Buy or sell: Breaking down MLB’s biggest playoff and awards races

We’ve gotten through the trade deadline season, and the rosters that will decide the playoff picture over the next month-plus are set in stone. Teams continue to jockey for playoff positioning, and many races – particularly in the Wild Card standings – are very tight. 

Players are also showcasing their talents for top awards races, and we all love to debate who should take home which hardware.

Which MLB contenders and award favorites are for real?

With SeatGeek serving as the Official Ticket Marketplace of MLB, we’ve followed all 30 teams and their players very closely, and we’re also paying close attention to what fans and pundits have to say about all things baseball. As such, we’re breaking down whether we’re buying or selling eight very important MLB topics. 

Buy: The Cubs are a legit threat to Brewers in NL Central race

The Cubs finally have some rotation depth after adding Kevin Gausman and Clay Holmes ahead of last week’s trade deadline, and that’s exactly what Chicago needed if it was to have any chance of catching the Brewers. 

The Cubs have been streaky this year – sometimes to a fault – but when they’re hot, they’re typically red hot. Gausman and Holmes provide some needed stability in the rotation, which is simply something the team hasn’t had for much of 2026. But the team was still barely outside the top 10 in ERA while ranking second in runs scored. If Gausman and/or Holmes get on a roll here, you’re looking at a team with maybe the best offense in baseball and a top-10 pitching staff.

Now, the Brewers are second in team ERA and are top five in runs scored, so it’s not like that magically will make the Cubs better. But they took two of three from Milwaukee the last time these teams faced off in June after getting swept in a cold stretch in May, and these rivals square off seven times in September in what could very well decide the NL Central. 

The Cubs are just three games back of Milwaukee after spending most of the year in rotation purgatory. Some stability there coupled with continual hot play from the lineup should make the Brewers very scared moving forward. 

Sell: Pete Crow-Armstrong will win NL MVP over Shohei Ohtani

We’ll stick with the Cubs here but move to the NL MVP race. 

Ohtani has been the clear favorite all year long, which makes sense as he won this award each of the last two years, and he’s also pitched more in 2026 than he ever has in a Dodgers uniform. But PCA has been playing out of this world for a while now, and he leads MLB in bWAR with Ohtani sitting second. 

What Crow-Armstrong has done is incredible. He’s an awesome young talent who is arguably baseball’s best defender regardless of position. He’s the game’s elite power-speed threat, and he’s really just an all-around great hitter overall. But I think we need to talk about what the MVP award has become. 

Full disclosure: I think MVP is a bit of a silly moniker. While WAR does a pretty good job of assigning value, it doesn’t always paint a full picture of how important a player is to their team’s success. As such, an award that is meant to represent value has slowly but surely morphed into who is the best player in the league that year? Sometimes those things line up, but the Dodgers would have won a lot of games without Ohtani last year, even with him largely off the mound. Was he still more valuable than other top MVP contenders who finished behind him in the standings? 

Voters have shown that the “valuable” aspect of this award isn’t really important anymore. MVP is really LBP, or League’s Best Player. And that’s totally fine! As such, I think Ohtani will still get the hardware here barring voter fatigue, injury or Ohtani really scuffling down the stretch. Even if he doesn’t pitch again, he was great on the hill to start the year, and that simply puts him in a different category than everyone else. 

But if Ohtani continues to hit well and returns to the mound and pitches anywhere close to how he did before this knee injury took that part of his game away, I think it’s hard to overtake him. I know his glove provides a ton of value, but even as good as PCA has been overall, Ohtani has the same number of home runs (27) and more RBIs along with a higher batting average, on-base percentage and OPS and is just a single point worse in slugging percentage. Add in a sub-2 ERA and nearly 3 bWAR as a pitcher and yeah, Ohtani’s still really freaking good. PCA has a strong MVP case, but I don’t think it’s strong enough to name him the NL MVP favorite at this point in time. 

Buy: The Mariners are cooked

Things have not gone well in the Pacific Northwest. After emerging as the top team in the AL West and sitting four games over .500 as of June 9, the offense has absolutely cratered and the Mariners now find themselves with one of the worst records in the American League while in the midst of a tremendously difficult August schedule. Seattle has lost six in a row and is now nine games under .500. 

Ahead of the season, there were plenty of reasons to be optimistic about the Mariners’ chances to reach the franchise’s first World Series. They returned a very strong pitching staff, had the bulk of their offense from last year back, added a very good player in Brendan Donovan and were just a few outs away from winning Game 7 of the ALCS last October. Add in the presence of Cal Raleigh off a 60-homer season, Josh Naylor staying on a five-year deal and Julio Rodriguez being one of the game’s best all-around talents, and you had the makings of a World Series team.

But even amid a very weak AL West and AL Wild Card, the Mariners have not been able to put it together this summer. The pitching is still very good, but the offense regularly fails to score even four runs at times, making it very difficult to string wins together. There’s name recognition here, sure, and this is a team many of us have thought would get hot and shoot up the standings eventually, but time is running out and this stretch of the schedule is very difficult. Raleigh, Naylor and Rodriguez have all struggled tremendously throughout the year, cratering an offense that’s arguably the worst in baseball. There’s an outside chance they make a run, but at nine games under .500 and 4.5 games out of a playoff spot, it looks like the Mariners’ time has run out. 

Sell: The Red Sox are the team to beat in the American League

What the Red Sox have done this year is almost unreal. The team went 21-4 in July and has gone 32-10 since June 25. Who does that? 

Even with ace Garrett Crochet sidelined for basically all of 2026, the Sox have had one of baseball’s best rotations, headlined by an elite year from veteran right-hander Sonny Gray. It was always a matter of the offense getting it together. That’s happened, and suddenly Boston is as well-rounded of a team as there is in baseball. But has this hot stretch catapulted them into being the team to beat in the American League? That I’m not so sure.

The Rays have been great start to finish and have a great pitching staff with three great starters, a formerly great starter (Freddy Peralta) who could certainly get hot and a dominant bullpen, and the lineup is just very tough and has a quartet of big bats who can make you pay in any given at-bat.

And even amid some inconsistent play with Aaron Judge out, the Yankees are very dangerous, especially with an elite starting rotation of their own. If Judge returns and looks like he normally does, the Yankees could be viewed as the AL’s top contender for a World Series title.

But for now, I’ll lean Tampa Bay as the top dog. I’ll give Boston a slight edge over New York for the No. 2 spot, but I have a hard time putting the Red Sox above the Rays, even as good as they’ve played for the last month and a half.

Buy: The AL pennant winner is in the AL East

In case you couldn’t tell from above, I – like many others – think the three best teams in the American League are in the AL East. Now, the White Sox have been an awesome surprise this year and shouldn’t be discredited, and the Astros are loaded with postseason experience, but I have a hard time seeing either of those teams getting through the AL playoff picture and securing a pennant. 

The Rays are the most complete team in the entire AL, the Red Sox are the hottest and the Yankees have the best pitching staff and a different ace in the hole with Judge, who should return before the end of the regular season. It’s very difficult to envision the Astros, White Sox, Tigers, Guardians, Rangers or whoever getting through one or more of those three squads. 

Someone could get red hot and ride that momentum into a deep October run, but it doesn’t feel like any of these non-AL East squads will represent the league in the World Series over the likes of Tampa Bay, New York or Boston.

Sell: Dylan Cease is AL Cy Young frontrunner over Cam Schlittler

Don’t get me wrong – this is very close. These are the clear two best pitchers in the American League this year, and they’ll finish first and second in Cy Young voting barring injury or a catastrophic collapse by one or both of them.

Schlittler has been the frontrunner in this race all year long, and it’s easy to see why. The second-year right-hander has really broken out and been a major part of the Yankees’ success this year, anchoring a rotation that missed key veterans early on and also leads MLB in team ERA. He’s 10-6 with an AL-leading 2.21 ERA and 4.9 bWAR. Schlittler also has a sub-1 WHIP with 11.2 K/9, 6.4 H/9 and 1.9 BB/9 over 146 2/3 innings in 25 starts. 

Cease’s numbers are more than comparable. He’s 7-5 with a 2.40 ERA, and he’s also tied with Schlittler with 4.9 bWAR. Cease leads the AL with 191 strikeouts, 13.1 K/9, 5.8 H/9 and 0.6 HR/9 in 131 1/3 innings over 22 starts. 

I think Cease has had the higher peak this year with the Blue Jays, especially considering he’s put up these numbers in three fewer starts than Schlittler to date, but it’s pretty incredible what Schlittler has done in just his second MLB season and his first full year of MLB action. He’s been the guy in a rotation that also features Gerrit Cole and Max Fried. And with those two missing considerable time, Schlittler more than carried the load, and he’s the biggest reason New York has the No. 1 team ERA in all of baseball. Add in that the pitching staff has needed to be elite with Aaron Judge on the shelf and Schlittler’s value just continues to skyrocket. 

Unlike MVP, team success doesn’t always play a role in Cy Young voting. But if voters take that into account, Schlittler has been the most valuable pitcher in the American League this year. The consistency we’re seeing from him is pretty remarkable, as he’s allowed three or more runs just six times this year, and four or more just three times. He’s basically spinning better than a quality start each time he takes the mound. 

Cease’s strikeout prowess and lack of hits allowed will make him an intriguing option, but Schlittler has been arguably more dominant overall while also being more consistent. He’d get my vote, and I think he’ll take home the honors when it’s all said and done. 

Buy: The AL Rookie of the Year race is over

Munetaka Murakami was my preseason pick to win AL Rookie of the Year, and considering he was on a 57-homer pace after swatting 20 homers over his first 57 games, I feel somewhat vindicated. But a hamstring injury cost him more than a month, and while he’s still been very good upon returning, the overall production has dipped. Couple that with just steady elite play from Detroit infielder Kevin McGonigle and it appears this race is done barring an injury. 

McGonigle has been tremendous as Detroit’s soon-to-be-21-year-old infielder is hitting .286 while getting on base nearly 40% of the time with some pop and more walks than strikeouts. He has an approach that’s well beyond his years, and really he’s a bit of an old-school player in terms of his offensive approach. He also showcases a great glove at multiple positions. 

Murakami needs to get scorching hot to make this a race again, but McGonigle has been just really darn good from the jump for the Tigers and hasn’t missed time. If Murakami can get to 40 home runs (he’s at 26) then he has a chance, but this is looking more like a question of whether or not the Detroit youngster will be unanimous Rookie of the Year. 

Sell: Dodgers are no longer baseball’s best team

Did we not learn our lesson last year? The Dodgers didn’t have the best record in baseball, nor did they earn a first-round bye in the National League. It obviously didn’t matter as they rolled through the National League before winning the World Series in seven games.

That’s not to say the Dodgers are perfect, by any means. The bullpen is still a bit of a weak spot, some big names – Kyle Tucker and Mookie Betts – are struggling and the rotation has been beat up for much of the season. And the Dodgers have also really struggled in recent weeks. 

But I don’t think any team in baseball has shown enough to point to and say, “Yeah, that team is the team over the reigning two-time champs.” The Brewers have the best record in the National League, but they have yet to show their formula can work deep in the postseason. The Braves at one time looked like the best team in baseball, and while they’re still very good, I don’t think they have the makeup to get past the Dodgers and into the World Series. Over in the American League, the Yankees have some issues offensively and are awaiting Judge’s return, the Red Sox are hot, but it’s unclear if that’s sustainable, and the Rays aren’t nearly as deep or talented as the Dodgers are even if they have baseball’s best record entering Thursday. 

It may be a simplification, but the Dodgers still need to be viewed as the team to beat. No one team has shown enough to put them in a different category than L.A., and I have a hard time seeing that changing over these next few months.