There has been a certain monotony to my National League predictions in recent years.
I picked the Los Angeles Dodgers to defeat the Chicago Cubs in the 2021 NL Championship Series, then lose to the Chicago White Sox in the World Series.
Incorrect on both counts. The actual NL champions were the Atlanta Braves, who went on to defeat the Houston Astros for the world title.
I chose the Dodgers again in 2022, predicting that they would subdue the St. Louis Cardinals in the NLCS and the Tampa Bay Rays in the World Series.
Another strikeout. The real-life finalists were the Philadelphia Phillies from the National League and the Astros (again) from the American, with the latter taking the crown.
So what did I do in 2023? I tapped the Dodgers in the NL for the third straight time, forecasting victories over Atlanta in the Championship Series and Houston in the finale.
Wrong again. The Arizona Diamondbacks came out of nowhere to win the NL championship, only to lose the World Series to the Texas Rangers.
That brings us to the upcoming 2024 season.
I once again envision the Dodgers emerging from the National League playoffs, as I revealed last Friday. How could they not? L.A. has been making significant acquisitions at two-year intervals, adding Mookie Betts in 2020, Freddie Freeman in 2022, and Shohei Ohtani this year. No other team can come close to the Dodgers’ firepower.
If my forecast is correct, it will fall to the Toronto Blue Jays to confront Los Angeles in the World Series.
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I simulated each 2024 postseason series 1,000 times as I generated last week’s playoff forecasts for the two leagues. (Click here to learn more about the simulation process.)
I expanded the process for the World Series, pitting the Blue Jays and Dodgers 10,000 times. These were the results:
Los Angeles Dodgers, 5,705 wins
Toronto Blue Jays, 4,295 wins
The Jays obviously have a chance, given that they won almost 43 percent of the simulations, but the Dodgers’ lead is nonetheless impressive.
Admit it. We all expect Los Angeles to walk away with the Commissioner’s Trophy in late October (or early November).
And the computer does, too.
If you’d like to revisit my predictions for the 2024 season, you can follow these links:
It has been a long winter, but we’ve finally arrived at the opening week of the 2024 season (notwithstanding the two games in Korea last week). Enjoy the action.
I’ll be back next week with a new format for Baseball’s Best (and Worst), tinkering a bit with the layout and presentation after three and a half years (and 451 posts) of this newsletter.
See you then.
