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Photo Courtesy of Sports Illustrated |
I’m fearful that this will solidify my reputation of being a bit of a baseball geek. So be it. I’m excited. With the Brewers closing in on the Central Division title, I started exploring exactly how many games they need to win to get there, and how we can keep track. The question is, can we start counting now? Or is it too soon? And what about the SI jinx?
I must confess I got nervous when the Brewers, specifically Ryan Braun, Prince Fielder and Nyjer Morgan, made the cover of last week’s Sports Illustrated. It’s the first time the Crew has graced the cover since 1987.
There is a huge faction that believes there is a jinx associated with being on the cover of SI, and it’s not without foundation. It started in 1954, ironically when Milwaukee Braves’ slugger Eddie Mathews appeared on the cover. Immediately after the issue came out, the Braves’ nine game winning streak was snapped, and Mathews broke his hand in the game causing him to miss seven games. The legend picked up speed after that, and there so many examples of the jinx being real, continuing into 2011, it’s mind-boggling. Some of them are kind of sad actually. And some are really funny. Wikipedia has a wonderful summary here, which if you have some time you might find interesting.
But so far there hasn’t been a jinx for the Brewers. After they lost their game to the Pirates last Wednesday, the day the issue came out, I began to worry. But they went on to sweep the Cubs at Miller Park over the weekend. So far so good.
That begs the question, then, what will it take to win the Central Division title? The Brewers have a 10 ½ game lead over the Cardinals, who come to town tonight for three games. So how do you calculate what the Brewers need to do to finish first in the division?
That’s where this thing called the magic number comes in. The Brewers magic number right now is 18. This means that they need to win 18 more games to win the division, assuming the Cardinals win all of their remaining games. Each time you win, the magic number goes down by one. Each time the second place team, i.e. the Cardinals, loses, the magic number also goes down by one. When the magic number hits zero, bingo, you’ve won the division.
So how do we get to this 18 number?
Major League Baseball uses a formula that would have Einstein scratching his head. You take the number of games the Brewers have remaining, add one (to eliminate a tie), then subtract the difference in the number of losses between the Brewers and the Cardinals. Like this:
Brewers have 27 games left. Add 1 equals 28. The Brewers have lost 54, the Cards 64, so that’s 10 (brilliant, eh?). So 28 minus 10 equals 18.
There is a simpler way to get the same number, a formula you can keep on your fridge and only worry about two stats. Here’s how it works.
Take the total number of games in a baseball season, 162, add 1 = 163, so write 163 in ink on a piece of paper. Then write in pencil the number of Brewers wins (81) and then Cardinals losses (64). All you have to do is subtract those two numbers from 163 and you get the magic number, which you should write in pencil too, so you can update them daily. So it’ll look like this when you put it on your fridge:
Now you can follow along at home with just a pencil and eraser. And watch the number dwindle! But to be safe, if you picked up a copy of last week’s Sports Illustrated, throw it out.
In honor of Labor Day, Palmer’s Perspective will be taking a week off, partly so I can watch some baseball. By the time we get back together, that magic number could be pretty tiny. Let’s hope so! See you on September 13!
