It’s mid-September and that means it’s officially clinching season in the majors. As MLB’s best teams celebrate punching their postseason tickets with champagne festivities in clubhouses across baseball, we’ve got you covered with all of the clinching details and an eye on who could pop the corks next.
WHO IS IN
Boston Red Sox (Clinched season’s first playoff spot, Sept. 11)
The Red Sox became the first team to officially punch a ticket to October with a 7-2 victory against the Blue Jays on Tuesday night. Boston clinched in its 145th game of the season, which is tied for the sixth-earliest by any team in the wild-card era (excluding the strike-shortened 1995 season) and is the earliest the Red Sox have ever clinched a spot, according to the Elias Sports Bureau.
What does clinching first mean? In the wild-card era, 12 of the 25 teams to clinch first were eliminated in the first round of the postseason, while seven reached the World Series — most recently the Cubs in 2016. Two of those seven teams were the Red Sox squads of 2007 and 2013, with Boston winning both times.
What’s next: An American League East crown is the next prize within Boston’s reach as the Red Sox sit comfortably ahead of the New York Yankees in the division with two-plus weeks to go.
Cleveland Indians (clinched AL Central, Sept. 15)
While the Red Sox own baseball’s best record and the AL’s likely top seed, the Indians became 2018’s first division winner after their 15-0 obliteration of the Tigers on Saturday. Even though Cleveland owns the AL’s fifth-best record, the Tribe easily pulled away from a weak AL Central pack, with none of their division rivals getting anywhere close to the .500 mark. The Indians become the first team to clinch a division this season despite the fact that they were 18½ games behind the Red Sox and 9½ behind the Houston Astros, as well as 8½ games worse than the Yankees and 7 worse than the Oakland Athletics. To put that into context, the only other division the Indians would be leading is the National League West — by 1½ games.
What does clinching the AL Central mean? It was the Indians’ third consecutive AL Central title, and marks their fourth trip to the postseason in six seasons under manager Terry Francona. The Indians have never finished below .500 on Tito’s watch.
WHO COULD BE NEXT
The Red Sox are closest to clinching a division title with a magic number that’s now down to two in the AL East title. The next-closest AL team to clinching a playoff spot is the Astros, whose magic number for a playoff spot is down to three, followed by the Yankees at six and the Athletics at seven.
The closest National League team to clinch any spot is the Cubs, whose magic number to clinch a playoff spot is at eight heading into Sunday’s games. The Braves are closest to clinching a division title with their number for sealing up an NL East title is at eight.