N.L. Tiebreakers

I've been trolling a lot of Roto/Fantasy blogs tonight, and I notice that there's understandably a good deal of confusion about the tiebreaker scenarios in the National League. Under Troy Tulowitzki tonight, Rotoworld says:

The Rockies need a win and a Padres loss Sunday to have a shot, and that would only get them into a playoff, possibly with the Mets or Phillies.

Technically, that's correct. But there's much more to it than that.

First off, there's obviously the possibility that everything ends cleanly tomorrow and there are no ties that result in a play-off or play-offs to get into the NLDS. If the Padres win, they are the wild card no matter what. If the Rockies lose, they are out. If the Phillies win and the Mets lose or if the Mets win and the Phillies lose, the loser goes home regardless of what happens with the Padres and Rockies.

That's easy enough, since it's all based on records. Where it gets complicated is due to the fact that some people are confused by the coin flips. Coin flips only apply in three-way tie scenarios. They do not apply if there is a four-way tie. If there is a four-way tie, head-to-head records are used to determine how many games a team must play and where those games will be played.

If both the Mets and the Phillies lose on Sunday, they play a winner-take-all play-off for the N.L. East regardless of what happens elsewhere. That's because the Padres already have 89 wins, and the Mets and Phillies currently only have 88. If the Mets, Phillies and Padres lose and the Rockies win, there will be two play-off games that will not create a scenario that generates additional play-off games. The Mets head to Philadelphia for a one-game play-off to determine the N.L. East winner while the Padres would go to Colorado to play for the Wild Card. The winner of each of those games heads to the play-offs.

If the Mets and Phillies both win, and the Padres and Rockies both lose, then the Rockies are eliminated. The Mets go to Philly to determine the winner of the N.L. East. The loser then plays the Padres to determine the Wild Card. The Phillies would be at San Diego, while San Diego would be at New York.

The crazy four-way scenario only takes place if the Mets, Phillies and Rockies win and the Padres lose. All four teams would then be deadlocked at 89 wins. In this wacky scenario:

• The Mets go to Philadelphia to determine the winner of the N.L. East.
• The loser is then thrown into the three-way tie for the Wild Card. The Rockies have the best head-to-head record between themselves, the Phillies and Padres or the Mets and Padres, so they can choose to either host two games or take a "bye" and play the winner amongst the other two teams.
• In the Rockies/Phillies/Padres scenario, the Phillies have the second best head-to-head record, so they would host the Padres and then the winner would host the Rockies.
• In the Rockies/Mets/Padres scenario, the Padres have the second best head-to-head record, so they would host the Mets and then the winner would host the Rockies.
• If, for some reason, the Rockies wanted to take advantage of their 50-31 record at home (and Matt Holliday's 300+ OPS differential at Coors), they could choose to host two games. However, this is a dangerous choice: you're only "hosting" two games if you win the first game. If you lose you go home.
  
• If the Rockies did decide they wanted the two home games, the Phillies could still choose to play at Colorado and then would host the Padres if they won. Or the Phillies could take the road game and San Diego would go to Colorado and then the Phillies would play the winner on the road.
• If the Rockies did decide they wanted the two home games in the Mets/Padres wild card scenario, it is the Padres that have the option of either sending the Mets to Colorado and then traveling to the winner or going to Colorado and then sending the Mets to the winner.

I hope my explanation cleared things up for anyone who was confused by the possibility of the four-way tie.

Thanks to Jesse Spector's blog Touching Base at the New York Daily News for providing the most concise explanation of the four-way tiebreaker that I could find on the Internet.