Quantifying Hope: Listless Cubs Somehow Maintaining Better Playoff Odds Than Cardinals

It’s been a really wild week here at CI, what with the trade deadline taking its annual psychological toll and the Cubs playing like 75 pounds of crap in a 50-pound bag. So if it’s all the same to you, this week’s QH is going to be even more brief than usual.

Despite dropping six of nine on the road trip, including two of three with a grand total of three runs in St. Louis, the Cubs somehow maintain the best playoff odds in the division. It helps that Pittsburgh’s odds now match the amount of class displayed by Clint Hurdle and their pitching staff, but all the bottom-feeding teams in the world won’t help if the Cubs can win a damn road series.

This will turn into a battle of attrition down the stretch, which is where the Cubs do look better than the Cardinals, who did nothing at the deadline to improve their roster. Even so, you can’t feel good when you look at a chart that had the Cards at 18% odds on July 12 and 53.2% just three weeks later.

Now that the clock has officially struck Big Boy Time, perhaps we’ll see these trends head in more positive directions. Well, for the Cubs at least, since St. Louis has been heading up and away for a while now. If you’re looking for another chart that accurately depicts the Cubs season so far, here’s another one for you…

Speaking of positive direction, I do want to leave you with a note of thanks for a month of July that was the biggest in CI history. Like, by a lot. Our growth chart looks a lot sexier than the Cubs’ odds chart above and that’s only because we have great readers. Sometimes, anyway.

Seriously, y’all are awesome.

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