MLB Postseason 2017: Recapping the Series That Made Champs of the Houston Astros

It was a bumpy road for the Houston Astros from the regular season to their first ever franchise World Championship. They nearly dropped out vs. the Yankees in the ALCS, when they reached the nadir of their playoff chances. The Dodgers had a chance to bounce them, too. Houston prevailed, however, only occasionally the favorite but eventually the only team left standing.

World Championship Probabilities by Playoff Team over Time

An Astros victory in seven games was the third most likely projected outcome at the start of the series at 14%.

Estimated Probability of Discrete Series Results

The Astros' hopes bottomed out at 12% after their game five loss to the New York Yankees, putting them down 3-2 in the American League Championship series. They would later rebound, of course.

Probability of Winning Various Postseason Series: Houston

The simulator performed slightly above average when it came to Houston's World Series odds throughout the postseason. A Houston win seven games was among the top ranked possibilities at the start of every new round, becoming steadily more likely as the playoffs progressed, but becoming relatively less likely compared to other possibilities according to the model.



The modeled simulation took off in the final two rounds of the postseason. Barely better than chance in the LDS round, the simulator was successful vs. a random guess in the ALCS, NLCS and World Series.



You can review every post of the 2017 MLB Postseason here. Thank you for following along. It was a blast as always.