Tigers Tragic Number: Don't let the weak schedule fool you, their season's all but over

Entering play on Wednesday, the Tigers are 9.5 games behind the AL Central-leading White Sox and 7.5 games out of the third Wild Card spot with six teams standing in their way. They're not totally dead yet, but they may as well be.

There are less than three weeks and 17 games left of the regular season. They have the 23rd weakest remaining schedule with the White Sox their only remaining opponent with a record currently above .500 (the Blue Jays are sitting right at .500), but we've all seen how the Tigers perform against below-.500 teams.

Four teams have been officially eliminated from postseason contention so far, the Angels, Giants, Athletics, and Rockies. Everyone else has a magic number — or, for most of us, a tragic number.

The magic number is calculated as Games + 1 − Leader's wins − Chaser's losses and applies only to the division leader. It's also the chasing team's tragic number. When the magic number reaches zero, the contending team is in, no matter what. The opposite is true of the tragic number for trailing teams.

So, for example: Chicago's magic number to clinch the AL Central over the second-place Guardians is 16. To clinch a first-round bye over the third-place Astros, it's 17.

The Tigers' tragic number, or when they'll officially be eliminated, is 9.

Tigers' tragic number makes it clear their time is running very short

After they wrap up their current series against the Twins, the Tigers will move on to see the Rockies, Blue Jays, White Sox, Nationals, and Pirates. They've already seen the Blue Jays, Nationals, and Pirates this season and have losing records against all of them.

The Tigers technically still have more of a chance than the Royals, whose tragic number is 4, but Detroit's is still the fifth-lowest in the league. They're on life support, and they're playing like it.

On Tuesday night, they lost their second game against the Twins 3-2, after Drew Anderson gave up a go-ahead homer to Kody Clemens, who takes his revenge games against the Tigers very seriously. Detroit's offense couldn't muster up another run against Minnesota.

In all likelihood, the Tigers are going to finish out the season with their worst record since 2022 and will have been a below-.500 team since May 4 despite getting desperately close to that most mediocre of marks later in the season. And then it's back to the drawing board.

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