On the brink
Happy Thursday! And what an unexpected place we’ve reached in October: The mighty Dodgers are somehow just 1 loss away from elimination, with Milwaukee up 3-0 in the NLCS and heavily favored to move on to the World Series. We’ll look at how the Brewers have flipped last year’s sweep completely on its head — and whether LA has any realistic path back from the deficit almost nobody (except their manager) has ever escaped. Plus, the Rays and Guardians resume their tied-up ALCS this afternoon — someone will take 2-1 control — the Seahawks and Broncos kick off NFL Week 6 tonight, and oh by the way, the Champions League just delivered the highest-scoring day in its history. Here’s what else we’re watching today:
The Main Events
All listed times are Eastern. 🚨= Elimination game
MLB:
⚾ ALCS: Rays (45%) at Guardians (55%) - Game 3 (Series tied 1-1), 1 p.m. (TBS / HBO MAX) - Afternoon start due to inclement weather!
⚾ NLCS: Brewers (42%) at Dodgers (58%) - Game 4 (MIL leads 3-0), 8 p.m. (FS1 / FOX ONE) 🚨
⚾🏆 World Series title check-in: Brewers 58% to win
Football:
🏈 Thursday Night Football: Seahawks (57%) at Broncos (43%) - 8:15 p.m. (Prime Video)
🏈 CFB: East Carolina (65%) at UAB (35%) - 7:30 p.m. (ESPN2)
🏈 CFB: Georgia Southern (61%) at Old Dominion (39%) - 7:30 p.m. (ESPN+)
🏈 CFB: Colorado State (16%) at Texas State (84%) - 8 p.m. (ESPNU)
🏈🏆 Super Bowl check-in: 49ers 16% to win NFL title
🏈🏆 College Football Playoff check-in: Georgia 21% to win national title
NHL:
🏒 Rangers (43%) at Devils (57%) - 7 p.m.
🏒 Sabres (48%) at Maple Leafs (52%) - 7 p.m.
🏒 Mammoth (46%) at Oilers (54%) - 9 p.m.
🏒🏆 Stanley Cup check-in: Avalanche 12% to win
WNBA:
🏀 No games. (Off-day; Dream-Valkyries Finals begins Sat., Oct. 17)
🏀🏆 WNBA title check-in: Valkyries 52% to win
Soccer:
⚽ Europa League: AC Milan (51%) at Red Bull Salzburg (26%) - 12:45 p.m. (Paramount+)
⚽ Europa League: Lyon (41%) vs. Crystal Palace (34%) - 12:45 p.m. (Paramount+)
⚽ Europa League: Celta Vigo (27%) vs. Juventus (45%) - 3 p.m. (Paramount+)
⚽🏆 Champions League title check-in: FC Barcelona 30% to win
⚽🏆 Premier League title check-in: Arsenal FC 64% to win
⚽🏆 Europa League title check-in: SL Benfica 17% to win
⚽🏆 MLS title check-in: Nashville SC 19% to win MLS Cup
⚽🏆 NWSL title check-in: Gotham/Washington 28% to win
NBA:
🏀 Preseason action (regular season starts 10/20)
🏀🏆 NBA title check-in: Spurs 24% to win
Dynasty in danger
After months — nay, years — of Dodger Derangement Syndrome across baseball, Los Angeles’ once-inevitable march to a third-consecutive World Series crown, and with it the argument that MLB owners need to shut down the sport to force a salary cap upon themselves and the players, has hit a major snag. The Milwaukee Brewers, who rank 17th in luxury-tax payroll, not only are up on the No. 1 ranked Dodgers (whose tax payroll is more than double Milwaukee’s) but they are on the verge of sweeping LA out of the playoffs after winning Wednesday night’s Game 3 by a 6-2 score.
To say this has been a shocking development is like saying the dinosaurs were caught just a little off-guard by the asteroid.
Just 12 months ago, the Dodgers humiliated the Brewers with one of the most one-sided sweeps in MLB history — Milwaukee led for just half of an inning out of the series’ 35 total innings (or 1.4%) — and if anything, LA seemed even more powerful this time around. Sure, the Brew Crew won a franchise-record 103 games during the regular season, but the Dodgers seemed to prove last year that they could treat regular seasons with roughly the same seriousness as an NBA contender treats a mid-February game against the Wizards. When the time came to defend their title, we all assumed LA would just flip the switch and leave the rest of baseball in the dust.
Except, it’s been Milwaukee leaving Los Angeles in said dust so far this series. Staking themselves to a 3-0 lead, the Brewers have done it with a combination of timely hitting, mostly lights-out relief pitching, and an uncanny ability to frustrate the Dodgers’ star-studded lineup. In Game 1, they overcame a merely OK Jacob Misiorowski start by scratching out 2 runs against Tarik Skubal, then turning things over to the bullpen to slam the door. Then they knocked out postseason ace Yoshinobu Yamamoto after just 2⅔ innings in Game 2, with William Contreras delivering both the tying homer and go-ahead single in a 7-4 win. And on Wednesday, Milwaukee turned a 2-1 deficit into a 4-2 lead with back-to-back seventh-inning homers from Jake Bauers and Garrett Mitchell off of the previously dominant Blake Snell, eventually pulling away for a 6-2 victory.
All the while, LA's mighty offense has managed just 7 runs in 3 games, looking nothing like the October juggernaut we've come to expect. Shohei Ohtani is hitting just .182 with a .515 OPS this postseason, and he’s not alone — of LA’s 10 most-used batters these playoffs, only three (Kyle Tucker at .886, Max Muncy at .810 and Freddie Freeman at .664) have an OPS even over .600 — for context, the league average during the regular season was .719.
Now, the big question becomes how much the humbled-but-not-eliminated Dodgers can chip away at the Brewers’ commanding lead. Manager Dave Roberts knows a thing or two about coming back from down 3-0 — his stolen base in Game 4 of the 2004 ALCS was the turning point for Boston becoming the only MLB team to surmount the insurmountable 3-0 deficit — and LA will turn to Tyler Glasnow (1.73 playoff ERA the past 2 seasons) in Game 4 tonight. Traders only think there’s a 41% chance the series ends in a sweep:
They even think there’s an 11% chance the Dodgers come back from down 3-0 — a spot all previous teams are 1-41 (2.3%) in, so some habits die hard even in an impossible situation. And who knows? Maybe the Dodgers have one last switch to flip. But the Brewers are 1 win away from shattering our most deeply-held assumptions about life, the universe and — most importantly — baseball.
Somebody forgot how to defend
The Champions League got back underway this week, and the results were absolute offensive fireworks on Wednesday. Across 9 matches, there were 46 total goals scored (or 5.11 per match), with PSG beating Man City 4-2, Real Madrid outscoring Roma 4-3, Liverpool topping LASK 6-3 behind a Bradley Barcola hat trick, and Aston Villa dropping a 6-0 result on Fenerbahçe. That made for the single highest-scoring day (minimum 5 matches) in the history of the Champions League/European Cup, and it also made Matchweek 2 of this season’s campaign the highest-scoring week in Champions League/European Cup history.
What else we’re reading
Smart, short reads we liked while building today’s odds.
🏈 “Daily Debunk: Special teams play will cost the Rams the Super Bowl” by Kevin Cole
🏈 “Advanced NFL Coin Toss Analytics” by Ray Carpenter
🏀 “Enjoy the LeBron Lower-Third Era While It Lasts” by Bryan Curtis
🏈 “Contract-Year ALWAYS Wins in the NFL” by Caroline Edmonds
🏈 “Debating Peter King over the most important media people in NFL history” by Andrew Marchand
Next on deck…
Friday (10/16)
🏈 CFB: Memphis at Tulane
⚾ MLB Playoffs: Rays at Guardians, ALCS Game 4
⚾ MLB Playoffs: Brewers at Dodgers, NLCS Game 5 (if necessary) 🚨
🏀 WNBA Playoffs: No games. (Off-day)
🏒 NHL: Penguins at Avalanche
⚽ Soccer: Eintracht Frankfurt vs. Köln
Saturday (10/17)
🏈 CFB: #4 Ohio State at #5 Indiana
🏈 CFB: #2 Notre Dame at #8 BYU
🏈 CFB: #13 Missouri at #9 Ole Miss
🏈 CFB: #6 Alabama at #14 Tennessee
🏈 CFB: #16 Mississippi State at #22 LSU
🏈 CFB: #18 Oklahoma State at #20 Houston
⚾ MLB Playoffs: Rays at Guardians, ALCS Game 5 🚨
🏀🏆 WNBA Playoffs: Dream at Valkyries, WNBA Finals Game 1
🏒 NHL: Hurricanes at Jets
⚽ Premier League: Liverpool at Brentford
🥊 Boxing: Sebastian Fundora vs. Ermal Hadribeaj (WBC junior middleweight title)
🥊 UFC Fight Night: Buckley vs. Malott
Sunday (10/18)
🏈 NFL: Cowboys at Packers
🏈 NFL: Chargers at Chiefs
🏈 NFL: Ravens at Browns
🏈 NFL: Texans vs. Jaguars (London game)
⚾ MLB Playoffs: Dodgers at Brewers, NLCS Game 6 (if necessary) 🚨
🏀🏆 WNBA Playoffs: No games. (Off-day)
🏒 NHL: Hurricanes at Flames
⚽ Premier League: Leeds United vs. Manchester United
🏁 NASCAR: South Point 400 at Las Vegas Motor Speedway
🏁 F1: United States Grand Prix (Austin)
