The annual release of the Major League Baseball schedule is usually a pretty fun night. You get to see what's lined up for Opening Day. You see how specialty games -- such as the one in Williamsport, Pennsylvania, or the once-planned series this year in London -- fit onto the calendar. Most of all, it's the unfurling of 2,430 glorious games of baseball that will play out over six months. The original version of the 2020 schedule was released way back in August of last year. That feels like a different epoch.
Monday's release of the shortened version of the 2020 schedule didn't quite stack up to the usual flurry of excitement. Of the 2,430 games we usually get, there will be 900 -- or at least we hope there will be. Sixty games per team, the fewest in the major leagues since the 1870s, will determine who squeezes into the usual playoff format. Of the many things we could say about such a state of things, we can at least say this: We've never seen a big league schedule such as this one.
Strength of schedule isn't usually a big factor in deciding the final standings. Teams competing for the same division title usually play nearly identical schedules. There is a bit of variation for the teams competing for wild-card slots, but it isn't typically a deciding factor. This time, however, relative schedule strength has a wider range than in any season we've had.
That's because of the unprecedented formula for this year's slate. Teams will play 40 of their 60 games within their own divisions (67%). That number is significantly higher than in a typical season, when teams face division opponents 76 times (47%). The other 20 games will be interleague matchups -- the exact number of games in which teams usually face the opposite circuit. However, those 20 matchups now make up a third of each team's schedule (33%) rather than being spread across 162 games (12%).
With the need to limit travel because of the coronavirus pandemic, MLB schedule makers didn't have many great options for coming up with an ideal schedule formula from a competitive standpoint. Geography, not balance, was the overriding factor.
That isn't ideal, because now teams will be playing a third of their slates against clubs that are not competing for the same playoff slots. Salvaging the traditional interleague rivalry series probably made sense, and in this schedule, teams will play their assigned rivals in two home-and-home, three-game series. However, I would argue that the other interleague matchups -- Yankees vs. Marlins, Cubs vs. Royals, Dodgers vs. Mariners, to name a few -- don't serve much purpose.
Alas, there isn't much the schedulers could do. With the balance of the schedule made up of division games, at least one team in each division will be playing an interleague contest on any day that features a full slate of games. That's the problem with having an odd number of teams in the divisions. There was virtually no formula in which the schedule could contain teams within their geographic regions and max out on pennant-relevant matchups. This is the best MLB could do, and we just have to roll with it.
After receiving the schedule today, I analyzed through a number of prisms. Each prism makes the mini-schedule look better for some teams than others.
Prism No. 1: Strength of schedule
Winner: Minnesota Twins
This the most basic of calculations. To measure schedule strength, I ran 10,000 Monte Carlo simulations of the schedule. The winner for each matchup is determined by the power rating currently assigned to each team by my projection system, along with home-field advantage. (Well, we don't actually know what home-field advantage will look like in this strange, possibly fanless season. We also don't know that teams will be able to play all of their home games at home.) Without anything better to go on and armed with at least some research that suggests familiarity with venue is a major factor in home-field advantage, we left the built-in adjustment for home cooking as it has always been. Anyway, the difference between a team's power rating (which is expressed in wins) and how many wins it averaged in the simulations is attributable to schedule considerations. That's the measurement we're looking at.
Armed with a baseline power rating of 33.1 wins per 60 games, the Twins averaged 35.2 wins in the 10,000 Monte Carlo simulations. That 6.2% bump was the second highest in the majors. However, these observations require some context: Nine of the top 10 teams by that metric are Central clubs. The only team with a bigger schedule bump was the Cleveland Indians, and it was close. The reason I'm declaring the Twins the winners here is because they were already the favorites in the American League Central. They very much remain that, despite the skewed schedule, as their chances at a division title didn't change much because of the schedule.
The larger takeaway: The two weakest divisions in the majors (the Centrals) will be playing each other -- and only each other -- this season. The flip side of that is the fact that the other divisions don't get to play them. This could have a major impact on wild-card entrants and eventual playoff seeding.
Loser: Los Angeles Angels
The Angels don't have the toughest slate. That misfortune belong to the Miami Marlins, whose average win total in the sims was 7.4% below their already modest power ranking. The four teams with the toughest schedules are all teams that project to finish near the bottom, with the Mariners, Orioles and Giants joining Miami in the top (that is, bottom) four. Because those teams weren't expected to compete for postseason spots anyway, we'll declare the Angels the losers here because they suffered a hit to their playoff chances.
In addition to a tough division menu that includes elite foes in the Astros and Athletics, the Halos will play one-sixth of their games against the mighty Dodgers in interleague matchups. That includes the final three games of the season, which will be played at Dodger Stadium. The Angels were borderline wild-card contenders before, and they are now, but their schedule won't do them any favors.
Prism No. 2: Biggest boost in playoff chances -- American League
Winner: Chicago White Sox
In most years, teams that project to win a few games better or worse than .500 tend to have similar wild-card chances, with an injury here or a lineup tweak there sometimes having a tipping-point kind of effect on playoff probabilities. Like the division brethren Twins and Indians, the White Sox benefit from one of baseball's easier 60-game slates, and the added couple of wins from the docket are enough to have an outsize effect on Chicago's playoff chances. With their current depth chart playing the original schedule, the White Sox earned a postseason slot in the simulations 20.1% of the time. That is now 29.3%.
Loser: Houston Astros
A general rule for the short slate is that with so much small-sample randomness introduced, the top teams will invariably see a decline in playoff odds, and the bottom teams will get a boost. The best teams still rate as the best teams, but from a probabilistic standpoint, the playing field narrows. When you fold that factor in with the tougher relative slates faced by Western teams, no team has seen a bigger hit to its postseason chances than the Astros. If Uncle Schadenfreude is plying you with ironic GIFs right now, that might be why.
The bad news for Houston haters: The Astros remain the clear favorites to win the AL West. But their margin for error has diminished. Under the original schedule, this version of the Astros had a 91.8% shot of playing into October. That is now 82.8%.
Prism No. 3: Biggest boost in playoff chances -- National League
Winner: Cincinnati Reds
The Reds are the National League's version of the White Sox in the schedule derby. But don't go breaking out those 1919 World Series tribute jerseys just yet. Just as the bolstered White Sox's odds still leave them with less than a one-in-three shot at the postseason, the Reds are at just better than one in four. However, no team's chances at October were improved more by the revamped schedule and the small sample of overall games. Cincinnati made the playoffs in just 16.9% of simulations under the original schedule. With the 60-game/geographically enhanced version, the Reds leap to a 26.4% shot.
Loser: Atlanta Braves
The NL East projects to be tightly bunched, so when you factor the rough East vs. East games into the mix, Atlanta's hit on win projection has an ugly effect on its playoff chances. Don't fret, Braves fans: Your club is still better than a 50-50 prospect. But whereas the Braves made the playoffs 74.4% of the time under the old schedule, the revised version knocks that number down to 62.5%.
Prism No. 4: Off days
Winner / Loser: Everyone!
I'm including this for factual completeness. The schedule runs from July 23, when there are two games, and finishes Sept. 27. That's a run of 67 days. Technically, that means every team has seven days off. However, for 26 teams, one of those days is opening night, when only the Yankees, Nationals, Giants and Dodgers will take the field. If you don't want to count those as off days, then the four teams playing on the first day have one more day off than everyone else.
Prism No. 5: Night and day
Winner: Cincinnati Reds
The Reds would be losers if ballplayers were normal humans, but because they tend to prefer night games -- and the option to sleep in -- we'll call Cincinnati the winners in this category because 50 of their 60 games will be night affairs. That's the most in baseball. There's a little art included in these estimates, and for our purposes here, we're using each team's local time to make the day/night distinction. The only games that are in a gray area are those midafternoon tilts when an East team is playing in the Midwest time zone. But however you define it, the Reds should get plenty of Z's as they traverse the short season.
Loser: Oakland Athletics
By the definition used here, the A's are looking at 28 day games. Some of those aren't much of an issue, as Oakland has a number of weekend starts at Houston and Texas that register as night games for those clubs. Back in Oakland, though, they'll be late-afternoon starts. The A's will still be able to get their rest. Still, in a season for which the central scheduling aim was to limit travel, you have to feel for the teams in the AL West, who have multiple division foes two time zones away.
Prism No. 6: Air miles
Winner: Milwaukee Brewers
According to MLB Network, the Brewers will log just 3,962 miles of travel during the regular season. For context: For the Mariners to fly to Miami to play the Marlins, or vice versa, it is a haul of about 3,300 miles. The Brewers might as well rent that bus from "Almost Famous."
Loser: Texas Rangers
Good news: The Rangers will get to open their new stadium this season after all. Bad news: By the time they're finished flying around, they might not remember where it is. (Inside tip: It's right next to the old park.) The AL West clubs get the short straw when it comes to travel; the four flyingest teams are the Rangers, Astros, Mariners and Athletics.
Prism No. 7: Market-to-market trips
Winner (tie): Los Angeles Angels and Baltimore Orioles
Given the circumstances, the sheer number of times a team has to pack up and travel to a new market takes on added importance this season. The Angels and Orioles have to change towns just 12 times. For the Orioles, that number doesn't include short, interleague hops to Washington, D.C., and Philadelphia. For the Angels, the number doesn't include a little side trip to San Diego near the end of the season. This is why the Angels don't join their division brethren on the air miles leaderboard.
Loser (tie): Tampa Bay Rays and Cleveland Indians
The Rays and Indians both have to change cities 15 times, so the team-to-team spread is modest. Still, every trip counts. Here, I'll also note that the Cardinals and White Sox each log in with 14 trips. That includes the scheduled "Field of Dreams" contest on Aug. 13, after which the clubs head to Chicago to play two more games. If that novelty game ends up being canceled, then we can remove one from the trip counts for Chicago and St. Louis. For the White Sox, whether or not the Iowa game comes off, they have plenty of home cooking to look forward to around that time. With a homestand sandwiched around an interleague series at Wrigley Field, the White Sox will be at home from Aug. 14 to Aug. 30.
Prism No. 8: The Big Picture
Winner: All of us. Well, it's not the season we wanted, and even now, we're not sure it's a season that will -- or should -- happen. But for one night, at least, we can focus on the 900 games we might get rather than the 1,530 contests that are already lost to the wind. We, even more than usual, are taking things one day at a time. On this day, we have some baseball to look forward to.
Loser: All of us. At times, with every update on the latest coronavirus numbers and the latest bulletin about a positive test for a player arriving at summer training, it seems like the chances of pulling off this 900-game season sprint are nil. A number of notable players have already opted out of the season, and more could go that route. This entire campaign, if it begins, will be played with everyone involved and everyone watching doing so with a nagging dread in the back of their minds. Even if it somehow comes off and a World Series champion is crowned, the viability of the champion will be debated forever.
It isn't the season we wanted. It's the season we got.