Five years into the expanded, three-wild card Major League Baseball format, it’s a bit of a fallacy that any team can simply get hot and steal off with a championship.
After all, three of the four World Series titles in this era were won by division champions, and the lone wild card – the 2023 Texas Rangers – tied for the American League West title. The cream typically rises in October – and the advantages available to a division champion are real.
In this year of rampant mediocrity, though, there are some live dogs lurking below the topline across the divisions. Here’s a look at six non-division winners with the best shot to cause havoc in October – and perhaps make off with the flag-covered trophy:
6. Chicago Cubs
Good luck finding a piece of promo art for the upcoming playoffs that doesn’t have Pete Crow-Armstrong’s face plastered prominently across it. For good reason: The presumed NL MVP is an absolute wonder, closing in on a 10-WAR season and a 40-40 campaign, albeit under the looser, modern stolen base guidelines.
Yet unlike another Chicago icon and MVP, PCA won’t be able to take over these playoffs like Michael Jordan once did.
That’s not to say the man has to go it alone. Chicago’s lineup is plenty potent, and Alex Bregman’s second half resurgence (15 homers, a 1.063 OPS in 46 games since July 27) is just the latest proof he’s a truly clutch player and a legitimate difference maker.
Yet it’s the pitching that will give cause for concern. Cubs pitchers rank 26TH in the majors in strikeouts per nine innings (7.81), which means many more balls in play, inviting the postseason randomness goblins to the party. Their front four of Kevin Gausman, Shota Imanaga, Clay Holmes and Matthew Boyd are all serviceable, yet in a postseason setting, it’s hard to imagine any of them getting more than 15 outs. That will be the red zone for a club that has a potentially potent back end of the bullpen thanks to Ryans Rolison and Zeferjahn and the return of Daniel Palencia.
Still, they’ll make for great theater – particularly watching PCA aim to stay disciplined as opposing pitchers are loathe to give him anything to hit.
We’ll start at the front and the back end – this club has a bona fide ace in Gavin Williams and one of the game’s greatest closers in Cade Smith. Not a bad foundation.
Naturally, filling in the rest of it is the trick and the Guardians will lean heavily on their bullpen to do so. Not a bad thing: The club’s 1.88 ERA in September led all of baseball entering this week and the big three of Smith, Hunter Gaddis and Erik Sabrowski are very playoff-seasoned.
So, too, is manager Stephen Vogt, who shines pushing buttons in October, even if he may not have all the horses his opponents enjoy. But there’s some nifty X-factors, most notably rookie lefty Parker Messick, who’s posted a 1.03 WHIP, 2.51 ERA and 5.8 WAR in 29 starts. He’s a bat-misser, unlike fellow lefty Foster Griffin, who relies on a beguiling seven-pitch mix. Can Griffin miss enough of them in October?
The Guardians are volatile, relying on rookies Chase DeLauter, Travis Bazzana and Angel Genao to juice a lineup that has missed Jose Ramirez’s usual production as he reocvers from a hamate injury. But they’ll be a tough out – and one of these Octobers, it will all click for them.
Do stout bullpens win championships? The Padres would love to find out.
It’s not a stretch to say that the game is over if the Padres are leading after five innings and can line up closer Mason Miller, Adrian Morejon, Bradgley Rodriguez and Yuki Matsui. And thank goodness for that, as it may be charitable to call some of the Padres’ starters five-inning pitchers.
Clearly, the club will have to lean heavily on a “pitching chaos” type of scenario, with starters working out of the ‘pen and relievers coming in at unpredictive times. It is helpful that Nick Pivetta has returned from injury and can slot in behind Michael King. But trade acquisitions Robbie Ray and Casey Mize – who struck out zero in his last start – aren’t going to shut anyone down, nor is the 2026 version of Walker Buehler.
On a more positive note, the lineup has been unstoppable since the All-Star break, as Manny Machado, Fernando Tatis Jr. and Jackson Merrill have all been on heaters, Merrill posting a .915 OPS and 21 extra-base hits since Aug. 1. Are they the proverbial “got hot at the right time” dark horse, or will the shortened rotations and bullpens of the postseason send them back to mediocrity?
It will likely be very entertaining to find out.
In just four short years, these guys have gone from the wonder of a surprise World Series trip to Sisyphus, trying to push the boulder up Broad Street.
Yet you’re never out of it with good starting pitching, and that’s why Jesus Luzardo’s shoulder inflammation might be the most watched injury among all contenders. He hasn’t pitched since a 109-throw shutout against Atlanta that affirmed his status as the Phillies’ best pitcher at the moment.
Yes, even better than Cristopher Sanchez and Zack Wheeler. Unless we count Aaron Nola’s recent run of nine consecutive excellent starts has bailed them out.
Get the picture? They can pitch. Yeah, their fate will once again rely on a bullpen that can make hearts palpitate faster than anything Wawa might serve over the counter and the boom-or-bust lineup that simply needs to find it for a couple weeks.
Dangerous club – for opponents and for their tortured fans.
Did someone mention pitching?
On paper, the Red Sox’s arms don’t run as deep as the Phillies’ nor the club ranked one spot above them. Yet start with the building blocks of a postseason team – Nos. 1-2 starters and eighth- and ninth-inning guys – and the Red Sox look very much alive.
At 36, Sonny Gray is having one of the finest seasons of his career, his 148 adjusted ERA third-best in his 14 years that includes three All-Star appearances. The Red Sox have been judicious in his usage, as he’s pitched just 156 2/3 innings (he spent two weeks on the IL with a hamstring strain). Perhaps he doesn’t miss enough bats for a No. 1 playoff starter, but another guy does.
That’d be Payton Tolle, the gruntin’ southpaw who has struck out 166 in 143 innings; the Red Sox are 15-10 in his starts.
Meanwhile, closer Aroldis Chapman and set-up man Garrett Whitlock shorten the game considerably, with Chapman holding lefties to a .278 slugging percentage with zero home runs. Lefty Erik Miller, acquired from San Francisco at the deadline, is a beast.
So start there. Will the Red Sox hit enough, particularly a bottom of the order that looks much thinner with Caleb Durbin and Jarren Duran scuffling? It’ll look livelier when Ceddanne Rafaela returns from a quad injury, but there are potential holes.
Is this the most low-key playoff run the Yankees have ever had?
They missed Aaron Judge for 75 games and shrugged through it, didn’t panic when the Tampa Bay Rays kept them at arms’ length in the East and seem wholly confident they’ll repeat their conquest of the Red Sox in the wild-card series and enter the main draw of the AL playoff field as if nothing’s happened.
Perhaps there’s something to that.
That 2025 wild-card series was Cam Schlittler’s coming-out party, and you wonder how he’ll handle the onus of definitive No. 1 starter from the jump this postseason. Gerrit Cole hasn’t been great lately. But Carlos Rodón is back and Max Fried is aiming to build back up and Will Warren looks very good as a back-end starter/long guy.
Oh, and did we mention Judge is back? Hit a home run, even.
No, this is a very good team, one that will win around 95 games and an opponent the Rays can’t be thrilled to face in their AL Division Series. Perhaps the Red Sox will do the dirty work and get them out a round earlier.
If not, there’s significant risk for the rest of the field to let these guys get hot.
This article originally appeared on USA TODAY: Ranking MLB's most dangerous wild card teams for 2026 playoffs
