Chicago Cubs gain one important leg up on the Brewers

Despite what the standings show, the Chicago Cubs earned a crucial edge over the Milwaukee Brewers by picking up their third straight win in the series. That victory marked their seventh against Milwaukee this season, officially clinching the season series and giving them a potential tiebreaker advantage in the NL Central race.

Why is it important that the Chicago Cubs clinched the season series against the Milwaukee Brewers?

Unlike in 2018, when the Brewers and Cubs finished the regular season with identical records and had to play a Game 163 tiebreaker to determine the NL Central champion, Major League Baseball has since done away with tiebreaker games. Now, playoff seeding is decided by head-to-head records in the event of a tie.

That change has big implications in this year’s division race. With the Cubs officially clinching the season series against Milwaukee, they now hold the tiebreaker. So if both teams finish the regular season with the same record, it would be Chicago,  not Milwaukee,  that’s awarded the division title and a higher playoff seed.

Because of this, any lead the Brewers hold in the standings is a bit misleading. Following Wednesday’s loss, the standings showed Milwaukee up by six games, but with the tiebreaker in play, that lead is effectively just five. The Brewers will need to finish with a better record outright to avoid letting the Cubs steal the division via the tiebreaker.

Now that Chicago has the season tiebreaker, hopefully they can use their success against the Brewers to their advantage. If they can continue to play like they have against Milwaukee the rest of the way, there is a real possibility that the Cubs could make up ground in the division and perhaps still be crowned the champions.