6 Minnesota.
The World Series is scheduled to begin Oct. 25 with an if-necessary Game 7 on Nov. 2, although the Fall Classic could begin Oct. 22 if both Championship Series go five games or fewer.
This article will be updated daily.