The end of the season is fast approaching, and it’s looking more and more likely that the Astros will not just be heading to the postseason, but that they will be facing the Cleveland Indians in the first round. Because MLB doesn’t seed playoff teams just by record, but rather, by the way they got into the playoffs then their record, the Astros would either need to pass the Red Sox in record or fall below the Athletics to change this. The former would require Houston to win every remaining game and Boston to lose every remaining game, and while Boston has choked badly down the stretch in living memory, I wouldn’t go betting on something that unlikely to happen again. The latter scenario is plausible, but still pretty unlikely even before you factor in that the biggest difference in their remaining schedules is that the Astros get four games against the Orioles instead of three against the Mariners.

So the Indians it is then (the Indians can no longer pass the Astros for the second seed, but even if they could, they would still face each other in the Division Series). They’ve been a good team this year, for a variety of reasons. Francisco Lindor and Jose Ramirez are legitimate MVP candidates, and their rotation is the only one that ranks above the Astros in Fangraphs’ version of WAR. You never want to underestimate any team in the playoffs, and even if you do take your opponent seriously, the best team doesn’t always win in October (just ask the 2006 Cardinals, or 1987 Twins). The randomness of baseball aside, if you are the nervous fan looking for good news about the postseason matchup, there are a few reasons to feel good about facing Cleveland.

In fact, the Indians are probably going to be the weakest team in the playoffs this season. Regardless of total wins or wild card status, the historic badness of the AL Central has likely inflated the Indians’ stats for the year. People have been noting this throughout the year, that the division has a truly historic clustering of bad teams, but it’s still worth noting as we draw close to the end of the season just how true that has been.

The division already has three 90-game losers, and could even see a fourth; the Twins aren’t likely to make it, given they’d need to go 1-9 the rest of the way, but they’ve had stretches this year where they’ve gone 1-11, 2-11, and 2-10, so it wouldn’t exactly be unheard of (of course, their own intra-division play has likely saved them, as they have a .422 winning percentage against non-AL Central teams). If the White Sox go 2-8 the rest of the way (feasible, given both their own streaks of 2-14, 2-13, 2-10, and 1-9 and a schedule that features the Cubs, Indians, and Twins), it would mark the first division since the 2012 NL Central to feature two 100-loss teams (courtesy of the Cubs and Astros, of course), and the first five-team division to do so since the 2002 AL Central.

There haven’t been any five-team divisions, since the switch the current three-division format, that have featured two 90-loss teams and a 100-loss team, let alone one 90-loss and two 100-loss (the 2001 and 2011 NL Central matched the former, but since there was an extra team there, the division wasn’t quite as bottom-heavy as this version of the AL Central). Four 90-loss teams would be, of course, totally unprecedented. Generally, the unbalanced schedule of modern baseball that focuses on divisional face-offs means that someone gets to avoid racking up losses, but nobody told that to this year’s AL Central.

But what does this all mean for the Astros? Well, all of those games against bad teams might be making them look better than they really are. After all, exactly two-thirds of their games this year will have come against teams with a losing record. Take their offenses, for instance. The two have looked pretty similar this year on the surface, with the Indians narrowly leading the Astros .762 to .756. Of course, we know that doesn’t account for a number of factors, and something like wRC+ shows the Astros leading the league at 111 against the Indians still-decent 103. But what does it look like once we break it down to games against over-and-under-.500 teams? And how does it stack up against the other AL Playoff teams?

AL Playoff Teams Offense vs Winning and Losing Teams Team Games (>.500) Games (<.500) OPS OPS (>.500) OPS(<.500) Diff Team Games (>.500) Games (<.500) OPS OPS (>.500) OPS(<.500) Diff Boston 71 81 0.784 0.720 0.838 0.118 Cleveland 51 100 0.762 0.687 0.797 0.11 Houston 79 73 0.756 0.755 0.757 0.002 New York 66 85 0.776 0.729 0.81 0.081 Oakland 82 70 0.758 0.689 0.814 0.125

So the Indians have played by far the fewest games against quality opponents, with the Astros 60% ahead of them. Interestingly, the Astros have shown the least difference across quality of opponents, and the Indians’ difference doesn’t look too out of line with the A’s and Red Sox. Of course, the Red Sox’s OPSs are noticeably higher against both good and bad teams, while the A’s have managed similar superficial numbers while playing their home games in a much harder run-scoring environment (in contrast, Fenway Park and Progressive Field rated pretty similarly in most recent park factors I could find).

The pitching numbers are an even starker contrast. Looking at Run Average (rather than Earned Run Average) for each team’s pitching staff, we see:

AL Playoff Teams Runs Allowed vs. Winning and Losing Teams Team RA RA (>.500) RA (<.500) Diff Team RA RA (>.500) RA (<.500) Diff Boston 3.89 4.34 3.52 -0.82 Cleveland 4.02 5.05 3.50 -1.55 Houston 3.34 3.68 2.97 -0.70 New York 4.04 3.97 4.09 0.12 Oakland 4.10 4.67 3.63 -1.04

The Indians look superficially comparable to the Yankees and Athletics, but a big part of that is due to fattening up on bad teams. This could be a good match-up for a strong Astros’ lineup, assuming that trend holds.

One last specific area that I want to take a quick look at is starting pitching, since that’s the clear strength of this Indians team. All four of their likely playoff starters have 4.0 WAR seasons so far (Fangraphs again), and three of them will likely finish above 5.0. But let’s break down their numbers again, and compare it with the Astros’ starters.

Starters vs. Winning and Losing Teams Name IP ERA WHIP K% Name IP ERA WHIP K% Verlander (losing teams) 122.2 2.42 0.929 33.7% Verlander (winning teams) 79.1 3.06 0.933 34.4% Cole (losing teams 71.1 2.65 1.093 37.4% Cole (winning teams) 116.0 3.03 1.009 33.0% Morton (losing teams) 58.1 2.62 1.149 33.9% Morton (winning teams) 104.2 3.44 1.185 25.7% Keuchel (losing teams) 101.1 2.49 1.253 19.4% Keuchel (winning teams) 90.1 4.78 1.306 15.5% McCullers (losing teams) 54.2 4.77 1.409 32.2% McCullers (winning teams) 71.1 3.28 1.023 21.8% Bauer (losing teams) 114.1 2.2 1.102 31.5% Bauer (winning teams) 51.2 2.26 1.065 31.3% Kluber (losing teams) 125.0 2.38 0.84 26.6% Kluber (winning teams) 78.0 3.81 1.205 24.8% Carrasco (losing teams) 114.2 2.43 1.02 28.7% Carrasco (winning teams) 61.1 5.28 1.321 29.0% Clevinger (losing teams) 146.1 2.52 1.08 26.3% Clevinger (winning teams) 42.0 4.93 1.476 23.6% Bieber (losing teams) 65.0 4.15 1.369 24.5% Bieber (winning teams) 39.0 5.08 1.282 24.4%

The best of the best pitchers, like Verlander, Cole, and Bauer, seem to not be affected much by team quality (Kluber also falls here, as his over-.500 numbers are badly skewed by one nightmare start against the Cardinals). But Mike Clevinger and Carlos Carrasco look like they could be exposed by a good lineup (which is especially nice because it looks like Carrasco will be starting one of the first two games of the Division Series). And while Lance McCullers going to the bullpen for injuries and being replaced in the rotation by Dallas Keuchel is suboptimal, I would absolutely take that over the Indians’ injury situation of Trevor Bauer (who is just about to come off the DL ten games before the postseason) possibly not being 100% (and, worst case scenario, having his extra innings taken on by Shane Bieber).

Now, ultimately, this could mean nothing, given the small sample size randomness of the playoffs. But I think it will be an interesting point to keep in mind once the Division Series starts, and if nothing else, looking for things like this to be positive about is a good way for me to manage my baseball-related anxiety as we head into the postseason, so maybe it’ll be something of a comfort for some of you as well.