Save Our Ship: Strength of Schedule and the Second Half

The time is now. The day is today. Our Seattle Mariners go into the second half 41-48, with a -48 run differential, a hope, and a prayer. Today could be the start of a one of the best comebacks in recent baseball memory, or the beginning of the end of the Zduriencik era. Before first pitch in the Bronx, I looked at where we are (not a happy place) and where we might be going (value undefined), using opponent strength of schedule as map. (Note: The acronym for Strength of Schedule is SOS which is also the acronym for Save Our Ship. Mariners sail on ships. They also play baseball. There's a joke in there. It's funny.) Let's go on an adventure!

The Bad News

How did we get here? What happened to us? The first half of the 2015 has been... not good. Gone are the halcyon days of March, when Mike Zunino was hitting the baseball and our 3-4-5 was being heralded as one of the best in the game. The bullpen has been doing its best to remind us what a cruel mistress regression can be. We have been hurt, we have been a bit unlucky; mostly, we've been pretty bad at baseball. Our 2015 Mariners story has been a tale of woe. The shocking thing? By all accounts, it actually should have been a little worse.

We all look back at June as the Month of Doom, but the fact is, the Mariners have played .500 ball just two months this season. Worse, at no point during this season have they posted a positive run differential. May was close, but that was presumably only because Kyle Seager won one baseball game twice. Hampered by the 27th ranked offense (Seriously, there are teams worse than the Mariners? Worse at hitting a baseball? Seriously?), hitting .209 with RISP, this offense has been bad. But given a -48 run differential, our Pythagorean wins over the first half were projected at 39. The 2015 Mariners: Luckier Than We Initially Thought!

The Good News

Mediocrity Parity is real! While the NL plays host to five teams at least ten games out of first place for their division leads, and a couple of legitimate dumpster fires (LOL Phillies), the AL is a sea of ‘meh' teams with a few winners floating on top. The Mariners are (only?) seven games out of the second wild card, but will have to leap frog nine teams to get there. The second wild card is projected around 87 wins, meaning the Mariners will need to finish 46-27 and play .630 ball down the stretch. How realistic it that scenario? One place we might look to help answer that question is at their second half strength of schedule:

According to ESPN, the M's played a .505 strength of schedule in the first half, or the 11th hardest schedule in baseball. The Mariners are bad, so that sounds pretty daunting! Well the second half Mariners have it a little easier; the weighted average win percentage for their second half opponents is .497. That's not a big drop off, but in an AL race that is likely to be very tight, every little bit helps. And while some of these teams are getting hot at the most annoying possible time (I'm looking at you, Anaheim baseball team), we catch breaks with others; we'll face a still Miggy-less Tigers team for four, get six against the pretty gross Rockies (although Coors field is always a Rocky Mountain gambel), and (hopefully) play host to the Mark Trumbo Revenge Series vs. the Diamondbacks (that trade: still pretty dumb).

More marginally good news? While the Rangers have shown surprising resilience given pre-season injuries, they boast (?) a terrible run differential of their own, and a sub .500 record. And we play them every day thirteen times in the second half. The moment for a rousing Coach Taylor halftime speech is now. Let's beat Texas forever.

And in perhaps the small sample size reachiest factoid of all, the Mariners will play more of their games on the road than they will in the Hunger Games like arena of Safeco. For the second year in a row, the Mariners have a better road record, playing .500 on the road and a grizzly .426 in front of their home fans. When you need every game, it's better to play where you win (sometimes although not a lot because again this team has been bad).

A lot of things have to break the Mariners way in the second half. They will have to get lucky, and they'll have to stay healthy. Mostly, they'll really just have to play better baseball. The road ahead is tricky but navigable. The payoff would be the sweetest. So let's go on a little run. Let's put on a show. LET'S GO M's. The time is now, before time runs out.