As the MLB regular season enters its final weeks, there’s one phrase that you’ll often see surrounding any team with postseason hopes: “magic number.”
It essentially goes like this: If a team’s chances at making the playoffs are high enough, they control their own destiny by only needing to win a certain number of games down the stretch to secure a spot in the postseason picture. That number can also be influenced by the wins and losses of teams in the race around them.
With 12 games remaining, the Cubs sit in the first of three National League Wild Card spots, four games ahead of the San Diego Padres and nine games ahead of the New York Mets. The scenarios for the Cubs to clinch their first postseason berth since 2020 are taking shape — and it could happen very soon.
After their win over the Pittsburgh Pirates on Monday night, the Cubs’ magic number to clinch a Wild Card spot was three.
Then, the San Francisco Giants — who are two games out of the third Wild Card spot — lost to the Arizona Diamondbacks (1.5 games out of the third WC spot), bringing the Cubs’ magic number to two. However, the Cubs cannot clinch on Tuesday, because both the Giants and the Diamondbacks have 75 losses apiece.
Essentially, the Diamondbacks and the Giants playing each other this week complicates matters for the Cubs because of potential NL West tiebreakers.
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That makes Wednesday the earliest the Cubs can clinch.
Here’s what has to go down for the Cubs to pop champagne on Wednesday in Pittsburgh:
Scenario 1Cubs win on Tuesday AND Wednesday
This is the simplest of scenarios — if the Cubs sweep the Pirates, they will be in no matter what by Wednesday’s end. Their magic number stands at two entering play on Tuesday.
Scenario 2
If the Cubs do not sweep the Pirates, here’s what has to go down in the next two days for the Cubs to still clinch on Wednesday:
Cubs win a gameReds lose a gameGiants lose a gameDiamondbacks lose a game
Plainly, the Cubs can afford to lose a game and still clinch on Wednesday if they split the final two games with the Pirates, the Reds lose one of their next two games against the St. Louis Cardinals, and the Giants and Diamondbacks split the final two games of their series.
Here are the game times to look out for on Tuesday:
Cubs at Pirates – 5:40 p.m. CTReds at Cardinals – 6:45 p.m. CTGiants at Diamondbacks – 8:40 p.m. CT
And here are the game times to look out for on Wednesday:
Cubs at Pirates – 11:35 a.m. CTReds at Cardinals – 12:15 p.m. CTGiants at Diamondbacks – 2:40 p.m. CT
Of course, even if the Cubs don’t clinch by the end of play Wednesday, they are still in a prime position to lock up a postseason spot sometime very soon. All they really have to do is win two more games the rest of the season and they will be in the 2025 playoff bracket.