The Last Road Trip

The Rockies did what they needed to do on their 10 game home stand, going 7-3 including 4-3 vs. the Dodgers and D-Backs.  Granted it would have been better for the Rockies to go 2-1 vs. Dodgers, but their 3-1 series with the D-Backs effectively puts Arizona in the position of needing to sweep both Colorado and the Dodgers in their remaining games, similar to where the Rockies were in 2007. 

So does it become strictly a Dodgers/Rockies battle for first?  The headlines from LA noted that the Dodgers are now 1 game out of the Wild Card after holding off the Cardinals last night. This is probably because they are directly playing the team they need to get ahead of.   As I mentioned before, the Rockies should concentrate on the West Title until they can't, and then worry about positioning in the Wild Card Race.  But for the record, the Rockies are 1/2 game ahead of the Cardinals.   

So the last Road Trip for the Rockies starts this weekend.  Starting off in San Francisco, and then taking them to Los Angeles and Phoenix.   With a magic number of 15 with 16 to go and 17 days to go, the Rockies simply need to average one per game played to win the division.  Of course directly against the Dodgers, there's a chance to gain two.   If the Dodgers lose, the Rockies pick up one. If the Rockies win, they pick up one.  The opposite of course, favors the Dodgers, however their magic number is 18 at the moment.

Also noted, for the first time this season, the Rockies have played more home games than road games  74-72. 

It's also not too early to look at seed positioning.

Currently the standings look like this:

Cubs 85-61 TGR Projection: 95-67
Braves 82-64 TGR: 92-70
Rockies 81-65 TGR: 88-74

The Brewers are also ahead of the Rockies and Braves with an 84-63 Record, however the Wild Card winner will be seeded 4th.

The Braves have a 7.5 game lead over the Phillies, so at this point the Rockies would need to pass them to have Home Field Advantage in the Division Series. We'll look deeper into that later.