Well, it’s that time of year again—just as soon as the leaves start changing color and falling to the ground, so do teams start clinching their 2022 postseason positions.
In the American League, so far we have the Yankees, Guardians, and Astros clinching their respective divisions, with the Wild Card race coming down between the Blue Jays, Rays, and Mariners.
In the National League, the Dodgers have clinched the West, while the Cardinals have clinched the Central. In the East, both the Mets and the Braves have clinched a playoff berth, but it has yet to be determined which will take the division crown, with the other probably taking on the Padres in the Wild Card game if things were to end as they are.
Who Has Home-Field Advantage in the 2022 World Series?
Home-field advantage for the 2022 World Series has yet to be determined, but will be awarded to the league champion team that has the better regular-season win-loss record.
So far, the Dodgers have clinched the National League’s best record with a .688 winning percentage. The Astros have yet to clinch the American League’s best record, but are close to doing so. If that were to happen, and the Dodgers or the Astros made it to the world series, either of them would have home-field advantage if they weren’t facing each other.
Alternatively, if they were in fact facing each other, whoever had the better record at the end of the season would have home-field advantage. While that’s still to be determined, the Dodgers have four more wins than the Astros with 10 games left to play.
If you’re wondering how this played out in 2021, the Giants had 107 wins and the best record in baseball, giving them home-field advantage throughout the playoffs. They lost their series to the Dodgers, though, who had the second-best record in the majors, thus giving them home-field advantage for the rest of the playoffs.
The Dodgers would then lose to the Braves, who would advance to the World Series to face the Astros, who had the better record between the two, thus giving the Astros home-field advantage. With the first two games in Houston, the teams split, and the Braves took the next two out of three games in Atlanta, giving them a 3-2 series advantage. Heading back to Houston for the next two games, game 7 wasn’t even needed with the Braves winning game 6 and the championship.
