@MarkKnudson41
Just imagine if there was a Ratings Performance Index – or RPI for short – in Major League Baseball. In college and high school sports, RPI helps determine who makes the postseason. If that were the case in MLB, the Colorado Rockies would actually benefit from playing in the loaded National League West instead of suffering in the win-loss column at the hands of the Los Angeles Dodgers, San Francisco Giants and San Diego Padres. RPI rewards teams for playing tougher competition – the formula combines your team’s winning percentage with that of your opponents, and even their opponents to come out with a ranking/play-off seeding that isn’t all about your team’s win-loss record.
That would have been awesome for the Rockies in 2021, when they went 74-87 (.460) but the Dodgers and Giants combined to win 213 games…to post an astonishing .657 winning percentage. It’s unheard of for two teams in the same division to do that…especially when they have to play each other 19 times. Colorado’s resulting RPI would likely to have been high enough to make them play-off contenders.
But that’s not how it works in pro sports. In pro sports, every win and every loss count exactly the same.
That’s why it so so sooo important for the Rockies to do what they did over the weekend, completing a sweep over the struggling Cincinnati Reds. That moved the Rockies four games north of break even (the realistic goal for this season) and at 13-9 (.591) they were tied with Nolan Arenado’s St. Louis Cardinals for the sixth best record in the NL. Remember, with the expanded play-off format this season, six NL teams will be in the play-offs.
Problem is, three of the teams in front of Colorado – those Dodgers, Giants and Padres – are all in their division. And the Rockies still have 19 games against San Fran and San Diego, and 16 more (including a lockout-forced six game series to finish the season) against LA. In short, the schedule gets a lot more difficult moving forward.
Making it all the more important, urgent even, that they beat the bad teams, like the Reds, who dot the slate.
Even after losing five of seven to the very average Philadelphia Phillies, the Rockies still have a lot of games left on the schedule against teams that just flat aren’t any good. That includes the Washington Nationals, this week’s visitors at Coors Field. The next road trip features the first of 19 games against the Arizona Diamondbacks, who lost 100 games last season and did pretty much nothing to improve their on field fortunes over the winter. The Rockies went a meh 10-9 against the DBacks last season. That won’t cut it this year, as we’ve noted before.
For the Rockies to make the postseason this year, they have to beat the bad teams, tread water against the average ones, and try to steal about 15 -20 wins against the elite teams in the NL West.
The good news is things will change in 2023, scheduling-wise. Reports are that MLB will be going to a more “balanced” schedule next season, with teams playing fewer games against their division rivals. Absent an RPI system, fewer games against the Dodgers and Giants is a very good thing for the Rockies play-off fortunes…next year.
Be sure to catch Mark Knudson and Manny Randhawa on the Park Adjusted Rockies Podcast each week, available on all major Podcast platforms.