Winning is awesome, and losing stinks. That will always be true, and that’s why every team that enters October is intent on winning the World Series.
But some wins carry more emotional weight than others, while some losses leave longer-lasting wounds than others. And so, each year at this time, we crunch the numbers to come up with our super-scientific World Series Urgency Index.
We factor in things like past postseason pains, pending free agents, payroll obligations and prospect potency to sort the remaining contenders on a relative scale, to determine how badly they need a crown — 10 being the most urgent situation, 1 being the most relaxed.
Note: We are including all teams still mathematically alive for the postseason, which is 13 in total at the moment, even though only 12 will ultimately qualify for the playoffs.
1) Mets
Urgency Index: 12, or how many times the Mets have changed managers since they last won it all
Yeah, we’re just gonna break the scale from the start.
Whatever the Mets need, “Uncle” Steve Cohen will probably pick up the tab. But in their current construction, they are heavily reliant on one 38-year-old ace nearing 3,000 career innings in Max Scherzer and another 34-year-old ace with a recent history of elbow and shoulder issues — and looming free agency — in Jacob deGrom. The Mets’ elite closer, Edwin Díaz, is also about to be a free agent, capable of breaking the bullpen bank. The more expensive this big-league roster becomes, the more important it will be for the Mets to produce cost-controlled talent in-house (both for direct help and trades), and right now their farm system rates as solid but perhaps a bit top-heavy. Things can get a little unwieldy if the Mets aren’t careful.
Then there’s the Buck Showalter factor. Sure, the manager is in the first of a three-year deal, but he’s also 66 years old and has won more than 3,000 games without winning the big one. And speaking of winning the big one, the Mets, as you know, haven’t done that since 1986. With Keith Hernandez’s jersey retired this year, they’ve pretty much milked that title for all it is worth. We are overdue for a coronation in Queens.
2) (tie) Astros
Urgency Index: 11, or how many times Dusty Baker has been to the playoffs without winning it all
Apparently, the Astros are never going away. After all, if you can handle the departures of elite talents like Gerrit Cole, Carlos Correa, George Springer and sustained injury absences from the likes of Justin Verlander and Lance McCullers Jr. in recent years and keep racking up the AL pennants, what’s going to stop you?
That said, they’ve now fallen short in two of the last three Fall Classics, and many baseball fans will continue to give the side-eye to their 2017 triumph. Above all else, this ranking is about Baker. In terms of wins and playoff appearances, he is the most accomplished skipper ever to have not hoisted the Commissioner’s Trophy.
Do it for Dusty, Houston. Do it for Dusty.
2) (tie) Padres
Urgency Index: 11, or how many prospects the Padres dealt in their latest Trade Deadline frenzy
In recent years, the Padres have done all the things we want teams to do, from the franchise-shifting free-agent foray with Manny Machado, the jaw-dropping trade for Juan Soto (amid so many other splashy swaps in recent years), the mega-extension with what had seemed a franchise cornerstone in Fernando Tatis Jr., etc. To date, all San Diego — a city without a World Series title — has to show for this admirable effort is a single postseason series victory (in front of zero fans) in 2020, immediately followed by a sweep at the hands of the rival Dodgers. Last year’s club fell apart in the home stretch, and this year’s squad has not yet met the outsized expectations placed upon it after the Soto swap, which further depleted the farm system.
With Soto under control for two more years, Wil Myers‘ contract coming off the books, Tatis hopefully mounting some sort of…
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