Philadelphia Phillies pose for a photo following the series victory against the Atlanta Braves. Eric Hartline-USA TODAY Sports

MLB League Championship matchups will make infamous history

By Adam Gretz | Last updated 10/13/23

The 2023 Major League Baseball playoffs have been defined by upsets, and that is showing itself in the two League Championship Series matchups.

The upsets continued on Thursday night when the Philadelphia Phillies eliminated the league's best regular-season team, the Atlanta Braves, in four games to advance to their second straight NLCS.

It is the second year in a row the Phillies will have reached that point in the season while winning 90 games or fewer. They reached the World Series a year ago winning just 87 regular-season games.

This time they will be joined in the LCS by three other teams (Texas, Houston and Arizona) that also won 90 games or fewer.

If that seems like an outrageously low number for the final four teams in the playoffs, that is because it is. This will be the first time (excluding shortened seasons) that all four LCS teams will be participating after failing to win more than 90 games during the regular season.

This is the first time in MLB postseason history (excluding shortened seasons) that all 4 teams in the LCS have 90 or fewer regular season wins.
— Katie Sharp (@ktsharp) October 13, 2023

Philadelphia, Texas and Houston each won 90 games during the regular season, while Arizona has reached the NLCS after winning only 84 games.

The league's best teams, Atlanta, Baltimore, Los Angeles, Tampa Bay and Milwaukee, all of whom won 92 games or more, all failed to win a single series in the playoffs. Not only that, they managed to win only a single game in the playoffs. Atlanta won Game 2 of the NLDS, while the Orioles, Dodgers, Rays and Brewers were all swept in their wild-card and divisional series rounds.

The biggest reason for this weird piece of history is simply the expanded playoffs. More teams make the playoffs now than ever before, which means teams with fewer wins in the regular season. When there were only two or four teams making the playoffs, there was a significantly higher bar to clinch a spot. That is no longer the case, and it creates a situation where upsets are going to happen. This season there just happened to be a lot of upsets.

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