Four teams are left standing, and the October picture is split in two very different ways. In the American League, the Tampa Bay Rays and Cleveland Guardians bring an unfamiliar look to the league championship stage. In the National League, the Los Angeles Dodgers and Milwaukee Brewers give the bracket a heavyweight feel.
The Rays and Brewers finished the regular season as the top teams in their leagues by record, while the Dodgers kept rolling as the reigning champions and the Braves could not stop them. Cleveland is the outlier in the field: the AL’s No. 2 seed, baseball’s lowest-payroll club, and a team that had to claw back from a 2-0 hole with two home losses in the ALDS before winning three straight, including two on the road, against the White Sox to reach the ALCS for the second time in three years.
ALCS: No. 2 Cleveland Guardians vs.
No. 1 Tampa Bay Rays
Tampa Bay enters this series looking like the more complete team, and that starts with the pitching setup. The Rays were already in a better position than Cleveland before the ALCS began, and they also have the luxury of arranging their staff however they want after the Guardians had to lean hard on their arms in a five-game series against the White Sox.
Cleveland does have more starter depth than Chicago did, but that rotation needs to deliver real length to keep everyone fresh in a longer series. Tampa Bay, meanwhile, can throw Drew Rasmussen, Freddy Peralta and Nick Martinez for innings, then follow with multi-inning weapons like Griffin Jax and Ian Seymour.
That kind of depth makes life miserable for a Guardians offense that is not built to trade punches. With Bryan Baker anchoring the back end, the Rays can turn almost every inning into a grind. Against that kind of pitching inventory, run-scoring chances can dry up fast.
The Rays did not exactly light up the Yankees, but they may not need a big offensive outburst here. Their lineup has gotten important contributions from players beyond Junior Caminero and Yandy Diaz, and that matters. Ryan Vilade and Victor Mesa Jr. both homered in the clincher in New York, while Cleveland’s pitching is not on the same level as New York’s when the starters are factored in.
The Guardians keep finding ways to stay alive, and they played their best baseball down the stretch and in the ALDS. But against a team this clean and this deep, a slow start would be a major problem.
Prediction: Rays in 5 (Rays to win ALCS 61.83% on ProphetX)
NLCS: No. 2 Los Angeles Dodgers vs.
No. 1 Milwaukee Brewers
Milwaukee won 103 games in the regular season, best in baseball, yet it still comes into the NLCS as the underdog. A lot of people still want proof that the Brewers’ brand of winning over six months can hold up against the Dodgers in a short series. Now they have to show it.
The Brewers had this same chance last October and got swept by Los Angeles. This group is better than that one, and there’s a case to be made that the Dodgers are a little less imposing than they were a year ago, especially with Shohei Ohtani clearly not 100 percent. Even so, the Dodgers still hold one huge edge: starting pitching.
Milwaukee’s pitching staff deserves respect. Jacob Misiorowski arrives as fresh as possible, having thrown only 12.1 innings over the previous 25 days, and the Brewers’ bullpen is a real advantage.
But postseason games still have to be won by scoring, and Milwaukee’s offense struggled to come through with timely hits in the NLDS and does not bring much power. Now it has to deal with Tarik Skubal, Yoshinobu Yamamoto, Blake Snell and Tyler Glasnow.
That is a brutal run of arms, and there is no easy stretch in it.
The Dodgers’ lineup is not especially scary at the moment. Ohtani is not swinging the bat like himself, and the group is among the oldest in baseball.
Still, Los Angeles won the World Series last season despite a poor offensive series against the Blue Jays, and this year’s rotation is better than the one it had then. Milwaukee can absolutely win this series if it plays its usual crisp brand of baseball, but it has to score enough to take down the champs.
Home-field advantage does not swing things much for Milwaukee, either. Getting a split in the first two games would be useful, but then the Brewers would have to go to Dodger Stadium for three straight.
Even if they steal one there, they could head back to Milwaukee needing to win both remaining games. In this format, the edge that mattered in the NLDS barely helps at all in the NLCS.
Prediction: Dodgers in 6 (Dodgers to win NLCS 63.79% on ProphetX)
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The Brewers are back in the National League Championship Series with the Dodgers, and this matchup already feels familiar after the two clubs met at this stage a year ago. Milwaukee earned home-field advantage by finishing level with Los Angeles in the regular season, and that matters in a series that figures to come down to pitching depth, bullpen management and which club can create just enough offense against elite arms.
The early turns of the rotation are where the most intriguing edge may emerge, especially with Milwaukee leaning into the kind of matchup planning that can swing a short series. There is a particular starter expected in the opener who adds another layer of intrigue, and if this goes the distance, the same name could come back into the picture again when the pressure is highest. [Read more 🡒]
Dodgers Set Up An NLCS Edge Brewers Fans Wont Love
The NLCS has already taken shape in a way Brewers fans probably wont enjoy. After both clubs needed just four games to advance through the Division Series, the Dodgers have lined up their pitching for the opener in Milwaukee with an eye toward controlling the early rhythm of the matchup, and the staff behind the choices has plenty of postseason momentum working in its favor.
Los Angeles is also weighing a roster tweak that would give it even more arm depth for the series, a sign the Dodgers are treating this as a long haul even if the first few games go their way. For Milwaukee, that means the challenge is not just the star power on the other side, but the possibility that the opponent keeps finding ways to stack the deck before a pitch is even thrown. [Read more 🡒]
Brewers' NLCS Path Looks Very Different Depending On One Dodgers Decision
The Dodgers rotation choice for the National League Championship Series gives the Brewers a very different opening to the matchup than they might have expected. Milwaukee has already seen Tarik Skubal twice this season and held its own in those meetings, which at least offers some familiarity as the series begins and lets the Brewers lean on what they learned from those competitive games.
Yoshinobu Yamamoto, though, is a far less comfortable assignment for Milwaukee. He has already beaten the Brewers twice this season, and even with Skubal coming off the stronger year on paper, Yamamoto is the pitcher who could make the early shape of the series feel much tougher for a Brewers offense trying to establish itself right away. [Read more 🡒]