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Well, the obvious answer is that the Dodgers aren’t that good, nor were the Twins. As an ex college player, I may have a little insight, but actually it’s common sense. All MLB teams play almost half their games in division. Three of the four teams the Dodgers played in division had losing records. The twins division was worse, I think three teams had average losses of 102 games each, the Dodgers division all four teams averaged about 90 losses each. Meanwhile the Cardinals were fighting a three-way battle with good teams. Their record is not as good because of that. The Nationals are in a division with only one team under .500. These super sports guys on TV never seem to figure this out, it isn’t hard, they just look at the total wins and declare them champions!

Good point. It is also worth remembering that most people, during preseason, were picking the Nats to win the NL East. No one anticipated that the Nats' bullpen would be as bad as it turned out to be. Heck, I didn't know it was possible for a bullpen to be that bad. Atlanta had a great season, but had the Nats had even average relief pitching, they would have edged out Atlanta. And then they lost Rendon, Turner and Zimmerman to early season injuries. The Nats' recovery from a 19-31 start was terrific, but this team had potential all along.

I don't know why it took the Nats so long to figure out the bullpen issues. The solution was obvious by mid-May. They needed to go into the 7th inning with an eight run lead to have a chance of hanging on to win by one or two. I don't know why Davey didn't figure that out a lot sooner. The trades at the deadline helped some, but the bullpen will still probably be their undoing.