The Boston Red Sox are heading to the playoffs, but the path to get there was paved by a broken league. The team survived a dreadful three-month start to secure a wild-card spot. They did not do it by being the best team in baseball. They did it because the rest of the American League collapsed around them. This year’s league features just two teams with 90 wins. That number ties the fewest since MLB expanded to 30 teams in 1998, per The Boston Globe.
As the regular season entered its final day, 10 teams in the league had losing records. That is the most sub-.500 teams the AL has seen in a single season since 2017. The modern league has never witnessed such a scarcity of elite teams alongside such an abundance of bad ones. The Red Sox knew they needed a turnaround, but the bar was set incredibly low. A strong two-week stretch was enough to keep hope alive for a playoff spot.
A League in Ruins
The situation in June looked dire for Boston. The team faced a potential deadline selloff if they could not find their footing. One member of the Sox explained the mindset at that critical moment. “At the end of June, it was like, ‘We’ve got two weeks here to go on some type of a decent run [by the All-Star break to avoid a deadline selloff],'” said one member of the Sox.
However, the competition was so weak that the Red Sox did not need a miracle. They just needed to be slightly better than the mess around them. The player noted that the league’s poor quality changed the math for Boston. “[But] the AL sucked so bad that it didn’t have to be [anything spectacular]. We needed, like, a 10-3,” the member added. Instead of a modest run, the team went on a historic 32-5 stretch. By mid-August, this surge had almost guaranteed them a playoff berth.
The Numbers Do Not Lie
Evaluators described the current state of the league with blunt honesty. Some called it “imbalanced” or “top-heavy,” per The Boston Globe. Others simply called it “mid,” a term that was volunteered multiple times. The data backs up these grim assessments. Three playoff teams will emerge from the AL East, and those three teams hold the top three records in the entire American League. The last round of expansion in 1998 marked the last time this occurred.
In contrast, the rest of the league is struggling to find competence. No team in the AL Central or AL West will reach 87 wins this season. Within the AL Central, a team achieving a mid-80s win total will secure a bye in the first round. That is a massive advantage for a team that did not dominate its division. The gap between the top and bottom is wider than ever.
Wilyer Abreu and the Red Sox are ready for their next test. They will face the New York Yankees in a wild-card series. The offense has been sluggish, scoring the fewest runs in baseball during September. Roman Anthony is the bright spot, batting .320 over his last seven games.
