We just survived an incredibly dumb offseason in Major League Baseball, as far as online discourse goes. The Dodgers won the World Series last year and then signed several very good players in the offseason. You know how it goes from there. Kicking, screaming, whining, the works. No fair!
Life ain’t fair, man.
I’m looking forward to getting this season underway and it starts for the other 28 teams — the Cubs and Dodgers have played twice already — on Thursday. Heading in, we know the following as facts:
- The NFL last had a repeat champion in the 2023-24 season.
- The NBA last had a repeat champion in 2019 and might very well have one in 2025.
- The NHL last had a repeat champion in 2021.
- The WNBA last had a repeat champion in 2023.
- College football last had a repeat champ in 2022.
- Men’s college basketball saw UConn repeat in 2023-24.
- For women’s college basketball, we have to go all the way back to … 2016 to find a repeat champ.
Is that enough yet? Because Major League Baseball hasn’t seen a repeat World Series champion since 1998-2000 when the Yankees hoisted the trophy three years in a row and four of five years.
Sure, the Dodgers are a pretty decent bet to change things and repeat this season. They are definitely the best team on paper heading into the season and I can’t see any scenario — within realistic reason — where they don’t make the playoffs. But the MLB playoffs are such a major crapshoot. A 2018 study found that Major League Baseball teams would need to play a best-of-75 series (that’s not a typo) in order for the best team to win just 80% of the time.
This is why our regular season is so long and we still end up with stuff like the Diamondbacks in the 2023 World Series (sorry, D-backs fans).
This means that while the Dodgers are the most likely team to win the World Series this season, they still only have about a 20% chance to win the World Series. Even if that’s low, we could put it at 25% and that means there’s a 75% chance the Dodgers do not win it all.
And then someone else has to. My job here is to point out just how many teams have a chance to win the World Series in 2025. And in doing so, I’ll go back to spring training of 2023. I was in a clubhouse in Arizona talking with a fellow writer friend about the Rangers. I said something along the lines of, “I definitely don’t think they’ll even make the playoffs, but you could easily make an argument that they’ll win it all.”
They did.
Now, I had no idea they were gonna lose Jacob deGrom and then trade for Jordan Montgomery and Max Scherzer, but isn’t that the point? There’s so much unknown heading into this season. And even just making the playoffs means a team is capable of running the table. It isn’t just 2023. The 2021 Braves had the worst record among playoff teams. The 2019 Nationals were a wild card. So were the Giants in 2014 (when two sub-90-win teams faced off in the Fall Classic), Cardinals in 2011, Red Sox in 2004 and both Marlins championship teams.
So how many teams in 2025 can win the World Series? It would be more efficient to list the teams that don’t. I truly believe the only teams that absolutely will not, under any circumstance, win the 2025 World Series are the White Sox, Marlins and Rockies. I think it would be a big stretch to predict the Angels, Nationals or A’s, but it’s not completely off the table.
Snyder, are you really saying there’s a realistic path to a championship for 24 teams in 2025?
Damn right. Get excited.
Biggest Movers
|
Rk |
Teams |
Chg |
Rcrd |
|
|---|---|---|---|---|
1 |
|
They didn’t have Mookie Betts or Freddie Freeman and I think you could argue they didn’t even play all that well in the Tokyo Series. They won two games and outscored the Cubs 10-4. | — | 2-0 |
2 |
|
If Jordan Romano and José Alvarado are putting on a regular-season preview in the spring, the Phillies have a stellar bullpen behind a sturdy rotation with a powerful lineup. That’s a lot of positives. | — | 0-0 |
3 |
|
Obviously, there’s no Spencer Strider or Ronald Acuña Jr. to start the season, but this team is fully capable of hitting its stride late and ending with the best record in baseball. | — | 0-0 |
4 |
|
I’ve gotten so high on this Rangers team in the last several weeks that I’m worried it’s gotten to be too much and maybe I need to back off. | 2 | 0-0 |
5 |
|
Corbin Carroll surely can’t be as bad as he was in the first half last season while Josh Naylor steps in for Christian Walker. And this team led the majors in runs last year by 44. | 2 | 0-0 |
6 |
|
I certainly don’t think the plan for a World Series hopeful should be for a converted reliever to serve as the Opening Day starter, but maybe some of that Stearns magic will play. | 1 | 0-0 |
7 |
|
Is Spencer Arrighetti or Hunter Brown a bigger breakout candidate? There’s still plenty to like on this team. | 1 | 0-0 |
8 |
|
The meteoric rise here was simply a case where I reflected on my early rankings and changed my mind about this team. The signing of Alex Bregman was definitely not enough to vault them up so many spots. Not in and of itself. It was a big deal, though. | 11 | 0-0 |
9 |
|
There’s still so much young, position-playing talent here along with a questionable rotation. Rinse, repeat. Grayson Rodriguez’s injury makes it even more extreme. Sleep on them at your peril, though. | — | 0-0 |
10 |
|
The Gerrit Cole injury is a disaster, even with Max Fried now on the team. | 6 | 0-0 |
11 |
|
They’ll certainly be among the best in run prevention. Can Julio Rodríguez and Randy Arozarena do enough around Cal Raleigh to propel the offense? | — | 0-0 |
12 |
|
It is obviously never good to lose and it sucks to look at 0-2 for more than a week before games resume, but losing two to the mighty Dodgers isn’t anything that should move the needle much in judging if the Cubs will be a contender this year. | — | 0-2 |
13 |
|
I liked Nick Pivetta as a depth signing, but the rotation is still awfully reliant on getting the best versions of Dylan Cease and Michael King. | 3 | 0-0 |
14 |
|
Yes, I’ve got the Royals taking the AL Central in what’ll be a very fun race that hopefully includes all four teams into September. | 1 | 0-0 |
15 |
|
In looking at the four AL Central contenders, the Guardians might look the weakest on paper. I think it would be foolish to count them out, though. Remember on “The Office” when Dwight said whenever he’s going to do something, he asks himself, “would an idiot do that?” And if an idiot would, he doesn’t do that thing? Yeah, picking the Guardians to finish fourth in the AL Central would be that thing. | 2 | 0-0 |
16 |
|
They are better than last year and there are reasons for optimism on the whole. They also had way too much go right for them down the stretch last year, so there needs to be some balance in evaluating them. | 2 | 0-0 |
17 |
|
They already showed last year for months they could withstand the loss of Devin Williams, so now it’s a matter of covering up the lost production from Willy Adames. They’ll find a way and contend. That’s what they do. | — | 0-0 |
18 |
|
I was already one of the people lowest on the Twins and it was mostly due to health concerns. And then Royce Lewis went down (again). Yep. | 2 | 0-0 |
19 |
|
They had so much go wrong last year. They should be better, perhaps significantly so. They’re also stuck in a tough division. | 1 | 0-0 |
20 |
|
I’m just not seeing it and having to play in a minor-league park absolutely matters, but, as always, we can’t count them out. | — | 0-0 |
21 |
|
How much stock do you want to put in spring stats? It shouldn’t be a ton, but Logan Webb, Robbie Ray, Justin Verlander and Hayden Birdsong have crushed it. | — | 0-0 |
22 |
|
Yes, they have enough talent to win it all. Given the ranking, I obviously don’t see it as likely, but there is plenty to like here and now a great manager in Terry Francona. | — | 0-0 |
23 |
|
No, I don’t have any concern over Sonny Gray’s terrible, horrible, no good, very bad spring stats. | 1 | 0-0 |
24 |
|
Major concern over Jared Jones feeling elbow pain in spring training. The Pirates’ path to contention is on the backs of the rotation and he’s such a key piece. | 1 | 0-0 |
25 |
|
This is a very strong team for a 25th ranking. Usually we’re into the dregs, but the Nats have a good amount of young talent. I do wish they’d have done more in the offseason, though. Maybe they are waiting for a big bang in the next few years. | — | 0-0 |
26 |
|
I’m never buying them again until they prove they can make the playoffs. Even if their magic number was one, I’d still expect them to somehow blow it. | — | 0-0 |
27 |
|
While I agree there are plenty of reasons to be excited at the A’s chances of being more competitive, let’s not go overboard and say they are good or anything. This is still a bottom-six team. | — | 0-0 |
28 |
|
The most exciting thing about this team is Sandy Alcantara returning from Tommy John surgery. After that, the most exciting thing will be when they trade Sandy Alcantara. | — | 0-0 |
29 |
|
Even though the White Sox are a worse team right now, the Rockies are a good pick to lose the most games this season. The NL West is a brutal assignment for this club. | — | 0-0 |
30 |
|
If you aren’t yet familiar, check out Opening Day starter Sean Burke. He’s interesting. In just 19 innings last year, he had a 1.42 ERA, 1.00 WHIP and 22 strikeouts. | — | 0-0 |
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