The Amazing Rays

You might not know it, but the Rays and Rangers are making history with their first-round series, one which hopefully leaves the winner with Yankee-killing momentum. How so, you ask?

There have been 96 best-of-five series in baseball history prior to this year, between the League Championship Series from 1969 to 1984, the 1981 Division Series, and the modern Division Series from 1995 until 2009. Of those 96, only 26 - 27% - went the full five games. And of those 26, ten - 38% - saw one team go down 2-0, then rally back to force a fifth game. They were:

1972 ALCS: Oakland 3, Detroit 2
1981 NLDS: LA Dodgers 3, Houston 2
1981 NLDS: Montreal 3, Philadelphia 2
1981 ALDS: NY Yankees 3, Milwaukee 2
1982 ALCS: Milwaukee 3, California 2
1984 NLCS: San Diego 3, Chicago Cubs 2
1995 ALDS: Seattle 3, NY Yankees 2
1999 ALDS: Boston 3, Cleveland 2
2001 ALDS: NY Yankees 3, Oakland 2
2003 ALDS: Boston 3, Oakland 2

A couple of interesting things here. First, in not all of these cases did the team rallying to force a fifth game win the series. The '81 Brewers and Phillies, along with the '72 Tigers, were able to force a fifth game but still lost the series. The other seven, however, all won three straight. That bodes well for the Rays, who evened up their series 2-2 with their second win in Texas today. History gives them a 70% chance of winning on that alone.

Consider this, though: prior to 1998, best-of-five series formats went 2-3, with the team having home field getting the last three games. So seven of the ten series above were played like that, and of those seven, four involved the home team winning all five games - i.e. the winning team going down 2-0 but then winning three straight at home (the '81 Dodgers, '82 Brewers, '84 Padres and '95 Mariners). So in some respects we can't really judge based on these, because series are now played 2-2-1.

And that is really where we get into history. Prior to now, only two teams ever opened a five-game series with two road wins, then lost the next two games at home. They were the '01 A's and the '81 Yankees.

The '81 Yankees won the first two games of their series in Milwaukee, then had three straight at home in which to clinch it - they dropped the first two, but won Game Five.

The '01 A's won the first two games of their series in New York, but after dropping Games Three and Four in Oakland, they had to go back to New York for Game Five... which they lost.

In other words, there has never been a five-game series in which the road team won all five games. The only analogous series to what the Rays/Rangers have done is the '01 ALDS, and if that "pattern" holds, the Rays will win Game Five. If the Rangers win, not only will they be the first team to win a five-game series in which the road team won every game, but they will be just the third team (after the '72 A's and '81 Expos) to take a 2-0 lead in a five-game series, blow the lead, but then win the fifth game on the road to take the series anyway (and just the fourth team to come back to win after letting the series go from 2-0 to 2-2).

So things would seem to look pretty good for the Rays (except for the part where they have to face Cliff Lee in Game Five). One other thing to consider, though. Out of the 26 series that went to five games, however they got there, the deciding Game Five has been won by the home team 14 times and the road team 12 times (including five of the last six). So overall, the chances of the home team winning Game Five are 54% - not much better than even.