Red Sox Favorite to Win World Series

The fine folks at Baseball Prospectus, who know whereof they speak did a million trial monte carlo simulation of postseason games taking into account pitching matchups.

The results from before yesterday's games.

---------- October 7 ---------------------
    Win DS   Win CS   Win WS    Yesterday
NYY  64.2544  33.6435  18.8283
LAA  30.8092  10.5926   3.7159
MIN  35.7456  16.0003   8.5059
BOS  69.1908  39.7636  26.6750
LAD  39.9346  17.5593   5.8868
PHI  61.8630  34.4457  17.8936
STL  60.0654  30.8148  13.4236
COL  38.1370  17.1802   5.0709

And the result after yesterday's games.

---------- October 7 ---------------------
    Win DS   Win CS   Win WS    Yesterday
NYY  76.6305  41.3935  23.2491   Won 7-2, lead series 1-0
LAA  30.7729  10.2526   3.7739
MIN  23.3695  11.1399   5.8484   Lost 7-2, trail series 1-0
BOS  69.2271  37.2140  24.9517
LAD  63.3328  25.9809   8.5261   Won 5-3, lead series 1-0
PHI  78.5403  44.5621  22.5593   Won 5-1, lead series 1-0
STL  36.6672  20.0471   8.2973   Lost 5-3, trail series 1-0
COL  21.4597   9.4099   2.7942   Lost 5-1, trail series 1-0

That, my friends, is the power of having two completely studly pitchers and an awesome bullpen.

Also I think these numbers point out how similar the baseball postseason is to a poker tournament. You don't win so much as you avoid losing.